The Trump administration has floated a plan to trim about $6 billion from the budget of NASA, while allocating $1 billion of remaining funds to Mars-focused initiatives, aligning with an ambition long held by Elon Musk and his rocket maker SpaceX.
A copy of the discretionary budget posted to the NASA website on Friday said that the change focuses NASA’s funding on “beating China back to the Moon and on putting the first human on Mars.”
NASA also said it will need to “streamline” its workforce, information technology services, NASA Center operations, facility maintenance, and construction and environmental compliance activities, and terminate multiple “unaffordable” missions, while reducing scientific missions for the sake of “fiscal responsibility.”
Janet Petro, NASA’s acting administrator, said in an agency-wide email on Friday that the proposed lean budget, which would cut about 25% of the space agency’s funding, “reflects the administration’s support for our mission and sets the stage for our next great achievements.”
Petro urged NASA employees to “persevere, stay resilient, and lean into the discipline it takes to do things that have never been done before — especially in a constrained environment,” according to the memo, which was obtained by CNBC. She acknowledged the budget would “require tough choices,” and that some of NASA’s “activities will wind down.”
The document on NASA’s website said it’s allocating more than $7 billion for moon exploration and “introducing $1 billion in new investments for Mars-focused programs.”
SpaceX, which is already among the largest NASA and Department of Defense contractors, has long sought to launch a manned mission to Mars. The company says on its website that its massive Starship rocket is designed to “carry both crew and cargo to Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars and beyond.”
Musk, who is the founder and CEO of SpaceX, has a central role in President Donald Trump’s administration, leading an effort to slash the size, spending and capacity of the federal government, and influencing regulatory changes through the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Musk, who frequently makes aggressive and incorrect projections for his companies, said in 2020 that he was “highly confident” that SpaceX would land humans on Mars by 2026.
Petro highlighted in her memo that under the discretionary budget, NASA would retire the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket, the Orion spacecraft and Gateway programs.
It would also put an end to its green aviation spending and to its Mars Sample Return (MSR) Program, which sought to use rockets and robotic systems to “collect and send samples of Martian rocks, soils and atmosphere back to Earth for detailed chemical and physical analysis,” according to a website for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Some of the biggest reductions at NASA, should the budget get approved, would hit the space agency’s space science, Earth science and mission support divisions.
Petro didn’t name any specific aerospace and defense contractors in her agency-wide email. However SpaceX, ULA and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin are positioned to continue to conduct launches in the absence of the SLS. Boeing is currently the prime contractor leading the SLS program.
“This is far from the first time NASA has been asked to adapt, and your ability to deliver, even under pressure, is what sets NASA apart,” she wrote.
President Trump’s nominee to lead NASA, tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, still has to be approved by the U.S. Senate. His nomination was advanced out of the Senate Commerce Committee on Wednesday.
Oracle shares snapped a seven-day win streak and notched their worst day since January, as the company’s earnings left traders questioning the company’s AI investments.
But as AI stocks faltered, investors put money to work in more cyclical names like financial institutions and insurance providers.
This morning, shares of Broadcom are down nearly 6% before the bell despite the company beating expectations on both lines yesterday.
The semiconductor company told investors that it expects its current-quarter AI chip sales to double from a year ago. It also revealed that its mystery $10 billion customer was Anthropic.
Hundreds of miles from Wall Street, President Donald Trump last night signed an executive order establishing a single national regulation standard for AI that curbs states’ regulatory power.
A customer shops in a Lululemon store on April 03, 2025 in Miami Beach, Florida.
Joe Raedle | Getty Images
Another day, another CEO departure: Lululemon announced yesterday that CEO Calvin McDonald will step down at the end of January. He will be replaced in the interim by two executives while the Canadian retailer searches for a permanent successor.
Lululemon reported better-than-expected earnings for the third quarter, but, as CNBC’s Gabrielle Fonrouge notes, the company has been underperforming for more than a year. Shares of the athleisure retailer are up more than 9% this morning.
Costco also surpassed Wall Street’s forecasts for its first quarter, boosted in part by e-commerce growth. The warehouse club said Black Friday was a record-breaking day for its digital business.
3. Wish upon a bot
Disney CEO Bob Iger and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman appearing on CNBC on Dec. 11th, 2025.
CNBC
Mickey Mouse, meet ChatGPT. Disney announced a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI yesterday. Under the agreement, users on OpenAI’s Sora video platform will be able to make content that features the entertainment giant’s copyrighted material — including more than 200 characters across the Disney universe.
Disney CEO Bob Iger told CNBC that the deal gives the company “a way in” to AI and will help it further reach younger consumers. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said there will be limits on how Disney characters can be used in Sora videos.
Yesterday also marked OpenAI’s 10th anniversary. CNBC’s MacKenzie Sigalos takes you through the company’s transformation from a small, nonprofit research lab to the booming business it is today.
Get Morning Squawk directly in your inbox
4. Tanking plans
A satellite image shows the very large crude carrier (VLCC) Skipper, which British maritime risk management group Vanguard said was believed to have been seized on December 10, as well as another vessel, off Port Jose, Venezuela, November 18, 2025.
Planet Labs | Reuters
After the U.S. seized a tanker off Venezuela’s coast, a White House official told CNBC yesterday that Trump is willing to do it again. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt also said that the tanker will be taken to a U.S. port where the oil it carried will be seized.
