Breakfast | Apple hits a new intraday high! Beyond Meat skyrockets 146%, sixfold increase in three days

Market Overview

U.S. stocks showed mixed results, with corporate earnings pushing the Dow Jones to a new high, while uncertainty in trade prospects weighed on technology and small-cap stocks, leading to a decline in the Nasdaq and a barely flat S&P 500.

Apple rose for the third consecutive day, hitting a new high during the session before retreating, closing up 0.2%. After its earnings report, General Motors surged 14.8%, and Coca-Cola rose 4%. Meme stock Beyond Meat skyrocketed 146%, accumulating an approximately 600% increase over three days.

U.S. Treasury yields fell across the board, with the 10-year yield dropping nearly 2.5 basis points. The dollar index rose for the third consecutive day, increasing by about 0.4%. Bitcoin rose more than 6% from its daily low.

Profit-taking and technical corrections drove a sharp decline in precious metals. Gold fell over 5.7%, marking the largest single-day drop since 2013, while silver fell even more, dropping nearly 8%. Influenced by the Trump administration's commitment to purchase 1 million barrels of strategic oil reserves, crude oil fluctuated higher, with U.S. oil rising over 1.2%.

In the Asian session, the ChiNext Index rose over 3%, driven by a surge in AI computing hardware, with "Yi Zhongtian" soaring, and the Hang Seng Index rising over 1%. Apple concept stocks strengthened, government bonds rose, and commodities showed divergence.

Key News

Minister Wang Wentao held a video conference with European Commission Trade and Economic Security Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis. Minister Wang also spoke with Dutch Economic Minister Micky Adriaansens.

London zinc saw another "short squeeze" scenario: available inventory was less than one day, and spot premiums soared to the highest level since 1997!

The Russia-Ukraine situation continues to be tumultuous: preparations for the Trump-Putin meeting have encountered obstacles, and Europe has clearly responded to Trump for the first time, calling for an "immediate ceasefire."

OpenAI launched the AI browser ChatGPT Atlas, causing Google to drop in response.

DeepSeek's new model has been wildly praised in Silicon Valley! It compresses one-dimensional text using two-dimensional vision, capable of running on a single GPU, with "Google's core secrets being open-sourced." Andrej Karpathy: I really like it; Elon Musk: 99% of the future will be photons.

Reports indicate that Samsung has made positive progress on 2nm chip yield, aiming for 70% by the end of the year, with production targets raised.

Pop Mart's Q3 overall revenue grew by 245%-250% year-on-year, with overseas revenue increasing by 365%-370%.

Brazil's tax impact led to Netflix's Q3 earnings falling far short of expectations, lowering its full-year guidance, with shares dropping 7% in after-hours trading.

L'Oréal's Q3 sales also missed expectations, with a recovery in high-end demand in China but weaker performance in North America, causing a plunge in stock price.

Western Alliance Bancorp, one of the key players in the recent small bank "blow-up," reported earnings that exceeded the expectations of most Wall Street analysts.

Market Closing

U.S. and European stock markets: The S&P 500 index rose slightly, closing at 6735.35 points. The Dow Jones increased by 0.47%, closing at 46924.74 points. The Nasdaq fell by 0.16%, closing at 22953.666 points The European STOXX 600 index closed up 0.21%, at 573.30 points.

A-shares: The Shanghai Composite Index rose 1.36%, closing at 3916.33 points; the Shenzhen Component Index rose 2.06%, closing at 13077.32 points; the ChiNext Index rose 3.02%, closing at 3083.72 points.

Bond market: The yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury fell by 2.30 basis points to 3.9570%. The yield on the 2-year U.S. Treasury fell by 0.45 basis points to 3.4509%.

Commodities: WTI November crude oil futures rose 0.52%, closing at $57.82 per barrel. Brent December crude oil futures rose 0.51%, closing at $61.32 per barrel. COMEX gold futures fell 4.94%, closing at $4144.10 per ounce. COMEX silver futures fell 6.37%, closing at $48.110 per ounce.

