Beats were sold: J&J -5.73%, Citi -5.60%; AMAT -6.69%; CPI at 8:30

Four companies beat estimates on Tuesday and were sold for it: Johnson & Johnson fell 5.73% after raising its outlook, Citigroup 5.60%, and Goldman Sachs and UnitedHealth both opened more than 3% higher on large beats and closed lower. Applied Materials fell 6.69% after declining to forecast industry equipment spending, Micron fell 3.62% on the Chinese memory story for a second day, and yet AMD, Texas Instruments and Nvidia rose, so Tuesday’s chip selling was about equipment and memory, not logic. The S&P 500 closed at 7,805.45, down 0.02%, the Dow at 51,670.10, down 0.35%, and the Nasdaq at 27,204.38, down 0.15%, with 59 of the 100 stocks and funds we track lower. The number that matters this morning is September CPI at 8:30 a.m. ET, the last inflation report before the Fed’s October 27–28 meeting, with the 10-year Treasury at 5.215% and consensus looking for 3.6% headline inflation. Bank of America and Morgan Stanley report before the open; ASML beat overnight and said it cannot fully meet demand in 2027 or 2028.

Beats were sold: J&J, Citi, Goldman and UnitedHealth

The pattern of the day was a company reporting better numbers than expected and finishing lower, and it happened four times. Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) fell 5.73% to $248.61 from $263.73 on 16.6 million shares, the largest drag on the S&P 500, per GV Wire’s Reuters report. Adjusted earnings were $2.59 a share against $2.53 expected, sales grew 5.9%, and the company raised its 2026 outlook to $101.2 billion of sales and about $11.10 of adjusted earnings per share, per the Motley Fool; GAAP earnings were $0.09 a share after a special charge for the proposed talc litigation resolution. CNBC attributed the fall to the medical devices unit, where sales missed because of the conflict in the Middle East. J&J was quoted at $249.07 after hours. The healthcare fund XLV fell 1.35%, with AbbVie (ABBV) down 2.40%, Merck (MRK) 2.39% and Eli Lilly (LLY) 1.36%.

UnitedHealth (UNH) reported adjusted earnings of $4.69 a share against about $4.14 expected on revenue of $112.69 billion against $111.40 billion, raised its 2026 adjusted earnings forecast to at least $20.50 a share from $19.50 to $20, and its chief financial officer said analyst consensus for 2027 “may understate the opportunity ahead,” per Reuters and Benzinga. The stock opened at $397.63, 5.05% above Monday’s close, traded as low as $372.80, and closed down 0.20% at $377.76. Formal 2027 guidance waits for an investor meeting before year-end, so the reversal happened without a new number to blame it on.

The banks split the same way. Goldman Sachs (GS) fell 0.23% to $891.91 from $893.95 after opening at $923.00, up 3.25%. It earned $17.01 a share against an LSEG consensus near $13.02 on revenue of $18.68 billion against $16.86 billion expected, with equities revenue up 72% to $6.44 billion and record advisory revenue of $1.654 billion, per Investing.com and 24/7 Wall St.; the figure includes a $1 a share accelerated charitable contribution. Citigroup (C) fell 5.60% to $124.53 from $131.92 on 20.4 million shares. It beat on revenue and earnings, but StockStory pointed to sequential declines in investment banking, trading and firm-wide profitability. Wells Fargo (WFC) fell 3.10% to $80.74 from $83.32 on 25.6 million shares after earning $1.87 a share against $1.85 expected on revenue of $21.87 billion against $22.3 billion, with net interest income below estimates, per CNBC. JPMorgan (JPM) fell 0.86% to $331.43 from $334.30 after a rare miss: $5.57 a share against $5.90 from LSEG, or $5.75 excluding $658 million of securities losses, on managed revenue of $50.9 billion, up 8%, per CNBC and Alphastreet. Net interest income rose 13% to $27.1 billion and the bank raised its 2026 net interest income guidance to $106.2 billion from $105.5 billion, so the miss was on expenses and securities, not the lending book. The financial fund XLF fell 0.42%. XTB’s Kathleen Brooks told Reuters that investors price a flattening yield curve early, which is why banks with large retail units are struggling; that fits Wells, Citi and JPMorgan falling while Goldman’s trading-heavy quarter was received better before it faded too.

