Financial Recap - Week of October 5-9, 2026

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Overall, the market was pretty positive. The S&P 500 was up 1.15%, the Nasdaq was up 0.64%, and the Dow was up 0.93%. Small-cap companies were down, with the Russell 2000 falling 0.92%.

AI Scrutiny and OpenAI’s Revenue

AI scrutiny shook expectations a bit for AI-related hardware manufacturers.

OpenAI reportedly reached around $50 billion in annualized revenue in September, while the company is still targeting around $70 billion by the end of the year. Very naturally, everybody started asking questions about whether the demand is really there.

Google, Constellation, and Vistra’s Nuclear Energy Deals

Google and Constellation’s agreement, along with Vistra’s DOE (Department of Energy) financing, pushed energy stocks higher than expected.

The Google arrangement covers 3,590 MW overall, including 890 MW of additional nuclear capacity. Vistra’s agreement with the DOE involves a conditional loan commitment of up to $4.2 billion and envisages 433 MW of additional nuclear capacity.

I am generally super optimistic about energy companies and bullish. Demand for electricity is going to rise at a much faster rate than we can develop new power plants.

I am also biased since I work in energy, and I know how long it takes to develop large plants.

Even if AI becomes much more efficient, imagine how much more electricity we will need when all cars become electric, we start to have robots, drones start to play a huge role, and etc.

SpaceX Entering the Telecommunications Market

Big news was SpaceX actually looking into expanding its ground-based connectivity capabilities. The company announced an agreement to purchase wireless spectrum, which could also create demand for connectivity tower capacity on the ground.

Tower provider stocks rose, but that also meant major telecommunications companies such as AT&T, Verizon, and others saw their stocks drop.

Very interesting approach. Also, a big question is how much power Elon is going to have over space.

If he starts to buy major capacity in ground-based networks and pairs it up with Starlink. He could completely crash these companies just because none of them have rockets to send satellites into space.

Apple Cutting iPhone Orders

Apple has also reportedly decreased component orders for the iPhone 18 Pro models by at least 15% compared to what was originally expected. Looks like demand for the iPhone 18 Pro is not quite there.

I think Apple creates great products, the best, but they have to learn a lot from Xiaomi when it comes to expanding into different categories. They are really slow.

Xiaomi has cars, some of the best AI models, high-quality phones, fridges, you name them.

Apple has the best shot at this super connectivity due to its core model. They need to widen their categories.

Phones are great, but to be honest, if they stop shipping updates that slow down your phone, those phones would last me 10 years.

The difference between my iPhone and the current one is three years, but literally, I feel no urge to buy a new iPhone. I decided to use it until it just completely shuts off.

Economic Outlook

Economically, yields have dropped a bit over the week, but there is still pressure on inflation.

Let’s see what happens next week when September inflation numbers are published.

If inflation is high, then we could see interest rate hikes by the end of the year. Let’s see what happens.

Top Gainers

Crown Castle (CCI) | +19.87%

Crown Castle had massive gains. Their stock gained 19.87% last week.

What do they actually do?

They are one of the largest owners of telecommunications towers in the USA, with approximately 40,000 towers.

Shortly, They are a real estate company. They own these towers and rent space to telecommunications companies such as Verizon and AT&T.

Instead of big telecomuncation companies starting to build their own towers, they just rent space from Crown Castle, attach their antennas and equipment, and make use of it.

SpaceX announced that it would expand its wireless network capabilities, which could mean more demand for ground-based infrastructure, so it sent the stock higher.

But there is a legitimate question. When a player such as SpaceX comes in with satellite capacity, will there be a need for as many telecommunications towers?

Overall, not a big fan of the company. High debt, and if there is less demand for towers, their balance sheet will get hit.

PTC Inc. (PTC) | +35.01%

PTC was one of the biggest movers, gaining around 35%, because Schneider Electric announced an agreement to acquire it.

