AI Selloff Meets Pivotal Week: Apple, AMD, Palantir Earnings, Midterms and Jobs Data

The tech selloff that closed last week was not triggered by a single disaster. It followed a run of earnings that failed to deliver the strength investors had priced in. Alphabet missed on both revenue and profit, and its shares fell 13 percent. Amazon missed on earnings and revenue despite strong cloud growth. Intel beat on earnings and matched revenue, but weakness in PC sales tied to higher memory costs sent the stock down more than 28 percent. Those figures come from Yahoo Finance's preview published on November 1, 2026, covering the week that ended October 30.

The important detail is that several underlying AI businesses grew faster than analysts expected. Amazon's AWS unit reported $45.9 billion in revenue, up 40 percent. Alphabet's cloud unit brought in $30.7 billion against a $29.1 billion estimate. Intel's data center and AI segment posted $7.318 billion versus a $6.675 billion estimate, up 78 percent year on year. Even Sandisk beat on both lines and still fell with the sector. The selloff was therefore concentrated in expectations, not in the operating numbers alone.

That distinction matters for the week ahead. Apple and Palantir report on Monday, alongside chip names Tower Semiconductor and Lattice Semiconductor. AMD reports on Tuesday, the same day US midterms take place and the government releases JOLTS job openings data. Toyota, ConocoPhillips, Eaton, Arm Holdings and McDonald's report later in the week. Friday brings the October nonfarm payrolls report, which economists expect to show 55,000 jobs added after a prior reading of 29,000. All dates and expectations are as of the November 1, 2026 Yahoo Finance calendar.

The midterms add a specific layer for technology investors. All 435 House seats and 35 Senate seats are on the ballot. Races in Ohio and Texas are being watched for their influence on state data center development. California voters are deciding Proposition 40, a proposed billionaire wealth tax that prompted Meta to issue new shares to protect CEO Mark Zuckerberg's voting power if he has to sell stock to pay it. These are political events, but they feed directly into the infrastructure buildout that underpins the AI trade.

There is a counterweight to election anxiety. Seth Meyer of Janus Henderson Investors wrote that hyperscaler AI infrastructure spending is aimed at growing earnings over the next decade and beyond, and that management teams factor in macroeconomic and regulatory changes when allocating capital over such horizons. That argument does not settle whether current valuations are right, but it does suggest that a single election cycle is unlikely to rewrite multiyear capex plans by itself.

The labor data carry their own risk. The Federal Reserve's ability to raise rates in September, and potentially again in December, has rested partly on labor market strength. A weak payrolls number could complicate that outlook. The same report is expected to show the entire 55,000 job gain coming from the private sector, with manufacturing flat despite the data center construction boom. That mix would underline how narrow the hiring base has become.

Crypto added a separate shock. Binance was hit late Thursday by what investigators describe as the largest crypto hack in history, with $6.3 billion in digital assets affected. The exchange suspended deposits and withdrawals while it completed security checks and said it would cover all losses. Ether fell 4 percent to around $2,200 and Binance's BNB token dropped more than 5 percent. These prices are as of the November 1, 2026 Yahoo Finance report.

The week therefore sets up several independent tests at once. Apple and AMD will show whether demand for devices and chips can carry the AI narrative. Palantir will show whether software earnings can justify premium valuations. The midterms will show how much politics can move data center plans. Payrolls will show whether the labor market still supports the rate backdrop. None of these outcomes is predetermined, and the market's reaction will depend on how far each result departs from already elevated expectations.