Stock market today: Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq tumble as oil climbs, investors weigh Tesla, Meta earnings

Chip bulls sprang a bear trap on Tuesday. Two sessions later, they’re the ones getting caught.

The iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) is down about 4% premarket, below Tuesday’s intraday low of $489.70. That was the floor of the bear trap — a breakdown that quickly reverses, catching traders betting on further losses. SOXX is on track for its lowest close since July 29.

Lam Research (LRCX) is leading the slide, down about 9% after its results Wednesday night. Applied Materials (AMAT) and KLA (KLAC) are off about 6%, and AMD (AMD), Intel (INTC), and Sandisk (SNDK) are down 4% to 5%. Nvidia (NVDA) is off a milder 2%.

SOXX is on track to flip direction for a fifth straight session, and the Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) for a seventh.

Dip buyers keep showing up anyway. Semiconductor ETFs saw record flows over the past week, Bloomberg senior ETF analyst Eric Balchunas posted Thursday. “Buying the dip here has [a] pretty good record of working,” he wrote.

There’s little room to hide. “Every index on the planet is basically an AI index,” Manulife John Hancock Investments co-chief investment strategist Matt Miskin said on Yahoo Finance’s live show Thursday.

Watch whether buyers come in yet again this session. A close above $490, roughly Tuesday’s trap low, keeps the bulls’ hopes alive — barely.