11:37 AM EDT, 09/18/2025 (MT Newswires) -- All three major US stock indexes were up in late-morning trading Thursday, a day after the Federal Reserve's Federal Open Market Committee lowered its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points and a day before President Donald Trump's phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

In company news, Nvidia (NVDA) said Thursday it will invest $5 billion in Intel ( INTC ) stock at $23.28 per share as part of a collaborative effort to develop custom data center and personal computing products. Under the terms of the deal, Intel ( INTC ) will build Nvidia's custom x86 CPUs for AI infrastructure platforms as well as new x86 system-on-chips that integrate with Nvidia's RTX GPU chiplets, the companies said. Nvidia shares were up 3.5% around midday, while Intel's ( INTC ) were up 28.1%.

The Federal Trade Commission said Thursday it and seven states have sued Live Nation Entertainment ( LYV ) and its Ticketmaster subsidiary for allegedly "tacitly coordinating with brokers and allowing them to harvest millions of dollars worth of tickets in the primary market." Live Nation and Ticketmaster then sell those tickets at a "substantial markup" in the secondary market, the FTC said. Live Nation shares were down 2.2%.

Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group ( SMFG ) is considering investing over 100 billion yen ($677 million) in Jefferies Financial Group ( JEF ) , which would increase the Japanese lender's stake in the US investment bank to about 20% from 15%, Bloomberg reported Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter. SMFG shares were up 0.5%, while those of Jefferies were up 4.2%.

Darden Restaurants ( DRI ) reported fiscal Q1 adjusted earnings Thursday of $1.97 per diluted share, up from $1.75 a year earlier but below the FactSet consensus analyst estimate of $2.00. Fiscal Q1 sales were $3.04 billion, up from $2.76 billion a year ago and in-line with the FactSet consensus estimate. For fiscal 2026, the restaurant conglomerate lifted its total sales growth projection to a range of 7.5% to 8.5% from 7% to 8% while reiterating its adjusted EPS outlook of $10.50 to $10.70. Darden shares were down 9%.

BlackRock (BX) and TPG (TPG) have restarted talks on acquiring Hologic ( HOLX ) , Bloomberg reported late Wednesday, citing people with knowledge of the matter. The investment firms have recently reconnected with Hologic's ( HOLX ) board to discuss a possible takeover, and they are currently conducting due diligence, according to the report. Blackstone and TPG shares were up 3.2% and 2.0%, respectively. Hologic ( HOLX ) shares were down 1.4%.

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