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👀 Today’s Stories at a Glance
🗳️ The S&P’s election-night swing: S&P 500 futures fell 1.4% as Democrats took Congress, then turned to a 0.9% gain before the US open.
💻 AMD guides to $17 billion: AMD beat on $13.38 billion of revenue and expects 2027 sales to grow more than 80%.
🇪🇺 Eurozone inflation hits 4%: Prices rose 4% in October, a 3-year high, as energy inflation jumped to 20.8%.
💊 Novo’s pill beats forecasts: Wegovy pill sales hit DKK 5.39 billion, and Novo raised its 2026 outlook for a third time.
₿ Bitcoin’s election-night low: Bitcoin hit $75,740 as the count came in, then climbed back above $78,000 a few hours later.
🛢️ Oil’s peace bet wobbles: Brent settled at $103.60 yesterday, a 4-week low, then rose as Iran called a US reply unconvincing.
👷 US workers quit more: Job openings held at 7.5 million in September while quits rose to 3.4 million, 2 days before payrolls.
📈 Silver bounces off $50: Chart of the Day covers the $49.78 support, the $55 resistance and the $44 level I am watching.
🧠 One Big Thing
Democrats now control both houses of Congress, and the S&P 500 swung both ways on it. Futures fell 1.4% as the results came in, on fears of tougher rules for AI and higher company taxes. By 5:25am New York time they were up 0.9%. What changed? The maths. Any new law now needs both a Democratic Congress and Donald Trump’s signature, and neither side can override the other. The likely result over the next 2 years is fewer big laws and more fights over the budget.
⚖️ Fear & Greed
📉 The Number That Matters
20.8%
How much eurozone energy prices rose over the year to October. It pushed headline inflation to 4%, a 3-year high, while core inflation sat still at 2.5%.
✅ 5 Things to Know
🗳️ The S&P 500 fell on the blue sweep, then turned higher
S&P 500 futures fell as much as 1.4% overnight as Democrats took the House and the Senate. Nasdaq 100 futures dropped as much as 2.4%, Reuters reported. By 3:13am New York time, all three main index futures were back in positive territory. By 5:25am, S&P 500 futures were up 0.90%, Nasdaq 100 futures 0.89% and Dow futures 1.28%, TipRanks said. That is a swing of about 2.3 percentage points on the S&P and more than 3 on the Nasdaq in a few hours. Tokyo and Seoul traced the same shape, with the Kospi going from down 4% to a 0.62% gain at the close. IBTimes TipRanks
Why did it fall? The first read was about AI. Democrats won in Texas and Georgia, both big data-centre states, and investors worried about tougher rules on AI, data-centre spending, crypto and corporate taxes, IBTimes reported. “The significance of these midterm elections is more like a referendum on AI than a referendum on Trump,” Aidan Yao, senior investment strategist at Amundi Investment Institute, told Reuters. Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft and Meta all traded lower on Germany’s Tradegate exchange. IBTimes
So why did it turn? Because winning Congress does not let Democrats write the law alone. Every bill still needs Donald Trump’s signature, and he told CBS his “ultimate power” is the veto, even as he told Fox News he thinks Democrats want to work with him. Overriding a veto takes two-thirds of both chambers. Democrats are on course for 53 Senate seats, well short of 67. A Congress that can block Trump but cannot override him points to gridlock, and investors began weighing gridlock against a crackdown, KuCoin’s news desk reported. AMD’s record forecast last night gave chip stocks a lift on top. KuCoin SBS News
Where does the count stand? Democrats are on course for 53 Senate seats to 42 for Republicans, with a few races still to call, SBS reported. They flipped Texas, Ohio, North Carolina, Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina, and Susan Collins conceded in Maine. Michigan stayed Democratic, with Abdul El-Sayed winning 52% to 46%. In the House, Democrats had 224 seats called against 133, well past the 218 needed. Trump took it calmly. “Congratulations to the Democrats,” he told Fox News. “I think the Democrats want to work with me.” SBS News ABC7
Sensei’s Insight: The first move was fear of new rules for AI. The second was the market doing the maths. Democrats can block Trump’s bills, and Trump can veto theirs. What I am watching is the US open at 2:30pm UK, 9:30am in New York, and whether the bounce holds.
💻 AMD sold the forecast, and the forecast was bigger
What is a record quarter worth this week? For AMD, about 6% before the open. It reported third-quarter revenue of $13.38 billion last night, up 45% on a year earlier, against about $13.06 billion expected, Investing.com reported. Adjusted earnings were $2.09 a share against $1.94 expected. Data centre revenue nearly doubled, up 97% to $8.5 billion. Gaming fell 40%. AMD guided fourth-quarter revenue to about $17 billion, against roughly $16.23 billion expected. “We delivered a record quarter with revenue exceeding the high end of our guidance,” chief executive Lisa Su said. AMD Investing.com
Palantir beat on Monday, guided higher and still fell. So why did AMD rise? The size of the forecast. Su told analysts “we now expect revenue to grow more than 80% in 2027”, with data centre chips making up more than 80% of sales, according to the call transcript. That is a number the share price had not already assumed. Supermicro added to it, with quarterly revenue of $19.9 billion against $16.4 billion expected, and its shares rose nearly 10% after hours at one point, TMGM said. Arm and Qualcomm report after the US close today. TradingKey TMGM
Sensei’s Insight: Palantir beat and raised, and the price had already assumed it. AMD’s 2027 number was bigger than the market had pencilled in, so the shares jumped. What I am watching is whether Arm and Qualcomm tonight get the same treatment for their guides.
