Welcome to Staten News — where the election rally got about one day to enjoy itself.
🩸 Nobody Showed Up to Buy
Thursday was the worst day for all three major averages since April 2025. The Dow fell 1,833 points, or 3.44%, to 51,523. The S&P 500 dropped 4.36% to 7,353.73. The Nasdaq Composite lost 5.52%, closed at 24,315, and landed in correction territory.
Read the next number twice. The Nasdaq shed $2.5 trillion in market value in one session, the biggest single-day loss in the index’s history, per Wall Street Journal figures cited by TheStreet.
Nvidia alone lost more than $440 billion. It fell 9.26% to $181.60 and is now down 2.6% on the year.
🗳️ The Ballot Hit the Buildout
Wall Street spent Wednesday cheering a Democratic sweep. By Thursday it had read the campaign literature. Democrats won House, Senate and governor races while running against data centers, and rising electricity bills gave them the argument.
Texas Governor-elect Gina Hinojosa says the state should stop building until protections are in place. Bernie Sanders called for a national moratorium on Wednesday. UBS estimates about 30% of the data center capacity expected in 2028 is at risk, per Reuters. President Trump posted that he still backs the AI buildout, which did nothing for the tape.
That’s not an earnings scare. That’s the market repricing who gets permission to build.
💥 The Damage Report
The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index fell 12.3%, its worst day since March 16, 2020. Here’s what the closing bell looked like:
Micron: down 17.46%
AMD: down 17.26%
Marvell: down 16.43%
Arm: down 13.08%
Broadcom: down 10.43%
Intel: down 10.33%
Tesla: down 10.77%
Apple fell only 1.5%. Amazon and Alphabet each lost a little over 2%. The market wasn’t dumping big tech so much as dumping anything whose story needs another few years of concrete and power hookups.
And somebody still had a great day. AppLovin ran 31.04%. Krispy Kreme ran 30.68%. Markets are weird.
📊 The 8:30 Number Has a Twist
We’re publishing this ahead of the October jobs report, due at 8:30 a.m. Eastern, so no guessing at the print here. The Dow Jones consensus is 59,000 jobs added, up from 29,000 in September, with unemployment holding at 4.2%. Yahoo’s calendar shows 65,000.
Here’s the twist. Traders see about a 70% chance the Fed hikes by a quarter point on December 9, per CME FedWatch via CNBC. That changes how to read this morning. A hot number usually means a healthy economy. Right now it could also mean a more expensive December.
Keep an eye on revisions too. The September report cut July and August by a combined 60,000 jobs, and July now sits at negative 10,000.
🧾 Where the Week Stands
Through Thursday, the Nasdaq was down about 4.4% for the week and the S&P 500 was down almost 3%. The Dow was off just 0.5%, which tells you how big Wednesday’s rally was.
Futures looked split as of 7:47 a.m. Nasdaq-100 futures were up 1.6%, S&P 500 futures were up 0.3%, and Dow futures were down 444 points. Nvidia was up 3% in premarket trading and Micron was up 9%.
Airbnb gave the bulls something real. It earned $3.16 a share against the $2.85 expected, on revenue of $4.87 billion against $4.75 billion, and jumped 11% after hours.
🔮 Our Call From Here
Because a 9% premarket bounce in Micron after a 17% drop isn’t a recovery. It’s math. Micron needs roughly 21% just to get back to Wednesday’s close, and nothing about the permitting fight gets settled by a good Friday open.
Our new call: the chip bounce fades before December 9 unless the Fed odds come down and at least one newly elected governor softens on data centers. Possible? Sure. Guaranteed? Not close. Companies with power already secured should hold up better than the ones still waiting on a hookup.
This is the week the AI trade stopped being only an earnings story and became a political one too. Next stop: December 9.
Sources: Fox Business market close, CNBC live updates, TheStreet Pro, BLS Employment Situation
This is not financial advice. Always do your own research.
— The Bandicoots 📉🗳️