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Nov. 4, 2025, 10:15 PM EST / Updated Nov. 5, 2025, 3:40 AM ESTBy Mithil Aggarwal and Steve KopackHONG KONG — International markets plunged Wednesday as stocks across the Asia-Pacific region sold off on worries about the sky-high valuations of artificial intelligence and tech companies.The Kospi stock index in South Korea plunged more than 6% at its lowest point. Japan’s Nikkei 225 average slid about 4.5%, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index tumbled more than 1%. Stocks in Taiwan also fell around 2.5%.European markets also opened lower. Britain’s FTSE 100 index dropped over 0.25% and futures for Germany’s benchmark stock index showed a decline of 1.2%, while the major French index showed a drop of more than 0.5%.U.S. stock futures, an indication of where markets will open, showed that losses were likely to continue Wednesday after the opening bell rings in New York. S&P 500 futures pointed to a drop of 0.5%, and Nasdaq futures indicated a decline of about 1% on Wednesday.While Asian markets pared some of their losses from earlier in the day, the indices closed lower across the board, which economists said was an indicator of how reliant tech companies, even in Asia, are on the U.S.“There are some Asian economies — Taiwan the most, followed by South Korea — that are really dependent on U.S. tech companies,” said Alicia García-Herrero, chief economist for Asia-Pacific at Natixis in Hong Kong.“It’s about the export of chips and more generally the ecosystem,” she said. “It’s very correlated.”The selloff came after a day of significant selling in the United States that brought the recent global market rally to a halt. The S&P 500 closed Tuesday down 1.1%, the Nasdaq tumbled 2%, and the Russell 2000 fell 1.8%.The largest publicly traded company in the world, Nvidia, dropped nearly 4% on Tuesday. Palantir, another AI firm whose business involves government contracts, sank nearly 8% even after it beat Wall Street’s earnings expectations. “If you look at the graph for the whole index and how much that index has been contributed by AI stocks, you just can’t believe that’s sustainable,” García-Herrero said. Last week, the Kospi hit a record high, fueled by gains in AI stocks. Taiwan’s benchmark index, TWI, has gained 20% this year, driven in part by the 40% gain seen by TSMC, which supplies chips to Nvidia and other tech companies. But on Wednesday, the months-long rally came to a grinding halt after overvaluation warnings from Wall Street, resulting in a steep selloff, with shares of global electronics giant Samsung falling 5.5% and chipmaker SK Hynix dropping more than 6%. SoftBank, a major investor in AI firms, sank more than 14%, wiping out more than $30 billion in market value.Hot stock market fuels concerns about possible Wall Street bubble02:02Late Monday, the CEOs of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley warned that a possible market pullback may be on the horizon. Matters were made worse by lackluster earnings Tuesday afternoon from Advanced Micro Devices and Super Micro Computer, both of which manufacture chips used for AI services.Enthusiasm about artificial intelligence and the companies that produce AI services has been overflowing for months. Companies from Amazon to Microsoft to OpenAI have announced a steady stream of multibillion-dollar deals with one another, raising questions over the sustainability of the industry and its sources of funding.U.S. stocks are coming off a remarkable run, repeatedly setting recent record highs. For the year so far, the S&P 500 is still up more than 15%. The Nasdaq Composite, which more closely tracks the largest tech companies, has still gained more than 20% this year.Mithil Aggarwal reported from Hong Kong, and Steve Kopack reported from New York.Mithil AggarwalMithil Aggarwal is a Hong Kong-based reporter/producer for NBC News.Steve KopackSteve Kopack is a senior reporter at NBC News covering business and the economy.Jay Ganglani contributed.

International markets plunged Tuesday night, as stocks across the Asia-Pacific region sold off on worries about the sky-high values of AI and tech companies.