News Details

Global Highlights

Minister Wang Wentao held a video conference with EU Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security Valdis Dombrovskis. According to the Ministry of Commerce's press office, Wang Wentao stated that regarding the ASML semiconductor issue, China firmly opposes the broadening of the "national security" concept and hopes that the EU will play an important constructive role, urging the Netherlands to adhere to the spirit of contracts and market principles, and to propose a proper solution as soon as possible from the perspective of maintaining the overall safety and stability of the global supply chain.

Minister Wang Wentao spoke with Dutch Minister of Economic Affairs Micky Adriaansens. According to the Ministry of Commerce's press office, Wang Wentao stated that China attaches great importance to China-Netherlands economic and trade cooperation. The measures taken by the Netherlands regarding ASML semiconductors have seriously affected the stability of the global supply chain. China urges the Netherlands to adhere to the spirit of contracts and the principles of marketization and rule of law, and to resolve the issue properly as soon as possible, protecting the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese investors and creating a fair, transparent, and predictable business environment. Adriaansens stated that the Netherlands attaches great importance to the economic and trade relations with China and is willing to communicate closely with China to find constructive solutions to the ASML semiconductor issue.

Gold and silver have rarely plummeted in years! During trading, gold fell over 6% and silver nearly 9%, with Wall Street sounding the alarm for a correction. Gold and silver recorded their largest declines in twelve years and over four years, respectively. Analysts warn that speculative long positions may have accumulated significantly, making gold and silver more susceptible to corrections. The end of India's seasonal buying frenzy has also intensified market pressure There are also analyses suggesting that the fundamentals supporting the rise of precious metals have not changed, and potential buying interest may limit the extent of any pullback.

London Zinc Market Experiences "Short Squeeze": Inventory available for less than one day, spot premium skyrockets to the highest level since 1997! The London Metal Exchange zinc market is facing the most severe squeeze in decades. Due to production cuts by Western smelters and continuous depletion of inventory, LME available zinc stocks are less than one day's demand. The spot zinc price has surged to a premium of USD 323 per ton over the March futures contract (the highest in at least 27 years). Bullish traders hold large positions, forcing shorts to cover or deliver physical zinc, exacerbating the "spot premium" situation.

The Russia-Ukraine situation is full of twists and turns: "Trump-Putin Meeting" preparations encounter obstacles, Europe clearly responds to Trump for the first time, calling for "immediate ceasefire". Leaders from multiple European countries signed a joint statement on the 21st, supporting an immediate ceasefire based on the current front lines and initiating peace talks. However, the Russian Foreign Minister stated that the call for "immediate ceasefire" equates to ignoring the root causes of the conflict and contradicts the consensus previously reached by the presidents of Russia and the United States. This casts a shadow over the preparatory meeting originally scheduled for this week and introduces uncertainty to Trump's earlier announcement of holding the "Trump-Putin Meeting" within "two weeks."

OpenAI launches AI browser ChatGPT Atlas, Google shares drop in response. OpenAI launched its first AI-driven web browser, ChatGPT Atlas, on Tuesday, aimed at providing users with a more personalized online experience while also performing tasks such as booking flights or editing documents. Media reports indicate that this marks a new competitive front between the developer of ChatGPT and Alphabet's Google, with Alphabet's stock price dropping by as much as 4.8% on Tuesday. OpenAI stated that Atlas is now globally available on macOS, with plans to "quickly" expand to Windows, iOS, and Android platforms.

DeepSeek's new model is being praised wildly in Silicon Valley! Compressing one-dimensional text with two-dimensional vision, can run on a single GPU, "Google's core secrets have been open-sourced". DeepSeek has launched a revolutionary OCR model that addresses the computational challenges of AI processing long documents with the clever idea of "a picture is worth a thousand words." This small model with only 3 billion parameters significantly improves processing efficiency by compressing text into images. Industry speculation suggests it may have leaked core technological secrets of Google's Gemini.

