Review Preview: AI Fills a Void

Nov 03, 2025 20:06:00 -0500 by Teresa Rivas | #Markets #Review & Preview

Clocks Back. Stocks Forward. Once again, artificial intelligence stocks were one of the few things working for investors today—enough to push the S&P 500 higher, but only just. Third-quarter results could add fodder for bulls later this week as earnings season chugs on.

Without much in the way of AI exposure, the Dow Jones Industrial Average ended down 226 points, or 0.5%, while the S&P 500 added 0.2%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite led the pack, rising 0.5%.

A good deal of the optimism centered on a $38 billion pact between Amazon.com and OpenAI, in which Amazon Web Services will provide infrastructure for the ChatGPT maker’s AI workloads over the next seven years.

Given OpenAI’s ambitious targets, it was a question of if, not when, it made a deal with Amazon, notes William Blair analyst Dylan Carden, given that AWS is still the largest cloud service provider. Yet more to the point, the “bear narrative on Amazon has been focused on the absence of AWS from major AI deal announcements that other hyperscalers have been benefiting from,” he writes.

Between the OpenAI deal, the reacceleration of AWS growth last quarter, and Anthropic’s decision to expand use of AWS Trainium chips in late October that bear case is breaking down.

AI news seemed to overshadow the day’s economic data, with the latest Institute for Supply Management’s Purchasing Managers’ Index, or PMI, showing that tariffs are still weighing on U.S. manufacturing on the whole.

A slew of earnings reports is due later this week, including tech names like Advanced Micro Devices and Super Micro Computer, and other big companies like Pfizer.

The numbers could provide another leg up for stocks, given how well reporting season has gone thus far.

Company

Last

Chg

Chg%

Dow Jones Industrial Average

47,236.32

-100.36

-0.21%

S&P 500 Index

6,815.17

-36.80

-0.54%

NASDAQ Composite Index

23,624.90

-209.82

-0.88%

Market Data as of

The Hot Stock: IDEXX Laboratories +14.8%
The Biggest Loser: Kimberly-Clark -14.6%

Best Sector: Consumer Discretionary +0.9%
Worst Sector: Communication Services -1.1%

Created with Highcharts 9.0.1Monday, Nov. 3Index performanceSource: FactSetAs of Nov. 5, 3:25 p.m. ET

Created with Highcharts 9.0.1Nov. 5-0.50-0.2500.250.500.751.001.251.50%Nasdaq CompositeS&P 500Dow industrials

AI IOU

Artificial intelligence isn’t just revolutionary, it’s pricey. So much so that even the most valuable companies in the world can’t foot the bill just by dipping into their cash reserves anymore. Oracle’s debt offering in September is one example. Last month saw Facebook parent Meta Platforms use special purpose vehicle (SPV) Beignet Investor LLC to raise some $30 billion, most of it debt, for data center construction.

The problem is that SPVs are hauntingly familiar to anyone who lived through the Great Financial Crisis as they “effectively kept billions worth of housing debt off the balance sheets of the country’s biggest banks during the pre-crisis housing boom,” making it harder for investors to understand the real risks, my colleague Martin Baccardax writes.

Yet just as today’s boom isn’t a near parallel of the dot-com frenzy, investors don’t necessarily need to worry that new SPVs mean we’re in for a 2008 redux. From Martin’s article:

Dave Novosel, senior analyst at Gimme Credit, thinks the use of SPVs is likely more a reflection of the market having to cope with a big increase in new debt than concern over the health of big-tech balance sheets.

“The hyperscalers and other huge issuers of debt have incredibly strong credit profiles and therefore can easily borrow in the capital markets,” he told Barron’s.

Using an SPV, he said, not only keeps the debt separate but also isolates the risk of a particular project. It gives investors more choices in terms of where they can lend their money.

Others have similarly argued that debt isn’t necessarily a bad thing for the big AI players, and for now, growth is underpinning the bull case for funding these projects.

Just don’t ask ChatGPT to objectively analyze its own creditworthiness.

The Calendar

Advanced Micro Devices, AES, Aflac, American International Group, Amgen, Apollo Global Management, Archer-Daniels-Midland, Assurant, Astera Labs, Axon Enterprise, Ball Corp., Broadridge Financial Solutions, Corteva, Eversource Energy, Exelon, Ferrari, Gartner, Global Payments, Henry Schein, International Flavors & Fragrance, Jack Henry & Associates, Live Nation Entertainment, Marathon Petroleum, Marriott International, Martin Marietta Materials, Match Group, Molson Coors Beverage, Mosaic, Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings, Pfizer, Pinterest, Shopify, Spotify Technology, Stanley Black & Decker, Super Micro Computer, Skyworks Solutions, TPG, Thomson Reuters, Uber Technologies, Waters Corp., Yum! Brands, and Zoetis report earnings tomorrow.

What We’re Reading Today

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