🇪🇺 Eurozone inflation hit 4%, and energy did the lifting
4.0%. That was eurozone inflation in October, up from 3.8% in September, its highest in 3 years and in line with forecasts, Reuters reported. Energy did most of the work. Energy prices were up 20.8% on a year earlier, from 18.9% the month before, ActionForex reported. Core inflation, which strips out energy, food, alcohol and tobacco, stayed at 2.5%. Services edged up to 3.3% from 3.2%. The country figures were uneven. Italy rose to 5.6% and France to 3.8%, while Germany fell to 2.8% from 3.3%. Global Banking & Finance Review ActionForex
Why does a fuel bill matter to a central bank? It can leak into wages and prices of everything else. The European Central Bank has raised its 2.5% deposit rate twice this year and held it last week. Markets now price 2 to 3 more rises over the coming year, Reuters said, and the ECB expects inflation to stay above 4% for much of the first half of 2027. The Bank of England decides tomorrow at noon UK, 7am in New York, with a rise to 4.00% from 3.75% expected in a Reuters poll. Global Banking & Finance Review PrimeXBT
Sensei’s Insight: Headline inflation is 4% and core is 2.5%. That gap is oil. If Hormuz reopens, a lot of this number fades on its own. What I am watching is whether the Bank of England tomorrow treats energy the same way the ECB does.
💊 Novo’s Wegovy pill beat forecasts, and Novo raised its outlook again
“Growth was led by our obesity portfolio,” Novo Nordisk chief executive Mike Doustdar said this morning. Sales of the Wegovy pill reached DKK 5.39 billion, about $810 million, in the third quarter, up 53% on the second quarter and above the DKK 4.62 billion expected, Reuters reported. Total adjusted sales were DKK 79.2 billion. Adjusted operating profit rose 27% at constant exchange rates to DKK 31.72 billion, against about DKK 28.9 billion expected. Novo now sees 2026 sales and operating profit between a 2% fall and 2% growth, from a 6% fall to flat. The shares rose as much as 6.6% in Copenhagen, Investing.com reported. SRN News Investing.com
How clean was the beat? Part of it came from pricing. Jefferies said about DKK 2 billion of one-off pricing gains flattered the quarter, mostly for injectable Wegovy. Without them, the beat would have been about 5% and Wegovy would have missed, the broker said. Novo is also cutting US list prices for Wegovy and Ozempic by about 50% and 35% from 1 January 2027. Its rival Eli Lilly raised its own 2026 revenue guide to $91 billion to $92 billion last Thursday. Investing.com AskTraders
Sensei’s Insight: The pill is the bit that is working, up 53% in a quarter. Some of the rest came from pricing that will not repeat. What I am watching is the first quarter of 2027, when the US list-price cuts start to bite.
₿ Bitcoin hit its low on the count, then the sellers eased
Bitcoin fell to $75,740 at 10:10pm New York time last night as the results came in, CryptoTicker reported, using CoinGecko data. By 1:16am it was back near $78,300, CoinDesk said. Money is still leaving the US bitcoin ETFs, at a slower pace. Outflows were $643.2 million on 30 October, $398.6 million on Monday and $115.6 million yesterday, according to Farside data cited by crypto.news. That is a fall of about 82% from Friday’s figure to yesterday’s. CryptoTicker crypto.news
Binance takes its next proof-of-reserves snapshot today, covering more tokens than the 10 in Saturday’s check. This is the one that counts the money that left after the hack. A proof takes about 40 to 50 hours to build, so the result is due around Friday. Binance reopened withdrawals for 51 more Ethereum and Solana tokens yesterday, and it says it has replaced about 95% of the $6.3 billion stolen on 29 October, crypto.news reported. crypto.news
Sensei’s Insight: Bitcoin had a bad night and a good morning. The ETF selling is shrinking, from $643 million on Friday to $116 million yesterday. What I am watching is today’s Binance snapshot, because it is the first one taken after the run.
Stories You Might Have Missed
🛢️ Oil’s peace bet got its first pushback
Brent settled at $103.60 a barrel yesterday and WTI at $96.09, both their lowest in nearly 4 weeks after 2 days of falls, Angel One reported. In Asian trading this morning Brent rose 1% to $104.61. A senior Iranian official told Reuters that Washington’s response to the latest peace proposal was not convincing, and Qatar is still carrying messages between the two sides. Supply data added to the move. The American Petroleum Institute reported US crude stocks fell 5.27 million barrels last week, against a rise of 2.1 million expected. Angel One
👷 More Americans quit their jobs in September
US job openings were little changed at 7.5 million in September, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said yesterday. Quits rose to 3.4 million, a rate of 2.1%, the first time above 2% since June 2025, Indeed Hiring Lab noted. People quit more when they are confident of finding another job. Hires held at 5.4 million and layoffs at 1.6 million. “Employers are hiring at the slowest pace since 2013,” Indeed economist Cory Stahle wrote. The official October jobs report lands on Friday at 1:30pm UK, 8:30am in New York. BLS Indeed Hiring Lab