• DeepSeek OCR paper goes viral online! Andrej Karpathy: I really like it; Musk: 99% of the future is photons** AI god Karpathy believes that pixels may be superior to text as LLM input, presenting four main reasons: higher information compression efficiency, greater universality of pixels, support for bidirectional attention, and the ability to eliminate Tokenizers that pose security risks. He envisions that in the future, text should be rendered into images before being input into the model. His single graphics card generates 200,000 pages of training data daily, praised by experts like Karpathy and likened to the "JPEG moment of AI." Elon Musk commented that in the long run, 99% of AI model input and output will be photons, as the number of photons in the universe is overwhelmingly dominant, making it the only scalable solution.

The Inside Story of AI's "Trillion-Dollar Closed Loop": The "Offensive and Defensive Strategies" of Contemporary Tech Giants like Altman, Jensen Huang, Nadella, and Masayoshi Son. Sam Altman leveraged the scarcity of computing power and the FOMO sentiment among giants to build a "massive and too big to fail" AI business ecosystem. Microsoft chose to observe, allowing competitors to take risks while maintaining key discourse power; Jensen Huang, with an aggressive stance on the largest computing project in history, deeply intertwined Nvidia's fate with OpenAI; while Masayoshi Son reignited his ambitions under pressure, igniting a global computing arms race with a $500 billion "Stargate."

Challenging TSMC? Report: Samsung's 2nm chip yield shows positive progress, aiming for 70% by year-end, production target raised. Samsung Electronics has made positive progress in the advanced process competition, reportedly raising its year-end yield target for the 2nm GAA process from 50% to 70%. The president of Samsung expressed strong confidence in the technological progress during a meeting and hinted at the desire to compete for the top position in the global foundry market.

Pop Mart's Q3 overall revenue increased by 245%-250% year-on-year, overseas revenue up 365%-370%. Pop Mart's overall revenue in the third quarter of 2025 increased by 245%-250% year-on-year, with overseas revenue growing by 365%-370%, and explosive growth in the Americas market exceeding 1265%. Despite the astonishing growth rate, concerns among investors about whether the company's growth myth can continue, due to a slowdown compared to the first half of the year, led to Pop Mart's Hong Kong stock plummeting over 8.1% on Tuesday.

Brazil's Tax Shock, Netflix's Q3 earnings far below expectations, lowers full-year guidance, and fell 7% in after-hours trading. In the third quarter, Netflix's revenue grew year-on-year by over 17%, in line with analyst expectations; advertising revenue hit a record high for a single quarter; net profit and EPS earnings were at least 14% lower than expected; operating profit margin fell to 28.2%, with $619 million in expenses related to the Brazilian tax dispute causing a 5 percentage point drop in profit margin. Without this expense, the margin could have exceeded the company's guidance of 31.5% Netflix expects that tax disputes will not have a significant impact on future performance, but due to tax issues, it has lowered its operating profit margin guidance for this year from 30% to 29%; it expects advertising revenue to more than double this year, and has raised its full-year free cash flow guidance by 9%.

L'Oréal Q3 sales fall short of expectations, high-end demand recovers in China but North America lags, stock price plummets. In the third quarter, L'Oréal's same-store sales grew by 4.2%, falling short of analyst expectations for two consecutive quarters; same-store sales in North Asia saw a significant turnaround, from a nearly 9% decline in the second quarter to nearly 5% growth, achieving moderate single-digit growth in mainland China, thanks to the recovery of the high-end skincare market; same-store sales growth in North America slowed from over 8% in the second quarter to 1.4%, far below the expected growth rate of 4.4%. After the earnings report was released, L'Oréal's U.S. stock, which had previously risen by 2%, turned negative, dropping more than 6% at one point.

One of the "blow-up" small banks in the U.S. releases earnings report, exceeding most Wall Street analysts' expectations. Last Thursday, the loan fraud cases disclosed by two regional banks in the U.S., Zions Bancorp and Western Alliance Bancorp, triggered market panic. On Tuesday after the U.S. stock market closed, Western Alliance Bancorp, one of the key players based in Phoenix, Arizona, released its earnings report, showing a year-on-year profit increase of over 27%, exceeding most Wall Street analysts' expectations, which undoubtedly relieved investors.