The connecting thread is that the quarter was fine and the market is paying for the next one. Every one of these companies described a good three months; the questions in the reactions were about the devices business in a war zone, the retail bank in a flat curve and whether 2027 is already in the price. Morgan Stanley (MS) fell 1.78% to $186.64 from $190.02 and BlackRock (BLK) 1.64% to $1,066.12 ahead of their reports this morning; Bank of America (BAC) fell 1.14% to $53.96 from $54.58 and was quoted at $52.73 after hours on 10.1 million shares. Domino’s Pizza fell 3.8% after trimming its full-year sales outlook, per GV Wire.

Applied Materials fell 6.69% on the forecast it did not give

Applied Materials (AMAT) fell 6.69% to $464.24 from $497.53 on 10.9 million shares, trading as low as $452.81, its steepest intraday selloff since July 28, per Investing.com. At its investor day, chief executive Gary Dickerson said demand for computing power would keep expanding and called AI fundamental to the company’s competitiveness, but the company stopped short of a forecast for wafer fabrication equipment spending, the industry number investors use to size its market, and Dickerson listed factory space, supply-chain constraints and the financing of energy infrastructure as things that could affect near-term spending. Lam Research and KLA each fell about 4%. The selling here rhymes with Monday’s: Broadcom’s chief said AI investors may run out of capital before chips, and the largest equipment maker just named financing as a constraint on its own customers’ building plans.

Micron (MU) fell 3.62% to $953.19 from $989.04 on 29.0 million shares, after Monday’s 3.88% decline, and was quoted at $956.20 after hours. China’s ChangXin Memory Technologies said at a Shanghai industry event that it intends to launch a denser server memory product before the end of 2026, per Yahoo Finance and Quartz, and the sell-side debate on Tuesday was whether Micron’s most profitable lines are the ones exposed; Micron had risen 261% this year through Friday’s close, per Yahoo Finance, so the stock had the most to give back. SanDisk fell about 4% in the morning, and Western Digital and Seagate between 1% and 2%, per GV Wire.

The data disagrees with the “chips fell” headline. AMD (AMD) rose 1.90% to $605.53 from $594.24, Texas Instruments (TXN) 2.17% to $287.85 from $281.74, Intel (INTC) 1.44% to $102.81 from $101.35 on 87.7 million shares, Qualcomm (QCOM) 1.39% to $176.86, Nvidia (NVDA) 0.97% to $228.52 from $226.32 on 83.8 million shares, Broadcom (AVGO) 0.73% to $357.31 and Arm (ARM) 0.06%. The technology fund XLK fell 0.04% and the Nasdaq-100 fund QQQ 0.33%. Tuesday’s selling was in the two parts of the industry where a Chinese competitor or a missing forecast changes the arithmetic, equipment and memory, while the logic designers that buy from both groups rose. Apple (AAPL) rose 0.09% to $341.27 after touching $348.15, a record high per GV Wire, Microsoft (MSFT) 0.43% to $543.45 and Alphabet (GOOGL) 0.30%.

Oracle, Meta and the refiners rose; Caterpillar and MongoDB fell

Oracle (ORCL) rose 4.23% to $143.20 from $137.39 on 26.3 million shares, the largest gain among the 100 names we track. No single cause is confirmed: Oracle filed a proposed energy service agreement with El Paso Electric for its Project Jupiter data centre campus, reports pointed to a Tencent AI-chip deal and a new NetApp storage service on Oracle’s cloud, and board members disclosed share purchases, per Invezz and Benzinga. Meta (META) rose 2.63% to $762.50 from $742.96 on 22.7 million shares, its second day higher on the Muse Wonder models and about 6% over two sessions, per CNBC, which also noted an RBC analyst’s caution about weaker estimate revisions and fewer buybacks ahead of Meta’s October 21 report. Salesforce (CRM) rose 1.75% to $238.01 from $233.92, IBM (IBM) 1.66% and Block (SQ) 2.67%. The payment networks rose while the banks fell: Visa (V) 1.74% and Mastercard (MA) 1.63%, with no company news we could find. The carriers extended Monday’s rebound: Verizon (VZ) rose 1.75%, AT&T (T) 1.60% and T-Mobile (TMUS) 1.22%.

