AI Stocks Lift Wall Street as Microsoft Surges

Wall Street ended on a positive note Friday, driven by gains in AI-related technology stocks. Microsoft led the charge, up 3.7% after unveiling new capabilities in its Copilot app, including a coding tool and an always-on AI agent.

The software giant's 2026 gain now stands at 7%. Qualcomm and Dell also performed well, rising 4% and 5%, respectively. Akamai Technologies rallied 3.2% after striking an $11.6 billion cloud services deal with AI leader Anthropic, which includes a warrant that could grant the latter up to 5% of Akamai stock.

Despite the positive sentiment, concerns about high oil prices and rising US Treasury yields kept investors on edge. The yield on the benchmark US 10-year Treasury note reached a fresh 19-year high.