Finance

Nasdaq hits record high as bonds flash warning signs in U.S. stocks

U.S. stocks kept hitting record levels despite a sharp rise in Treasury yields, driven by strong gains in AI megacaps such as Nvidia, Microsoft and Meta, an analysis said. CNBC’s Jim Cramer said a handful of heavily weighted stocks were distorting indexes and masking broader weakness from higher rates. He pointed to pressure on defensive and utility shares and said investors should watch the bond market more closely than stock indexes for direction.

AI & Enterprise

Microsoft unveils real-time transcription and speech synthesis models to support voice AI agent development

Microsoft has unveiled three voice AI models, including one real-time transcription model and two speech synthesis models. The streaming transcription model converts speech to text in real time and updates transcripts as users speak. It delivers an initial result in an average of 320 milliseconds, supports more than 60 languages and costs $0.54 per audio hour. The company also highlighted a cheaper non-streaming transcription model released last month.