Energy rose with oil’s geopolitics rather than its price. Exxon (XOM) rose 1.12% to $174.08, Chevron (CVX) 1.27% to $217.73 and the energy fund XLE 1.80%, and the refiners led the movers feed: PBF Energy (PBF) rose 7.26% to $91.19, Par Pacific (PARR) 8.26% to $89.92 and CVR Energy (CVI) 7.22% to $63.14, after the White House denied a rumoured diesel export ban and Goldman raised its target on PBF to $91 from $81, per GuruFocus and Seeking Alpha. Brent settled at $105.69, down $0.96, and WTI at $94.14, up $0.40, per Newsquawk, a day that included Houthi attacks on Saudi Aramco’s Dhahran headquarters and Riyadh’s airport and stepped-up Iranian tanker attacks in the Strait of Hormuz, per Saxo.

Caterpillar (CAT) fell 3.33% to $772.78 from $799.37, trading as low as $755.31, after Citi’s Kyle Menges cut his target on the shares to $950 from $1,100 while keeping a Buy rating, citing a stretched valuation and the higher long-term yields that raise financing costs for the customers who buy its equipment on credit, per Investing.com. Honeywell (HON) fell 1.12%; the two were the largest drags on the Dow, per GV Wire. MongoDB (MDB) fell 2.16% to $373.07 from $381.29 after trading as high as $411.49: Bank of America’s Koji Ikeda said the AI strategy remains intact, which took the stock up more than 7% in the morning, and Wolfe Research’s Alex Zukin then flagged further senior departures after the chief executive left for Meta last month, per TipRanks. Reddit (RDDT) fell 2.90%, ServiceNow (NOW) 1.22% and Boeing (BA) 1.59%.

In the movers feed, Bumble (BMBL) rose 56.66% to $5.95 on 118.2 million shares after agreeing to be bought by Ithaca Holdings for $6.05 a share in cash, about $1.3 billion and a 138% premium to its October 9 close, per the Motley Fool and Investing.com; the stock still closed below the offer. Cipher Digital (CIFR) fell 12.84% to $11.34 on 128.4 million shares after announcing an $850 million convertible note offering, per the Motley Fool. Summit Therapeutics (SMMT) fell 9.48% to $15.52 ahead of a report Earnings Whispers lists for after today’s close.

Korea’s rebound faded; ASML beat and Europe opened higher

South Korea’s Kospi rose about 2.6% in early trading and closed down 0.44% at 6,008.82, its sixth straight decline, per TradingKey’s closing report, with Samsung Electronics flat at 232,000 won, SK hynix down 1.66% and Kioxia down 3.23% in Tokyo. Japan’s Nikkei 225 closed down 0.05% at 67,744.24. Earlier reports from Invezz and others had both indexes up more than 1% and described Monday’s 5.46% Kospi fall as a possible capitulation, so the morning’s story changed by the close; the won was near 1,342 per dollar, per Saxo. The Hang Seng and Shanghai Composite were flat after China’s September data, which Newsquawk reported as consumer prices up 0.9% from a year earlier against 1.0% expected and producer prices up 5.0% against 4.5%.

ASML published its third quarter at 6:00 a.m. London time: net sales of €11.66 billion and net income of €4.96 billion, both above expectations, basic earnings of €12.95 a share against €10.68 expected, fourth-quarter sales guided to €14.2 billion to €15.2 billion, and full-year guidance raised to a range topping out at €45 billion, per Newsquawk and TradingKey, which give the bottom of the range as €44 billion and €43 billion respectively. The company said AI-driven demand is strong enough that it “will not be able to fully meet customer demand in 2027 or 2028” and is looking at ways to expand capacity, per Reuters. The shares were indicated 3.3% lower on Tradegate before the open and were up 1.8% by 7:13 a.m. GMT, when the Stoxx 600 was up 0.32% at 636.99 with technology the leading sector, up 0.8%; Ørsted fell 4.2% after Bloomberg reported the US would re-evaluate the permit for its Rhode Island wind farm, and oil rose after two vessels were struck in the Strait of Hormuz, per Reuters via Marketscreener. On Tuesday the Stoxx 600 closed down 0.1% at 635.01 after a late technology selloff. US futures were modestly higher early: S&P 500 futures up 0.15%, Dow futures 0.20% and Nasdaq-100 futures 0.04% at 1:37 a.m. ET, per TipRanks.

