The Wall Street Wrap: October 30, 2026

Stocks tumble as an AI-spending scare sends the Nasdaq to its worst day since June and Intel plunges 29%, while energy and staples rise on record Exxon and Chevron profits

Welcome to Wall Street Wrap, your quick end-of-day rundown of what moved US markets today, plus what's shaping global sentiment overnight.

MARKETS TODAY

US stocks fell sharply on Friday as an AI-spending scare hit chipmakers and megacap technology shares, sending the Nasdaq Composite to its worst day since June while defensive sectors and energy rose. The S&P 500 fell 1.82% to 7,580.07 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 2.86% to 25,436.999, while the Nasdaq 100 fell 3.46% to 28,384.845, the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 1.09% to 51,770.31, and the Russell 2000 fell 1.75% to 2,809.041. The VIX rose 13.14% to 19.46. Six of the 11 S&P 500 sectors rose, led by energy at 1.91% and consumer staples at 1.38%, while information technology fell 4.24%, industrials 1.57%, and communication services 1.11%. FedEx Freight rose 14.906% and Regeneron 13.327%, while Reddit fell 29.221% and Intel 28.576%. The 10-year Treasury yield eased to 4.929%, crude oil rose 0.91% to 102.930, and gold fell 3.51% to 3,880.19.

ANALYTICAL VIEW

The selling started with chips and spread to everything that depends on the AI buildout. Intel fell 28.576% for its worst day on record after a weak fourth-quarter forecast tied to a PC slowdown and soaring memory costs, and Qualcomm fell 11.121%, AMD 10.879%, and Nvidia 4.222%. Software and neocloud names followed, with Datadog down 11.499%, AppLovin 10.361%, Nebius 10.379%, and CoreWeave 9.664%. Amazon fell 1.411% and Alphabet another 1.402% in the wake of their results, and the damage was compounded by an analysis of company filings showing that five of the biggest US technology companies spent more on capital projects in the first nine months of the year than their operations generated. An equity analyst described a "sell first, ask questions later" mood, and the Nasdaq was left on course for its steepest monthly decline since March 2025, while the S&P 500 fell about 0.9% in October and the Dow rose about 1.7%.

Money moved elsewhere. Energy rose 1.91% as Exxon Mobil and Chevron hit record highs on record refining profits, consumer staples rose 1.38%, utilities 0.64%, and health care 0.43%, while Walmart, Coca-Cola, Merck, and Chevron led the Dow's gainers. The Employment Cost Index rose 0.8% in the third quarter, in line with forecasts, and an economist said labor costs were no longer a significant source of price pressure, but two Federal Reserve officials argued for more rate increases, and markets price roughly a 74% chance of a December hike with the 10-year Treasury yield at 4.929%. Crude rose 0.91% to 102.930 and Brent 1.43% to 112.387 on Houthi strikes on Saudi energy sites, while forced selling dragged gold down 3.51% to its lowest since October 2025 and silver down 5.67%, and a $6.3 billion hack at Binance pushed bitcoin to a six-week low.

What could change the picture: Whether the selloff in chips and megacap technology extends into November as Palantir, AMD, Apple, and Qualcomm report, whether Monday's ISM manufacturing PMI and the jobs report later in the week firm up the case for a December rate hike, and whether Tuesday's midterm elections and supply disruptions in the Middle East push oil and yields higher.

SECTOR PERFORMANCE

WINNERS & LOSERS

Top 5 Gainers (across S&P, Nasdaq, Dow):

• FedEx Freight Holding Company (NYSE:FDXF): +14.906%
• Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:REGN): +13.327%
• Global Payments Inc. (NYSE:GPN): +12.973%
• GoDaddy Inc. (NYSE:GDDY): +10.719%
• CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP): +7.214%

Top 5 Decliners:

• Reddit, Inc. (NYSE:RDDT): -29.221%
• Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC): -28.576%
• Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN): -18.641%
• Twilio Inc. (NYSE:TWLO): -15.242%
• Sandisk Corporation (NASDAQ:SNDK): -13.47%

Note: Regeneron surged after third-quarter earnings and revenue beat estimates on record sales of Dupixent, Eylea HD, and Libtayo, Reddit fell on weak fourth-quarter revenue guidance and concern that Google's AI search is cutting referral traffic, Intel fell on its weak fourth-quarter forecast, Illumina fell on a reported revenue miss, flat China sales, and weak research demand, Twilio fell after Thursday's results on concern about slowing organic growth, and Sandisk fell despite beating estimates and announcing a stock split. 

