Nvidia, Bitcoin and Big Tech Sell Off Weigh on Stocks

Markets opened lower on November 17, 2025 as investors digested a clearer signal from strategists and policymakers that the era of preemptive monetary easing may be over. Shares of high volatility growth names, led by Nvidia, fell alongside a renewed retreat in Bitcoin, a combination that weighed on the broad market and underscored fading risk appetite among speculative traders.

In the Treasury market the 10 year yield eased slightly to 4.13 percent from 4.14 percent late Friday, a marginal move that nevertheless reflected a tug of war between safe haven flows and lingering expectations for future rate relief. Overseas, major indexes in Europe and Asia registered modest declines as global markets tracked U.S. developments and the shifting calculus on Federal Reserve policy.

Barry Bannister, chief equity strategist at Stifel, argued that the Fed had altered its approach, and that rate cuts would come only as a reaction to a materially slowing economy rather than as a preemptive boost to markets. Bannister summed up the change in market dynamics with a blunt assessment, "Fed’s ‘free lunch’ is over." That view sits uneasily with investors who had earlier priced a higher probability of a third Fed cut this year at the December meeting.

The policy pivot has several immediate consequences for asset prices. Lower interest rates can support higher equity multiples by reducing discount rates and encouraging risk taking, but they can also increase inflationary pressures. With inflation stubbornly remaining above the Fed’s two percent target, officials have signaled concern that easing too quickly could reignite price pressures. At the same time the recent U.S. government shutdown delayed release of labor market updates and other economic indicators, prompting some Fed officials to prefer waiting in December to obtain clearer data before adjusting policy.

For equities the practical effect is a higher hurdle for growth companies whose valuations depend on low discount rates and optimistic future cash flow assumptions. Investors are recalibrating models to reflect a smaller probability of near term easing, and that has compressed multiples, particularly in technology and other long duration sectors. Risk assets such as Bitcoin, which had benefited from prolonged liquidity and dip buying, have shown heightened sensitivity to shifts in rate expectations and a renewed preference among investors for fundamental earnings over momentum.

Looking further out, the emerging consensus that policy will be reactive rather than preemptive could lengthen the period of elevated rates and increase volatility across both equity and credit markets. If inflation continues to run above target while growth slows, markets could face the difficult trade off of slower economic activity with persistent price pressures.

In the near term investors will watch for resumed economic releases that were delayed by the shutdown, incoming inflation data, and any signals from Fed speakers about the sequencing of policy. Those data points will determine whether the market’s reassessment of Fed timing proves temporary, or marks a durable shift in how monetary policy supports financial markets.