CNBC’s Lori Ann LaRocco found that the tanker in question, identified as the “Skipper,” had hid its location on multiple occasions since last year. Data suggests it has carried sanctioned oil from Iran and Venezuela since 2022.
Data shows 22% of consumers listed high fiber content as a top-three factor when shopping, compared with 17% four years ago. On social media, the kids are calling it “fibermaxxing.”
As a result, companies such as Coca-Cola and Nestlé are rolling out fiber-focused drinks, CNBC’s Laya Neelakandan reports. PepsiCo also told CNBC that it’s planning to launch high-fiber versions of Smartfood and SunChips next year.
The Daily Dividend
Here are some stories we’d recommend making time for this weekend:
— CNBC’s Sean Conlon, Jordan Novet, Tasmin Lockwood, Jennifer Elias, Kif Leswing, MacKenzie Sigalos, Gabrielle Fonrouge, Melissa Repko, Ashley Capoot, Kevin Breuninger, Spencer Kimball, Lori Ann LaRocco, Justin Papp, Eamon Javers andLaya Neelakandancontributed to this report. Josephine Rozzelle edited this edition.
U.S. artificial intelligence names were in negative territory in premarket trading on Friday, extending losses into their third day.
Oracle was 0.9% lower in premarket trading, paring earlier losses which saw it fall 1.3%. Nvidia shed 0.7%, Micron fell 0.9%, and CoreWeave was down 1.3% at 5:16 a.m. ET.
The share price of cloud computing and database software maker Oracle plummeted on Thursday, ending the session around 11% lighter after revenue earnings missed analyst expectations on Wednesday.
It dragged other AI-related names down with it despite a record-breaking rally elsewhere on Wall Street, suggesting investors are rotating out of tech into other parts of the market.
Despite booming demand for Oracle’s artificial intelligence infrastructure, it posted mixed results this week. Revenue came in at $16.06 billion, compared with $16.21 billion expected by analysts, according to data compiled by LSEG.
It followed widespread speculation around the long-term health of the company, with investors cautious about its reliance on debt to execute its AI infrastructure build-out. The broader industry’s circular dealmaking has also raised eyebrows.
“We think recent investor scrutiny on artificial intelligence’s potential and circular GPU deals can be overly punitive to key AI suppliers like Oracle,” said Morningstar Equity Analyst Luke Yang. “Oracle remains a respectable cloud provider that enjoys strong switching costs across its database, application, and infrastructure lineup.”
That said, the firm reduced its fair value estimate for wide-moat Oracle to $286 per share, down from $340. Morningstar’s moat rating refers to its assessment of a company’s durable competitive advantage.
“We lowered our long-term earnings outlook as delivering Oracle’s planned capacity on time now proved to be a harder task. However, we continue to view shares as undervalued,” Yang added.
Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on Dec. 11, 2025, in New York City.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images
The S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced on Thursday, with both hitting fresh closing records. The Russell 2000 index also ended the session at a new high, following the U.S. Federal Reserve’s quarter-point cut on Wednesday.
But if investors analyze Thursday’s individual stock movements, they will see not all is well with the AI play yet. Oracle shares plunged nearly 11%, a day after it reported weak quarterly revenue, higher capital expenditure and long-term lease commitments. Oracle’s slide dragged down AI-related names such as Nvidia and Micron.
In extended trading, Broadcom shares fell 4.5%. The chipmaker beat Wall Street’s expectations for earnings and revenue, but CEO Hock Tan appeared to have failed to address worries that their largest customer, Google, might eventually make more of its chips in-house. Rising memory prices would also pressure margins, while the company’s chip deal with OpenAI might not be binding.
That’s why the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite fell 0.26% despite other major U.S. indexes hitting records. Putting the two together, that means investors are rotating out of tech into other parts of the market. The S&P 500 financials sector, for instance, closed at a fresh record, buoyed by jumps in Visa and Mastercard.
Even though the AI theme seems to be under scrutiny, other sectors are performing well on the back of a resilient U.S. economy — as signaled by Fed officials on Wednesday — and buoyed by interest-rate cut. So long as nothing throws a spanner in the works, looks like we’re all set for a happy holiday season.
— CNBC’s Kristina Partsinevelos contributed to this report.
Disney to invest $1 billion in OpenAI. The media giant will also allow Sora, OpenAI’s video generator, to use its copyrighted characters, under a $1 billion licensing agreement. “We think this is a good investment for the company,” Disney CEO Bob Iger told CNBC.
Reddit launches legal challenge in Australia. The county introduced a ban on social media for teens under 16, which came into effect on Wednesday. Reddit argues that the law is “invalid on the basis of the implied freedom of political communication.”
[PRO] Where will Oracle go from here? Analysts are re-looking their price targets for Oracle stock after the firm released a disappointing and confusing earnings report on Wednesday.
And finally…
Gen. David Petraeus, Former CIA Director, Fmr. Central Commander and American commander in Iraq.
White House’s new national security strategy gave Europe a scare last week as it warned the region faced “civilizational erasure” and questioned whether it could remain a geopolitical partner for America.
The strategy was, “in a way, going after the Europeans but, frankly, some of the Europeans needed to be gotten after because I watched as four different presidents tried to exhort the Europeans to do more for their own defense and now that’s actually happening,” David Petraeus, former CIA director and four-star U.S. Army general, told CNBC’s Dan Murphy in Abu Dhabi on Thursday.