The overnight gains follow a week in which the Nasdaq 100 fell 5.5%, its steepest weekly decline since April 2025, wiping out $1.9 trillion from US technology stocks and leaving the index 7% below its Oct. 6 high. Morgan Stanley's AI Tech Beneficiaries basket dropped 16.5% over the five sessions for its worst week on record, led by weekly declines of 25% in CoreWeave, 23% in Dell, 18% in Sandisk, 17% in Marvell, 15% in Micron and 6.6% in Nvidia.
Last week's tech rout was driven by hotter than expected September inflation data, including a 3.7% annual rise in CPI and a 6.3% jump in PPI, alongside Brent crude climbing near $110 a barrel and growing credit stress around debt-funded data center buildouts. Even before the 5.5% weekly slide, retail investors had bought $9.1 billion of AI and semiconductor stocks the prior week, their largest weekly purchase in four months.