PTC is a software company that helps manufacturers design, develop, manage, and maintain complex physical products such as cars, aircraft, medical devices, and industrial equipment.

Very legit customer base. Also, design software is kind of addictive. Once you hook people on it and they get used to it, they usually struggle to switch, even if there is a better product on the market. Like Adobe-style software.

Overall, a healthy company. Now, not only software, but potentially directly involved with manufacturing through Schneider if the acquisition goes through.

I don’t want to write a lot here. An absolutely stupid decision right now to acquire any kind of software company. You guys can be the judges.

Moderna (MRNA) | +18.41%

Moderna’s stock went 18.41% higher. They entered the Nasdaq-100 and also reported progress in their cancer vaccine initiative.

I don’t think I need to introduce this company or what they do. Just a couple of years ago, many of us were vaccinated with their COVID vaccine.

Financially, they are not the best company, currently losing money. But that’s typical of the industry. You have these massive upfront costs to develop treatments. If you succeed, then you cash out really nicely. If you don’t, then you just keep researching.

I have mixed feelings.

I would be happy if they had this really huge breakthrough in diseases such as cancer and other terrible diseases that people just suffer from. Imagine if we could use vaccines to treat these diseases.

But at the same time, if their revenues don’t grow massively, I won’t be that sad since they mainly specialize in vaccines. Their financial growth is a lot of times linked with pandemics, which is not nice.

Top Losers

Intel (INTC) | -12.26%

Intel lost around 12.26% last week after Musk announced that TSMC might participate in his Terafab project.

Terafab is Elon’s another crazy venture to step into chip manufacturing.

If you had asked me 10 years ago, I would have told you to stay invested in Intel, but they have had such a drastic downfall.

They were absolute leaders in chip manufacturing, but from 2016, it just went south.

They had massive delays in manufacturing, AMD and TSMC advanced a lot, and they lost Apple as a customer.

They failed to capitalize on the AI boom.

Financially, very scary as well. Around $50 billion in total debt, and operating income does not look that great.

Very hard to call what will happen. They can still turn around due to the serious demand in the sector they operate in.

They have started to lose slightly less money, but they are still losing money.

Mosaic (MOS) | -11.06%

Mosaic is one of the major global producers of phosphate and potash fertilizers. Very important fertilizers, but the company is in trouble and losing money.

Phosphate fertilizers require sulfuric acid in production, and sulfur prices have skyrocketed so much that it makes very little economic sense to manufacture certain phosphate fertilizers anymore.

Also, demand for sulfur from battery-related industries is increasing.

The company also has high debt.

Honestly, if it goes on like this, I worry about the risk of insolvency in the longer term. With this type of trend, it is very difficult to sustain the business.

Deere & Company (DE) | -9.62%

Deere dropped 9.62%.

Deere is aka the John Deere company we all know. Agriculture-related, they sell agricultural equipment such as tractors and etc.

The drop came as crop production forecasts were better than expected, pushing crop prices down. Confidence in farmers being able to afford tractors dropped, and operating costs for tractors have also increased due to fuel prices.

There was also regulatory scrutiny over competition in the agricultural equipment market.

But I see big potential for Deere if they try to utilize AI as much as possible.

You can have automated vehicles, better crop harvesting predictions, and etc.

They are global players. They hold a strong market position in the USA, a good part of Europe, and Brazil. They are known for quality.

Financially, they look good. They have huge debt, but most of the debt is from financial services.

Meaning, when someone wants to buy a tractor, they finance it. Most of that debt is backed by payments from customers.

They just have to be careful not to over-lend, like we did with mortgages in 2008.

Overall, still a strong company.

Things to Watch Out For Next Week

October 13, 2026

• JPMorgan Chase earnings
• Goldman Sachs earnings
• Citigroup earnings
• Wells Fargo earnings

October 14, 2026

• September CPI and real earnings data
• ASML earnings
• Bank of America earnings
• Morgan Stanley earnings

Let’s see what happens next week.