Key Notes
- The Nasdaq 100 fell 4.55% in morning trading as chipmakers, storage suppliers and AI cloud companies led a broad technology selloff.
- SanDisk dropped 17.7% and Nebius lost 16.3%, while 11 of the 20 stocks tracked in this snapshot declined at least 10%.
- Data-center restrictions and weaker profit expectations added pressure as investors reversed the previous day’s gains in the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite.
American technology stocks plunged Thursday morning, sending the Nasdaq 100 down 4.55% as investors dumped chipmakers, storage suppliers and companies exposed to the artificial-intelligence spending boom. SanDisk fell 17.7%, Nebius dropped 16.3% and Advanced Micro Devices lost 13.7% in a selloff that deepened through the first hour of trading.
At about 10:32 a.m. Eastern time, the Nasdaq Composite was down 3.85%, the S&P 500 had fallen 2.40% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was lower by 1.43%. The decline wiped out the previous day’s gains in the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite, while taking back part of the Dow’s roughly 1,570-point Wednesday rally.
The reversal exposed a split in the market’s response to the midterm elections. Wednesday’s relief rally followed a Democratic sweep of Congress and a sharp drop in oil prices. By Thursday, investors were focusing on what tighter scrutiny of AI and data-center construction could mean for the companies that supply that expansion.
The Stocks Leading the Selloff
The following moves are an intraday snapshot from Yahoo Finance at approximately 15:32 UTC on November 5, measured against Wednesday’s closing prices. They are not closing returns.
- SanDisk (Nasdaq: SNDK): −17.7%
- Western Digital (Nasdaq: WDC): −13.8%
- Nebius (Nasdaq: NBIS): −16.3%
- Advanced Micro Devices (Nasdaq: AMD): −13.7%
- Seagate Technology (Nasdaq: STX): −14.2%
- Qualcomm (Nasdaq: QCOM): −10.1%
- Micron Technology (Nasdaq: MU): −12.4%
- Tesla (Nasdaq: TSLA): −9.4%
- Dell Technologies (NYSE: DELL): −11.6%
- Arm Holdings (Nasdaq: ARM): −11.2%
- Marvell Technology (Nasdaq: MRVL): −11.1%
- CrowdStrike (Nasdaq: CRWD): −9.3%
- Intel (Nasdaq: INTC): −8.2%
- CoreWeave (Nasdaq: CRWV): −11.7%
- Palantir Technologies (Nasdaq: PLTR): −8.7%
- SpaceX (Nasdaq: SPCX): −9.0%
- Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (NYSE: TSM): −7.7%
- Nvidia (Nasdaq: NVDA): −6.5%
- Broadcom (Nasdaq: AVGO): −6.6%
- Oracle (NYSE: ORCL): −5.3%
11 of these 20 stocks were down at least 10%. The losses reached well beyond the chip sector: cloud providers, server makers, cybersecurity companies and high-growth businesses such as Tesla and SpaceX were also under pressure. The larger drop in the Nasdaq 100 than in the broader Nasdaq Composite showed how heavily the biggest growth stocks were weighing on the session.
Data-Center Restrictions Hit the AI Trade
Much of the selling centered on the infrastructure behind AI. Investors are questioning whether new political resistance to data centers could delay projects and weaken demand for the chips, memory, storage and servers intended to fill them. CNBC reported that concerns over the post-election regulatory outlook were driving another day of pressure on AI-linked shares.
That concern had already surfaced in Wednesday’s chip-stock decline, even as the major indexes rose. The Washington Post has since tallied bans or restrictions in at least 38 jurisdictions. Goldman Sachs estimated that potential moratoriums could affect 45% of planned American capacity expansion, Business Insider reported.
The estimate describes exposure to possible restrictions, rather than projects that have all been canceled. But a delay can still matter to suppliers whose valuations reflect years of rapid growth. A chip order may depend on a customer securing power, permits and financing before a new facility can open.
The breadth of Thursday’s losses suggested investors were reassessing that entire chain. Storage companies suffered some of the steepest declines, alongside the processors and cloud services more commonly associated with the AI trade. Falling together does not mean their businesses face identical risks; it does show how quickly doubts about construction can spread across their shares.
Earnings Pressure Adds to the Policy Risk
Qualcomm faced a separate test after its quarterly results. The company’s earnings release showed handset-chip revenue falling 26% from a year earlier to $5.14 billion. Automotive revenue rose 89% to $1.99 billion, but the handset business remained much larger.
Adjusted earnings of $2.17 a share and revenue of $10.44 billion exceeded the consensus estimates cited in our earlier coverage. The next quarter’s adjusted profit forecast, however, ranged from $2.15 to $2.35 a share. Its $2.25 midpoint was below the $2.32 analysts had expected.
Those results complicate any explanation of the selloff as a response to politics alone. Companies are also confronting different customer budgets, product cycles and profit expectations. Strong growth in one part of a business may offer little protection when investors see a larger division slowing or worry that future orders will arrive later than expected.
The Reversal Reaches Beyond Wall Street
The American declines followed a sharp Asian selloff. South Korea’s Kospi fell about 5.3%, with SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics among the major casualties, while Japan’s Kioxia dropped more than 13%. That earlier selling had already put pressure on memory and semiconductor shares before Wall Street opened.
Thursday’s opening losses also left the broad-market rally looking much less secure. The Dow was falling less than the Nasdaq indexes, but it was still down roughly 761 points at the snapshot time. Investors were cutting exposure to the AI trade while the wider market gave back some of its post-election relief.
The next major test comes Friday, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics releases October’s employment report at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time. For a market already questioning how much growth AI spending can deliver, the report will bring a fresh reading on the economy supporting those investment plans.
