NEW YORK – The Nasdaq and S&P 500 closed lower on Oct 30 as chip stocks tumbled and investors await a host of corporate earnings.
Shares of Alphabet, the first of the five “Magnificent Seven” megacap stocks that report results this week, rose after the company beat expectations for third-quarter revenue and profit on strength in its cloud business and YouTube ad sales.
Microsoft and Meta Platforms are set to report results after the bell, which are expected to provide insight into whether heavy AI investment is translating into better company performances.
Alphabet helped to offset falling chip stocks, weighed by dour forecasts from Advanced Micro Devices and Qorvo .
Meanwhile, shares of Super Micro Computer plunged after Ernst & Young resigned as the company’s accountant. Nvidia was also down.
The Information Technology sector was the biggest sectoral decliner, while Alphabet’s gains lifted the Communication Services sector.
“Qorvo, Advanced Micro and Super Micro – those are three pretty big moves that are causing a little bit of angst and taking some of the bloom off the rose from the stellar print from Google last night,” said Michael James, managing director of equity trading at Wedbush Securities.
“The clear laser focus is going to be on the stock specific reports and guides,” James said. According to preliminary data, the S&P 500 lost 16.01 points, or 0.27 per cent, to end at 5,816.91 points, while the Nasdaq Composite lost 96.37 points, or 0.52 per cent, to 18,616.38. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 65.14 points, or 0.15 per cent, to 42,167.91.
In economic data, the US gross domestic product increased at a 2.8 per cent annualized rate, according to the Commerce Department’s advance estimate of third-quarter GDP, slightly below economists’ forecast of 3.0 per cent growth.
A separate report showed US private
