Major indices were split yesterday, with the Dow slipping and the S&P 500 (SPX) essentially flat, while Technology (XLK) strength lifted the Nasdaq to a new all-time high, and small-caps pushed the Russell 2000 higher, putting both in the lead for the day. Crude oil fell below $90 a barrel, and Treasury yields continued to fall, with the 10-year holding below 5%.

Sector-wise, five sectors finished higher, led by Materials (XLB), which got a boost from higher metal commodity prices, followed by Consumer Staples (XLP), while Technology (XLK) held onto gains on strength in semiconductors, partially offset by weakness in software. Financials (XLF) were the clear laggard, and Communication Services (XLC) also slid, as fears that artificial intelligence (AI) agents could disrupt businesses built on consumer inertia weighed on banks, insurers, and telecoms (more below). Meanwhile, Energy (XLE) fell with crude oil.

Market breadth was mixed, mirroring the split in the indices. On the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), decliners narrowly outpaced advancers, and volume was roughly even, while the Nasdaq was solidly positive, with advancers well ahead of decliners, and up volume more than doubled down volume. New lows still outnumbered new highs on both exchanges.

Chips in the News

Qualcomm (QCOM) unveiled the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 and Extreme Gen 6, its first 2nm smartphone chips, built around running AI directly on the phone, with the Extreme version able to handle a 30-billion-parameter model locally. A new sensing hub powers always-on features, like speaker recognition and personal memory, and most major Android phone makers are expected to adopt the chips.

In other chip-related news, Nebius Group (NBIS) is reportedly raising pay-as-you-go pricing for dedicated endpoints on Token Factory, its AI inference platform, by roughly 16% to 20% across Nvidia’s (NVDA) graphics processing units (GPUs) starting Oct. 1, with B300 rates climbing to $9.70 per hour. The move follows last week's hike to its on-demand GPU cloud pricing, also effective Oct. 1, underscoring how tight AI compute capacity remains.

Dueling AI Launches

Anthropic and OpenAI released new models within roughly 90 minutes of each other yesterday. Anthropic's Claude Opus 5.5, the first model in its new 5.5 family, performs at the level of its top-tier Fable 5.1 on most tasks, while costing 40% less to run than Opus 5. OpenAI followed with GPT-6 Sol and GPT-6 Luna (faster and cheaper companions to its flagship GPT-6 Astra), with application programming interface (API) prices cut in half versus the prior generation. Both companies are leaning hard on cost efficiency, while still improving the underlying model, and each claims its new models outperform the other's on key benchmarks.

AI Agents vs. Consumer Inertia

Banks, insurers, and online travel agencies are sliding on fears that personal AI agents, such as Meta Platforms’ (META) offering, could disrupt businesses that profit from consumer inertia by making it easier and cheaper for customers to shop around and switch providers, while Goldman Sachs (GS) flagged telecoms, insurance, and Utilities (XLU) as the industries to watch.

Trump & Xi Preview

Chinese President Xi Jinping touches down today for the first Chinese state visit to Washington in more than a decade, and President Trump is expected to meet him on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews before Thursday's formal talks and state dinner at the White House. The two sides still differ on how long to extend the current trade truce, with the U.S. reportedly proposing six more months and China angling for something longer, while rare earths, potential tariff cuts on non-strategic goods, and AI round out the agenda.

Trump laid down his AI marker at the UN General Assembly yesterday, framing superintelligence as a race with a single winner and a shift that could surpass even the Industrial Revolution. The timing sends a clear signal to Beijing on the eve of the summit: Trump sees the U.S. as the AI leader and has no intention of ceding that edge to China, making AI one of the highest-stakes issues on the table.

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