May 23 (Reuters) - Futures tracking the tech-heavy Nasdaq and the benchmark S&P 500 climbed on Thursday, driven by a rally in chip stocks after Nvidia's upbeat revenue forecast cemented investor optimism around the meteoric rise of artificial intelligence technology.
The AI chip leader's stock (NVDA.O), opens new tab jumped 7.2% in premarket trading, on track to open above the $1,000 mark for the first time ever and add about $165 billion in market value if gains hold.
"Nvidia's earnings supported our expectations that the AI rally has plenty of more room to run... We stay positive on the AI trend and maintain our preference for big tech given the advantageous market positions," said Mark Haefele, chief investment officer at UBS Global Wealth Management.
The semiconductor bellwether also announced a stock split, following an over 90% surge in its shares this year and a threefold jump in 2023 that have made Nvidia the third-most valuable U.S. stock.
The response to Nvidia's widely anticipated results contrasts the muted, range-bound trading on Wall Street in the days leading up to the release, underscoring the company's growing significance.
Its results boosted other chip stocks as well, with Advanced Micro Devices (AMD.O), opens new tab, Micron Technology (MU.O), opens new tab, Broadcom (AVGO.O), opens new tab and Arm Holdings advancing between 2.1% and 3.7%.
AI-related stocks such as Super Micro Computer (SMCI.O), opens new tab, C3.ai (AI.N), opens new tab, Palantir Technologies (PLTR.N), opens new tab and SoundHound AI (SOUN.O), opens new tab also gained between 1.5% and 5.3%.
Meanwhile, Wall Street's main indexes closed lower on Wednesday as investors digested minutes of the Federal Reserve's latest policy meeting. Rate-setters indicated they still had faith price pressures would ease at least slowly in coming months, but doubts emerged about whether the current level of interest rates was high enough to ensure that outcome.
Traders currently expect the U.S. central bank to reduce its interest rates by nearly 40 basis points by year-end.
Markets are also eyeing economic data scheduled through the day including weekly jobless claims, S&P Global flash PMIs and housing figures.
At 7:14 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 35 points, or 0.09%, S&P 500 e-minis were up 31.5 points, or 0.59%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 190 points, or 1.01%.
The CBOE Volatility Index (.VIX), opens new tab, also known as Wall Street's "fear gauge", hit its lowest levels since November 2019.
Among other premarket movers, data cloud analytics firm Snowflake (SNOW.N), opens new tab advanced 4% after forecasting second-quarter product revenue above estimates and raising its annual expectations.
DuPont (DD.N), opens new tab climbed 5% on the U.S. conglomerate's plans to split into three publicly traded companies.
U.S.-listed shares of Taiwanese contract chipmaker TSMC rose 2.4% after forecasting an annual revenue growth of 10% in the global semiconductor industry, excluding memory chips.
Shares of Ticketmaster owner Live Nation (LYV.N), opens new tab dropped 7% after a report that the U.S. Department of Justice could seek a break-up of the company to combat its domination of concert ticket sales.
Reporting by Ankika Biswas and Lisa Mattackal in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath
