This report is from today's CNBC Daily Open, our international markets newsletter. CNBC Daily Open brings investors up to speed on everything they need to know, no matter where they are. Like what you see? You can subscribe here.

What you need to know today

End of year celebrations for markets
U.S. stocks ended the last trading day of 2024 on a negative note, but they finished the year higher. Asia-Pacific markets fell on Tuesday, which was a shortened trading day for many bourses. China's CSI 300 ended the year 15% higher, snapping its three-year losing streak, though its lost 1.6% on the day.

Bitcoin at $200,000 in 2024?
Bitcoin broke the $100,000 level in December 2024 after Donald Trump, largely seen as friendly to the cryptocurrency, won the U.S. elections. Industry executives and crypto investors see strong momentum for bitcoin, with several predicting that it will surge to $200,000 this year.

Nippon Steel offers U.S. veto power
The fate of Nippon Steel's planned acquisition of U.S. Steel rests with U.S. President Joe Biden, who has until Jan. 7 to decide. In an attempt to persuade Biden, Nippon Steel has offered to give the U.S. government veto power over any cuts to U.S. Steel's production capacity, reported Reuters, which cited a source familiar with the matter.

AI model price cut by Alibaba
Alibaba is slashing prices on its visual language model by up to 85%, the company announced Tuesday. The model, named Qwen-VL, is designed to understand both texts and images. Alibaba's move signals the growing competition between Chinese tech giants as they aim to gain market share for their artificial intelligence products.

[PRO] Top and bottom stocks of 2024
The Magnificent Seven basket of stocks have powered the S&P 500 forward for most of 2024. But only one of them achieved a podium finish in the three best-performing stocks of the year — and it didn't even win a gold medal. The three worst-performing stocks, surprisingly, included a market leader in tech.

The bottom line

A brilliant start, a saggy middle and then a flat thud — that was the trajectory of the S&P 500 last year.

The broad-based index blazed through the gates right from the start of 2024. In the first quarter of the year, it jumped up 10.2%. That's more than 10 times its average gain since 2000, noted CNBC's Robert Hum.

That momentum couldn't be sustained. The S&P added 3.9% and 5.5% in the second and third quarter, respectively, of 2024. In any other year, investors might not have been disappointed with those figures. But the index's first-quarter performance set the bar so high that subsequent quarters seemed to pale in comparison.

In the final quarter of 2024, the S&P limped forward just 1.9%. Making things worse, someone out there was naughty, preventing Santa from conducting his typical year-end rally in the stock market.

Of course, a gain is a gain. But it's hard not to feel disappointed when looking back at the high we started 2024 on, or when comparing it with the average fourth-quarter gain of 4.2% since 2000.

That said, a relatively weak end to the year wasn't enough to derail the ascent of the S&P in 2024. The index surged 23.31% in 2024 — notching 57 record closes along the way — following a 24.2% rise in 2023.

Artificial intelligence stocks were behind much of 2024's gains. Shares of Nvidia shot up 171%, while Broadcom, which one portfolio manager called "the next Nvidia in terms of outperformance potential," jumped 108%.

But uncertainties await the markets this year. Investors will have to contend with the incoming Trump administration's policies, possibly higher-than-expected interest rates for the year, which in turn are keeping Treasury yields elevated, among other headwinds.

The start of 2025 might be bumpy. Strap in.

— CNBC's Robert Hum, Jesse Pound, Gina Francolla and Samantha Subin contributed to this report.