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Nov. 5, 2025, 4:27 AM ESTBy Daryna Mayer and Elmira AliievaKYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian troops have launched helicopter raids and counteroffensives to try and ease the pressure on a key eastern city, as the Kremlin seeks a crucial battlefield victory with the U.S. push for peace shelved.Street battles were being fought in Pokrovsk, a transport and supply hub whose capture could serve as a springboard for the Russian military to threaten bigger nearby cities. It would also hand Vladimir Putin new leverage at a delicate diplomatic moment, with the Russian leader set on capturing the entirety of the broader Donetsk region.Putin’s forces have been battling to take Pokrovsk for more than a year, but now appear on the verge of a breakthrough with the front lines in the city increasingly blurred.The Russian Defense Ministry said Wednesday that Ukrainian troops should surrender to save themselves, claiming they were “trapped” by Russian forces in the city, which was once home to some 60,000 people but is now largely deserted and destroyed. It said that Russian troops were advancing further northward into Pokrovsk, blocking multiple Ukrainian attempts to break out of encirclement. Ukraine has rejected the idea that its troops were encircled. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited troops Tuesday in nearby Dobropillia, where Ukrainian forces are staging a counteroffensive to try and draw Russia’s focus.Zelenskyy has insisted that Russian forces had not achieved “any success” in Pokrovsk in recent days.Ukraine Presidency / ZUMA Press via Shutterstock NBC News could not independently verify the battlefield accounts from either side. However, Ukrainian military officials and soldiers on the ground have conceded that the situation in Pokrovsk is increasingly challenging.“The situation is difficult,” Sgt. Liana Kononchuk of the Ukrainian unit operating in Pokrovsk, told NBC News via WhatsApp this week. “We are trying to control it. But, unfortunately, it has only been getting worse lately,” the 31-year-old said.“As of now there is no permanent line of defense as such,” she said. “The enemy seeps northwards by one, two, three units at a time, thereby trying to erode the frontline,” Kononchuk added. Her comments match the assessment of the Ukrainian open-source mapping project Deep State. Its latest map showed that Russian forces had pushed further into the city from the south but that most of the area remained a contested gray zone controlled by neither side.Ukraine has deployed additional resources in a bid to hold back the Russian assault, including a special forces operation using U.S.-made Black Hawk helicopters to restore supply routes, according to a spokesperson for the 7th Rapid Response Corps that is leading the defensive effort. A still taken from a video said by a Ukrainian military source to show a helicopter and troops deployed in the eastern city of Pokrovsk, Ukraine. Ukrainian Military source / via ReutersKononchuk hopes that these reinforcements will stabilize the situation. “The logistics situation is now very complicated. Rotating positions is hard, and evacuating the wounded is even harder,” she said. The Ukrainian commander overseeing defense of the city, Col. Yevhen Lasiichuk, said via WhatsApp on Monday that Moscow’s claims of an encirclement were false and part of Russia’s propaganda “game.”Lasiichuk said that there were between 200 and 300 Russian soldiers inside the city.“They are trying to push through the town to block key logistic points,” he added.Lasiichuk stressed that, although complicated, Ukraine was still able to reach its troops in Pokrovsk.“Our Defense Forces units have recently carried out airborne landings,” he said. “This certainly does not look like an encirclement.” The Russian Defense Ministry said Saturday that its troops had repelled a Ukrainian special forces landing and killed all 11 soldiers who arrived by helicopter.Influential Russian military bloggers have reported the heavy use of drones and smaller mobile units to disrupt Ukrainian defenses.While the exact situation on the ground remained unclear, military analysts said that losing Pokrovsk would be a bitter blow for Ukraine as it pushes for greater U.S. support.”The loss of Pokrovsk would make Ukrainian logistics on this front complicated, increase the risk of losing or retreating from nearby positions, and require a restructuring of the defensive lines,” Viktor Kevliuk, a retired Ukrainian colonel now working for the Kyiv-based Center for Defense Strategies, said in an interview.Pokrovsk would be Russia’s most important territorial gain since it took the eastern city of Avdiivka in early 2024. Its capture could cause a “domino effect,” but would still be a limited strategic gain unlikely to shift the overall balance of the war, Kevliuk said. People walk past a destroyed military vehicle Saturday in Kostiantynivka, in the Donetsk region.Yan Dobronosov / Global Images Ukraine via Getty ImagesOther experts said it could bolster Putin’s bargaining hand after Trump called off a planned summit and imposed new sanctions on Russia last month. “Moscow could also try to use any battlefield gains to pressure Ukraine at the negotiating table and persuade Trump to accept Russia’s terms,” Mykola Bielieskov, a research fellow at the National Institute for Strategic Studies, said in an interview. “Ukraine is in a difficult position. Politically, it is hard to withdraw from territory — especially when the enemy is trying to turn local military successes into broader strategic and diplomatic victories,” said Bielieskov, who is also a senior analyst at Come Back Alive, a Ukrainian nongovernmental organization. But, he said, in practical terms keeping hold of the area was now “extremely challenging.” Daryna Mayer reported from Kyiv, and Elmira Aliieva from London.Daryna MayerDaryna Mayer is an NBC News producer and reporter based in Kyiv, Ukraine.Elmira AliievaElmira Aliieva is an NBC News intern based in London.Artem Grudinin and Reuters contributed.

