Markets Week-Ahead
📅 AI Stocks Week-Ahead — Sunday, November 1, 2026 at 5:00 PM
Prior week recap: SPX -0.6% · NDX -2.0% · DJI -0.9%
Three quiet up days gave way to a brutal Thursday–Friday, with Friday alone taking 1.8% off the S&P and 2.9% off the Nasdaq — the worst session since June. Alphabet, Amazon and Intel all showed real revenue growth and got sold anyway, because the capex line is now running faster than the cash coming in; Intel fell nearly 29% Friday on weak guidance, and roughly $5 trillion in AI market value came off the board.
Sunday futures: S&P +0.3% · Nasdaq +0.4% · Dow +0.2% (about 116 points)
Futures reopened firm but not enthusiastic. Over the weekend, OpenAI reportedly trimmed its raise target to roughly $20B from $30B at about a $1.25T valuation, with the first close coming in below target — the first visible repricing at the top of the private AI stack. Anthropic's IPO filing showed over $16B of first-half revenue and it's still aiming to list the week of November 16 at no less than $1.5T. Separately, WTI closed near $104 and Brent near $118 after tanker fires in the Strait of Hormuz and strikes on three Russian refineries — $100+ oil is now a live input to the inflation and margin conversation.
Earnings this week:
• Monday, November 2 — AAPL (FQ4, call 5:00 PM ET), PLTR (Q3, after the close)
• Tuesday, November 3 — AMD (after the close), SMCI (after the close)
• Wednesday, November 4 — ARM (after the close), QCOM (call 4:45 PM ET), UBER (morning), SHOP
• Thursday, November 5 — IONQ, SOUN, NET
Fifteen companies worth roughly $2.8 trillion in market cap report Monday through Friday, inside the busiest week of the season at over 1,200 names.
Economic calendar:
• Monday, November 2 — ISM Manufacturing PMI (consensus 54.5 vs. 54.5 prior): first read on whether the goods economy is holding up under $100 oil
• Tuesday, November 3 — JOLTS job openings: the labor-demand tell ahead of Friday's payrolls
• Wednesday, November 4 — ISM Services PMI (consensus 54.6 vs. 54.9 prior): services inflation is the piece the Fed cares most about
• Thursday, November 5 — Weekly jobless claims
• Friday, November 6 — October Employment Situation, 8:30 AM ET: the week's main macro event, and the number that sets the December cut odds
Fed events:
• Monday, November 2 — Goolsbee speaks: first post-meeting read from a voting dove
• Thursday, November 5 — Hammack and Barkin speak
• Friday, November 6 — Williams, Musalem and Bowman speak, all after payrolls — Williams is the one that moves the front end
Watchlist catalysts:
• AAPL — FQ4 earnings Monday, November 2 after the close; the holiday-quarter guide is the single biggest number of the week
• PLTR — Q3 earnings Monday, November 2 after the close; priced for perfection, so the reaction matters more than the print
• AMD — Q3 earnings Tuesday, November 3 after the close; the cleanest read on AI accelerator demand before Nvidia reports later this month
• SMCI — earnings Tuesday, November 3 after the close; a direct window into server/rack buildout velocity
• ARM — earnings Wednesday, November 4 after the close; royalty mix is the datacenter tell
• QCOM — FQ4 earnings Wednesday, November 4
• IONQ, SOUN, NET — all report Thursday, November 5; high-beta, low-float names most exposed to the AI funding-wall narrative
• NVDA, MU, MSFT, GOOGL, META, AMZN, AVGO, TSM, ASML, ORCL, CRM, ADBE, IBM, SNOW, MDB, CRWD, BBAI, TSLA — no earnings this week, but all carry sympathy risk to Monday's AAPL print and Tuesday's AMD print
• Anthropic / OpenAI — not publicly traded. Watch items only: Anthropic IPO targeted for the week of November 16 at ≥$1.5T; OpenAI's reduced round is the sentiment input for every listed AI name
• Macro overlay — U.S. midterm elections Tuesday, November 3. Historically the Dow has gained 2.8% across the eight trading days around midterms, and November is the Nasdaq's best month in midterm years at +3.5% average. Seasonality is a tailwind, not a thesis.