CPI at 8:30, with the 10-year at 5.215%

The Bureau of Labor Statistics releases September’s consumer price index at 8:30 a.m. ET. Economists polled by Dow Jones expect headline prices up 0.6% on the month and 3.6% from a year earlier, from 0.4% and 3.4% in August, with core prices up 0.2% on the month and 2.4% on the year, per CNBC; Investing.com’s calendar has core at 2.5%, and the Cleveland Fed’s nowcast runs at 3.60% headline and 2.39% core. Record September gasoline prices explain most of the expected jump in the headline, so the core figure is the one that carries information about the Fed. It is the last inflation report before the October 27–28 meeting, New York Fed President Williams said this week he sees one more hike this year, per Saxo, and Bank of America’s economists have said a hot print could revive hike speculation, per CNBC.

The bond market reopened on Tuesday after Columbus Day and yields eased: the 10-year closed at 5.215%, down about 2.7 basis points, and the 30-year at 5.563%, down about 3.7, per Saxo and CNBC, after Friday’s 10-year close of 5.24%. The long-dated Treasury fund TLT rose 0.41% and the gold fund GLD fell 0.13% to $381.67, with gold near $4,160 to $4,208 an ounce, per Saxo. Breadth was negative: 59 of the 100 stocks and funds we track fell. 41 of the 100 rose. On Monday 54 had risen. The S&P 500 fund SPY fell 0.01% to $778.01, the Dow fund DIA 0.33% to $516.21 and the small-cap fund IWM 0.43%; on the NYSE decliners outnumbered advancers 1.22 to 1 at midday and on the Nasdaq 1.9 to 1, with the Nasdaq recording 344 new 52-week lows against 33 new highs, per GV Wire.

What to watch today

September CPI at 8:30 a.m. ET. Dow Jones consensus: headline +0.6% on the month and 3.6% on the year, core +0.2% and 2.4%; Investing.com has core at 2.5%. August was 0.4% and 3.4% headline, 2.4% core.
Bank of America before the open, consensus about $1.10 to $1.11 a share on roughly $30.58 billion of revenue, per Alphastreet and Yahoo Finance; Morgan Stanley at about 7:30 a.m. ET with a 9:30 a.m. call, consensus $3.06 a share. BlackRock, Progressive, Fastenal and State Street also report before the bell. Home BancShares and Summit Therapeutics report after the close, per Earnings Whispers.
Fed speakers and the Beige Book: Governor Bowman at the IIF summit this morning, listed at 5:40 a.m. ET by most calendars and 4:40 a.m. by Investing.com; Richmond Fed President Barkin at 12:30 p.m. ET on one calendar; the Beige Book at 2:00 p.m. ET, with one listing at 1:00 p.m.
EIA weekly petroleum inventories at 10:30 a.m. ET, with Brent at $105.69 and tankers struck in the Strait of Hormuz overnight.
ASML in Europe, up 1.8% at 7:13 a.m. GMT after indicating lower, and the US chip equipment names at the open after Applied Materials’ 6.69% fall: Applied was quoted at $462.60 after hours.
The after-hours quotes of the names that reversed: J&J at $249.07, Bank of America at $52.73, Micron at $956.20.
Thursday: September PPI and retail sales at 8:30 a.m. ET, industrial production at 9:15, and TSMC, Charles Schwab, PNC, US Bancorp, BNY Mellon and Alcoa report.

Not financial advice. iTrading Buddy summarizes publicly available market data and news; every figure above is sourced from the reporting available before the US open on the date shown. Verify anything you act on.