Ukrainian troops have launched helicopter raids and counteroffensives to try and ease the pressure on a key eastern city, as the Kremlin seeks a crucial battlefield victory with the U.S..

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Nov. 5, 2025, 1:36 AM ESTBy The Politics DeskWelcome to a special-post election edition of From the Politics Desk, a newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.Sign up to receive this newsletter in your inbox every weekday here.Democrats sweep the first major elections of 2025Democrats scored a series of victories across the country Tuesday on the first major Election Day of President Donald Trump’s second term. The NBC News Exit Poll found that voters in Virginia, New Jersey, New York City and California expressed broad dissatisfaction with Trump. Most voters in those elections were also sour on the direction of the country as they expressed worries about financial issues and the economy.Even though voters generally did not hold positive views of either party, Democratic campaigns were able to capitalize on other areas of concern, giving the party a desperately needed boost one year out from the midterms. Here are the most notable results from the night:Virginia: Democrat Abigail Spanberger defeated Republican Winsome Earle-Sears to flip control of the state’s governorship, setting her up to become the first woman to lead the state.Democrats found success across the board in Virginia. Jay Jones won the election for Virginia attorney general, overcoming a text message scandal that threatened to derail his candidacy in the final stretch of the race. State Sen. Ghazala Hashmi became the first Muslim American woman elected to statewide office in the U.S. with her victory in the lieutenant governor’s race. And the party expanded its majority in the state House of Delegates. New Jersey: Democrats won the other governor’s race of the evening, with Rep. Mikie Sherrill defeating Republican Jack Ciattarelli after a race she worked to make a referendum on Trump. New York City: Democrat Zohran Mamdani won the mayoral race, after the 34-year-old democratic socialist energized progressives around the country. In his victory speech after vanquishing former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Mamdani claimed a broad mandate and set himself up in direct opposition to Trump, who made a late endorsement against him. “In this moment of political darkness, New York will be the light,” Mamdani said.California: Voters approved a new congressional map drawn by state Democrats, giving the party the chance to gain up to five House seats next year and counter Republican redistricting efforts in other states.Pennsylvania: Voters approved the retention of three Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices, preserving Democrats’ 5-2 majority on the battleground state’s high court. The rest: Maine will soon become the 22nd state to have an “extreme risk protection” gun law, also known as a “red flag law” — part of a slew of state ballot measures voters around the country considered, on issues from raising taxes on higher earners to parental rights and voting rules.The GOP’s view: No one thought Tuesday was going to be Trump’s election night, but there were even fewer silver linings than many Republicans had hoped, Matt Dixon, Henry J. Gomez, Jonathan Allen and Garrett Haake report. Still, Republicans were brushing aside the off-year races as aberrations that aren’t predictive of the 2026 midterms. That’s all From the Politics Desk for now. Today’s newsletter was compiled by Adam Wollner.If you have feedback — likes or dislikes — email us at politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.comAnd if you’re a fan, please share with everyone and anyone. They can sign up here. The Politics Desk    

Democrats scored a series of victories across the country Tuesday on the first major Election Day of President Donald Trump’s second term.

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What’s next in the redistricting fight?

NBC News’ Jane Timm joins “Here’s the Scoop” to discuss California’s vote on Proposition 50 — and what it may mean for Democrats in the redistricting fight. Listen to “Here’s the Scoop”.

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