COMMODITIES & RATES

US TREASURY YIELDS

TOP STORIES: US

The Nasdaq suffers its worst day since June as an AI-spending scare spreads from Alphabet to chips. The Nasdaq Composite fell 2.86% and the Nasdaq 100 3.46%, leaving the Nasdaq about 9% below its recent high, while the S&P 500 fell 1.82% and the Dow lost 572 points as selling intensified in the afternoon on month-end positioning and ahead of Tuesday's midterm elections. AMD fell 10.879%, Qualcomm 11.121%, Arm 9.966%, and Nvidia 4.222%, and software and neocloud names such as Datadog, AppLovin, Nebius, and CoreWeave fell between 9.7% and 11.5%, with CoreWeave down more than 37% this month. Amazon fell 1.411% a day after reporting negative free cash flow and holding its 2026 capital spending forecast at about $220 billion, and Alphabet slipped another 1.402%. Money moved into defensive areas, with Walmart, Coca-Cola, Merck, and Chevron among the Dow's gainers, and an equity analyst described a "sell first, ask questions later" mood.

Intel plunges 29% for its worst day on record after a weak forecast. The shares fell 29%, a day after the company guided fourth-quarter revenue more than $1 billion below estimates and said it does not expect positive cash flow this year, citing a PC slowdown and soaring memory prices. The stock had more than doubled this year before the drop, the cost of insuring Intel's debt against default surged to a record, and the US government, which owns about 10% of the company, faced a steep hit to the value of its stake. The rout spread through the industry, with Dell down 10.77% and Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Super Micro Computer down between 6% and 11%, and one analyst said the selloff reflected "a loss of faith in management's credibility."

Reddit sinks 29% on its worst day since going public as Google's AI hits traffic. The shares fell 29.221% to $91.73, their lowest in more than a year and well beyond the previous record one-day drop of 20.99% on July 31, after the company forecast fourth-quarter revenue of $1.00 billion to $1.03 billion against the $1.05 billion expected, even though third-quarter sales rose 53% and beat estimates. Reddit warned that daily active unique visitors could fall by a low double-digit percentage in the fourth quarter if referral traffic keeps declining, and Chief Executive Steve Huffman said search referral traffic from Google went "down meaningfully in this quarter" because of AI. The company plans to test requiring logins outside the US, at least 11 brokerages cut their price targets, and one analyst said "search changes highlight the problem with selling content to Google."

Exxon and Chevron hit record highs as refining profits soar. Chevron rose 1.754% to $235.52 and Exxon about 2.2% after third-quarter results beat estimates, with Exxon's profit doubling to $15.4 billion, or $4.23 a share adjusted, on revenue of $113.2 billion, and Chevron's net income rising nearly 200% to $9.9 billion, or $5.28 a share adjusted, on revenue of $67.8 billion. Refining drove the beat, as Exxon's refining earnings of about $7.2 billion outpaced its production business's $7.1 billion for the first time in at least six years, and Chevron's refining profit rose more than 300% to $4.9 billion with US refineries running at 98% of capacity. US diesel averaged $6.32 a gallon, up more than 70% from a year ago. Exxon raised its quarterly dividend by 4 cents and set a $20 billion buyback for 2027, while both companies are using the windfall mainly to pay down debt.

US labor costs rise 0.8% as wage growth cools. The Employment Cost Index rose 0.8% in the third quarter, matching forecasts after 0.9% in the second quarter, and 3.4% over 12 months, the same pace as in the year through June. Wages and salaries rose 0.7% in the quarter and 3.1% over the year, while benefits rose 0.9% and health benefits 6.4% over 12 months, and inflation-adjusted wages fell 0.6% over the year after a 0.3% drop in the year through June. An economist at a Canadian bank said "labor-cost inflation continues to move in the right direction." The Chicago PMI fell to 55.3 against 56 expected and 58.8 in September.

Also today: Sandisk fell 13.47% to $1,150.89 despite beating fiscal first-quarter estimates with adjusted earnings of $49.51 a share against $46.67 expected, as it announced an eight-for-one forward stock split and investors worried that memory pricing may be peaking; Regeneron rose 13.327% to a 52-week high of $927.89 after third-quarter adjusted earnings of $20.07 a share beat estimates of roughly $16.25 to $16.42 and revenue rose 36% to $5.12 billion; Illumina fell 18.641% to $235.99 after a revenue miss and flat China sales, even though adjusted earnings of $1.44 a share beat the $1.36 expected; Veralto rose 6.765% to a 52-week high of $111.10 after adjusted earnings of $1.18 a share beat the $1.09 expected and it raised its full-year adjusted earnings guidance to $4.49 to $4.52; Pinterest fell after missing third-quarter revenue and profit estimates and guiding holiday-quarter revenue below estimates; five of the biggest US technology companies returned 9.3% of their operating cash flow to shareholders in the first nine months of 2026, down from 27.4% a year earlier, as capital spending of $556.9 billion exceeded operating cash flow of $542.9 billion for the first time in data back to 2011; the Financial Times reported that Blackstone told investors Anthropic's debt may receive a "high" junk rating after its planned IPO; gold fell 3.51% to $3,880.19, its lowest since October 2025, and silver fell 5.67% as forced selling and December rate-hike bets weighed.

