why is the stock market down today
Archived — this story has rotated out of today’s deck. It is kept here in full.
The gist
Nasdaq 100 futures fell 0.5% while an ETF tracking US-listed chip giants dropped over 2% premarket.
Investors read the Democratic sweep as slower, costlier AI expansion, hitting chipmakers hardest.
Background
The selloff follows the US midterm elections, in which Democrats flipped both the House and Senate and voters rejected AI data centers in 40 of 41 local ballot measures, according to CNBC. Investors took that outcome to mean AI expansion will be slower and more expensive, helping companies that already own data centers and hurting chip sellers. The move extends a rough stretch for semiconductors: Nvidia was down 2% premarket after an 18% drop over the past month, and Intel had lost 51% in a month. The weakness began earlier with disappointing earnings from Alphabet, Intel and Amazon.
How it unfolded
- Oct 30, 2026US stocks fell as weak Intel and Amazon earnings and AI worries hit shares; the Nasdaq dropped 2.14% and Intel plunged about 28% after a soft fourth-quarter outlook.
- Nov 3, 2026Democrats flipped both the House and Senate, and voters sided against AI data centers in 40 of 41 local ballot measures, according to CNBC.
- Nov 4, 2026US stock futures pointed to a broadly lower open as Wall Street digested the midterm results; Brent crude rose 0.69% to $104.32 a barrel.
- Nov 5, 2026Nasdaq 100 futures fell 0.5% while S&P 500 futures were little changed, and an ETF tracking US-listed chip giants dropped more than 2% premarket on fears of tighter data center regulation; Qualcomm fell 9.6% after missing estimates.
Key terms
- midterm
- US general elections held near the midpoint of a president's four-year term, when all House seats and about a third of Senate seats are contested.
- ETF
- An investment fund that is bought and sold on stock exchanges and holds assets such as stocks, bonds or commodities.
- hyperscalers
- Large cloud computing providers whose infrastructure can scale rapidly to meet growing demand.
Source: Wikipedia
Who’s saying what
- Analysts
- Needham analyst Laura Martin said hyperscalers are AI incumbents, while Siebert Financial's Mark Malek said the most vulnerable AI companies are the borrowers, not necessarily the biggest spenders.
- Official
- Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan said the company faces headwinds across the PC industry and is finding it hard to meet extremely high AI-driven demand.
- Party
- Rep. Ro Khanna said Democrats will stop funding the Iran offensive, citing the need to lower domestic energy and food costs.
Still unverified
The sources say the coming trading sessions will help determine whether these movements represent a temporary reaction to the US elections or the beginning of a more sustained adjustment in global investment expectations.