Stock futures edged higher Sunday evening as Wall Street opened a week packed with Apple earnings, the midterm elections and $100 oil.
S&P 500 futures (ES=F), Nasdaq 100 futures (NQ=F), and Dow futures (YM=F) each opened with initial gains ranging from 0.2% to 0.4%.
The selloff that closed out October was brutal but narrow. The biggest AI and chip stocks have lost about $5 trillion in market value since Oct. 6, by Yahoo Finance calculations, while the other 625 large US stocks in that tally added about $1.3 trillion.
Last week drove it home. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) slipped about 0.6%, yet 9 of its 11 sectors rose about 1% or more. No other down week for the index since at least 1999 has had more than seven, by Yahoo Finance calculations.
What comes next is up for debate. One read of history says the tech meltdown could get a lot worse before it’s over. Another says the stock market’s sweetest stretch starts now: from the end of a midterm October through the following June, the S&P 500 has risen every time since 1950. Both could turn out to be true, since the October selloff showed the rest of the market can climb while tech sinks.
What’s next
Apple. Apple (AAPL) reports after the bell Monday, with iPhone 18 sales in the spotlight, as the world’s most valuable company again. It closed Friday worth about $5.03 trillion, ahead of Nvidia (NVDA) at about $4.93 trillion, and it’s the only “Magnificent Seven” stock beating the S&P 500 this year, up about 27% vs. about 11%. Palantir (PLTR) also reports Monday.
Oil. West Texas Intermediate crude (CL=F) opened lower Sunday after settling Friday above $104 a barrel, its highest close since mid-September. The Strait of Hormuz remains effectively shut in the ninth month of the Iran war, and OPEC+ held its December output targets steady on Sunday.
The midterms and jobs. Voters go to the polls Tuesday, and the October jobs report comes Friday, with Wall Street debating whether the Fed put is back. Here’s the full week ahead.
Internal AI tools helped analyze interview transcripts, research, and draft this post. Humans reviewed, edited, and fact-checked this post before publication.
Jared Blikre is the global markets and data editor for Yahoo Finance. Follow him on X at @SPYJared or email him at jaredblikre@yahooinc.com.
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