TOP STORIES: GLOBAL

The chip rout spreads across Asia and Europe. South Korea's Kospi fell 3.48% and the Kosdaq 3.83% on chip-sector worries, Samsung Electronics lost about 3% and was set for its first monthly decline since July, and Taiwan's TSMC fell nearly 2%, while China's tech-heavy STAR50 index hit a more than two-month low. In Europe, ASML fell more than 6%, and concern extended to consumer-device makers such as Sony and Samsung, whose PC and phone demand is being squeezed by soaring memory prices.

The Bank of Japan holds at 1.25% and says underlying inflation is now on target. The central bank left its policy rate at its highest level since 1995 in an 8 to 1 vote, with board member Hajime Takata dissenting in favor of a hike to 1.5%, and said for the first time since adopting the target in 2013 that underlying inflation is "generally consistent" with 2%. It raised its inflation forecast for fiscal 2027 to 2.6% from 2.4% and flagged a risk of upward deviation as firms shift toward raising wages and prices. A State Street economist called it a "hawkish hold," and all 16 economists in a survey expect the bank to set the stage for a hike in December or January, with 13 seeing a terminal rate of 1.75% to 2% by mid-2027.

Euro zone growth slows to 0.4% but beats forecasts. Eurostat's flash estimate showed third-quarter growth of 0.4%, down from 0.6% in the second quarter but above the 0.2% economists expected. France unexpectedly contracted 0.1% amid soaring borrowing costs and cost-of-living unrest, Germany grew 0.2%, Italy was flat, Spain grew 0.6%, and Ireland, whose figures are volatile, grew 5.5%. An analyst said the bloc is "showing unexpected resilience," a day after the European Central Bank held rates and said downside risks to growth had increased.

Hackers steal $6.3 billion from Binance in the largest crypto theft on record. Analysts blamed North Korea for the theft, most of which unfolded in about 20 minutes late on Thursday, and said the attackers manipulated a system used to approve transactions to empty a hot wallet. Binance halted withdrawals, said customer funds were safe, set aside about $6.34 billion of company funds to cover the losses, and expects to resume withdrawals within 48 hours, while Tether froze about $1.57 billion and Circle more than $800 million of the stolen assets. Bitcoin fell to a six-week low of $76,368 and ether to a two-month low of $2,178 before stabilizing, and Binance's BNB token fell 6.74%. Analysts at a blockchain firm said it was "almost certainly the single largest known theft of any kind."

MANAGEMENT & FED SPEAK

Lorie Logan, President, Dallas Federal Reserve, on the rate outlook:

Logan said the rate-setting committee "needs to implement at least two more 25-basis-point rate increases," after which it would make sense to pause and assess the economy. She sees the policy rate as at least half a percentage point too low, and said adjusting more gradually can help households and businesses adapt, while arguing the Fed should make its policy destination clear, in contrast to Chairman Kevin Warsh's reluctance to offer guidance.

Alberto Musalem, President, St. Louis Federal Reserve, on tightening:

Musalem said "additional firming of monetary policy will be necessary, and soon," arguing that moving sooner in smaller steps has a better chance of succeeding without hurting the labor market while inflation expectations are anchored. He said inflation remains too high with upside risks and is unlikely to ease without Fed action. He does not vote this year but will in 2027.

Darren Woods, Chief Executive Officer, Exxon Mobil, on refining:

Woods said "diesel is the key crunch point here" because demand is inelastic and critical to economic growth, calling refining capacity very tight. Exxon's Gulf Coast refineries ran at 100% utilization and produced record diesel volumes, and refinery investments will add another 100,000 barrels per day of US distillate production, with more expansion being explored.

Mike Wirth, Chief Executive Officer, Chevron, on market stress:

Wirth said "The system is under stress," describing an environment that remains fairly fragile. Chevron's US refineries processed a record of just above 1 million barrels per day, with diesel and jet fuel yields up more than 10%, and Vice Chairman Mark Nelson said refining "margins will stay a bit elevated, maybe into next year."

CORPORATE ACTIONS & EARNINGS CALENDAR

Top Ex-Dividend Companies for Monday, November 2:

Upcoming Earnings (Monday, November 2):

Macro Data Recap (Week of October 26):

Economic Calendar (Monday, November 2):

That's the wrap for today! Attention turns to Monday's ISM Manufacturing PMI, results from Palantir, Marriott, Realty Income, and Entergy, Tuesday's US midterm elections, and whether the AI-spending selloff in chips and megacap technology extends into November.