Volatility Pulse - That Escalated Quickly
S&P down, most stocks up
By midday Oct 22 the S&P 500 was down 1.36%, yet 324 of its 500 members were up and the median stock gained 1.09%. The last day that looked like this was DeepSeek Monday, Jan 27, 2025.
Source: Bespoke Investment Group
Smooth ride? Not for the average stock
The Nasdaq is up 15% this year and its worst slide from the high was 13%. The average Nasdaq stock, at some point this year, sat 47% below its own high.
Source: Charles Schwab
Chips back at the 200-day line
The semiconductor ETF fell 6.62% on Oct 22 to about $477, right on its 200-day average of $473.39. The last time it touched that line was June 2025.
Source: Barchart
Even Meta says money is getting tight
Meta's own filing says capital raises at Alphabet, SpaceX, Anthropic and OpenAI have made it an increasingly challenging environment for raising capital. So it wants to raise before the line gets any longer.
Source: Meta Platforms 10-Q via Joe Weisenthal
Seems a bit much
Polymarket traders put a 17% chance on Anthropic announcing bankruptcy by the end of 2028, with about $2.37 million wagered on the question.
Source: Polymarket
The riskiest bonds feel it most
The lowest-rated junk bonds now pay 9.79 percentage points more extra yield than the lowest-rated investment-grade bonds, the widest gap on a chart going back to July 2020.
Source: Lisa Abramowicz
Finally, something that got cheaper
Running a basic AI model cost more than $32 per million tokens in 2023. The same level of intelligence now costs about 2 cents.
Source: Artificial Analysis
Fewer home sales than during COVID
The pending home sales index fell 7.3% in September to 66.0, the lowest on a chart going back to 2005 and below the spring 2020 lockdown low.
Source: Liz Ann Sonders
Rates are just back to normal?
The 10-year Treasury yield ended September at 5.3%. Its average since 1940 is 5.1%.
Source: Ritholtz Wealth Management
Grandpa's doing just fine
From 2022 to 2025, median net worth for households 75 and older rose about 37% after inflation. For those under 35 it fell about 23%.
Source: Wall Street Journal
It's not just you...
US consumer prices are up about 30% since December 2019. Groceries and rent are each up about 30%, and auto repair more than 50%.
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics via Unusual Whales
Just Because...
'OK' Started as a Joke About Bad Spelling
In 1839 'OK' was a sarcastic abbreviation of 'oll korrect,' a deliberate misspelling of 'all correct' from a fad for abbreviating misspelled phrases. It stuck because President Van Buren's nickname, 'Old Kinderhook,' had the same initials. One of the most-used words on Earth is a 187-year-old spelling joke.
