CNBC Business News Update - Market Open: Stocks Lower, Oil Higher, Disappointing 4th Quarter Productivity Numbers 3/24/26

Episode Date: March 24, 2026

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I'm Jessica Eddinger, CNBC, Wall Street out of the gate, giving back some of yesterday's gains for the major averages as oil prices rise and optimism fades over a quick end to the U.S. assault on Iran. The Dow now down 388 points, 8 tenths of a percent. Salesforce shares. Leading it lower, they're down 4 percent this morning. The S&P 500 index, down 48. The NASDAQ down 197 points. That's almost 1%. Shares of Nvidia this morning down about a half a percent. We're not necessarily seeing true Broadbase selling. You know, obviously the SMP 500 being down roughly 6 percent to start the year isn't comfortable, but it's not down 20. And we're not necessarily seeing full oversold conditions where people would then be comfortable jumping back in.

Round Hills. Dave Mazza on CNBC. U.S. crude up 4 percent. To about $92 a barrel this morning, prices at the pump went up again overnight. AAA says the national average for a gallon of regular sitting at $3.98. 11 states now have gas at an average of $4 a gallon. That's a psychological milestone that consumers don't like. Americans are paying at least a dollar more per gallon on average than they were a month ago. When people go to the pump right now, the experience of the average person is the things that they spend the most money on. food, beef, up 18% year-to-date, and gas are much more expensive.

So what are they doing? At this point in time, they are increasingly dissaving to fund that, but not permanently changing their consumption. At some point, though, that has to happen. That's UBS is Ali McCartney on CNBC. Here's a take from Edward Jones, Mona Mahajan on CNBC. This oil shock does put upward pressure on inflation. It does take down.

economic growth somewhat given pressure on the consumer, pressure on the corporations potentially. But all that being said, we still see positive economic growth. We still see positive earnings growth. So disappointing productivity numbers. Non-farm productivity. This is our fourth corner final read. 1.8, but it follows 2.8. 1.8, the weakest productivity level going back to, looks like Q1 of 25, where 7.

3. CNBC's Rick Santelli. Investors are watching the private credit cracks widening. Moody's cutting its rating on a fund, which is run by KKR and Future Standard, down to junk as bad loans grow. People trying to get their money out of Apollo Global are getting only about half of their withdrawals, as that has now been gated. United Airlines removing more economy seats to make room for bigger premium cabin seating. United also trimming some of the its underperforming flights as a result of higher jet fuel prices. FedEx launching same-day delivery using a company called One Rail. It's a last-mile delivery firm. Rivals Amazon and Walmart trying to boost delivery speeds too. Amazon launching ultra-fast shipping of one to three hours. Of course, customers would pay for that. Gap has partnered with Google's Gemini AI agent and is allowing consumers to check out through the Gemini chatbot, the AI.

It's the first major fashion company to do that. Jessica Eddinger, CNBC. Money doesn't make the world go around. Information does. And CNBC is the great economic equalizer because we provide that information so you can make the decisions that are right for you.