Market top signal? Meme stock craze reappears, Beyond Meat rises sixfold in three days. After a surge of 127% on Monday, Beyond Meat skyrocketed over 146% on Tuesday, marking the largest single-day increase in history. Some analysts point out that Beyond Meat's "resurrection" may also indicate the re-emergence of market bubbles. One of the catalysts for the stock's surge this week was Roundhill including it in a meme ETF, which had previously closed due to lack of investor interest and was only restarted earlier this month due to an influx of retail funds.

Domestic Macro

Learning Times publishes article: Strive to stabilize the stock market to boost consumer confidence for the public. Learning Times stated that although the A-share market is rising overall, volatility undermines consumer confidence. The stock market affects consumption through wealth effects, psychological effects, and expectation effects, and it is necessary to stabilize the stock market from four aspects: improving institutional construction such as information disclosure to stabilize wealth expectations; optimizing multi-level capital markets to promote employment and income growth; strengthening investor protection to alleviate psychological burdens; and enhancing the coordination of monetary, fiscal, and industrial policies to achieve a positive resonance between the stock market and consumption, allowing the public to truly consume, dare to consume, and be willing to consume Learning Times: The Wartime Military Function of Digital Currency. Learning Times published an article stating that digital currency is becoming an invisible battlefield of geopolitical competition, achieving rapid and secure capital flow through blockchain technology. In geopolitical conflicts such as the Russia-Ukraine conflict, three application models have emerged: resource-rich countries are avoiding financial sanctions through resource tokenization, small and medium-sized countries are utilizing decentralized crowdfunding for military assistance, and developed countries are using on-chain technology to track and freeze enemy digital assets.

Hubei: Vigorously Promote the Reform of State-owned "Three Assets" Management! According to Hubei Daily, there is a need to further deepen understanding and grasp more profoundly the three principles of "assetization of all state-owned resources as much as possible, securitization of all state-owned assets as much as possible, and leveraging of all state-owned funds as much as possible." Additionally, there should be a more scientific application of the four methods of "use if possible, sell if not used, rent if not sold, and finance if possible," to further promote greater effectiveness in the reform of state-owned "three assets" management across the province.

Domestic Companies

CATL Conference Call: Capacity at Full Load, Price Increase Not the Core Driving Force, Significant Energy Storage Demand from Data Centers. CATL stated that as the construction of new bases such as Jining progresses, capacity will gradually be released, and the supply tightness will improve. In the future, there will be more energy storage solutions for data centers, and the application of main power sources will increase, leading to significant energy storage demand from data centers. Sodium batteries will start shipping next year and gradually ramp up.

Morgan Stanley: The Chinese Banking Industry Enters a New Era, First "Natural Cycle Bottom" Without Large-scale Stimulus, Good Investment Opportunities in Q4. Morgan Stanley believes that the upcoming dividend distribution, stabilization of interest rates, support from RMB 500 billion structural financial policy tools, and a more sustainable policy path will support the revaluation of Chinese banking stocks in the fourth quarter. Investors should shift their focus to high-quality banks that are likely to profit earlier and rebound stronger in a "natural clearing" environment.

China Telecom Q3 Net Profit Increased by 3.6% Year-on-Year, Revenue Slightly Decreased by 0.91% Year-on-Year.

Overseas Macro

Leverage Alert! The "Frenzy Indicator" of US Stocks Has Surpassed 1999 and 2007. Data from Deutsche Bank tracking NYSE margin debt shows that from the end of April to the end of September, investor leverage surged by 32.4% over five months, a speed only second to the peak of the internet bubble in early 2000 and the stimulus period after the pandemic in August 2020. Deutsche Bank stated that these historical points are all "bad entry points" for investing in risk assets What is more concerning is that the current leverage is accelerating from a historically high level—margin debt as a percentage of nominal GDP in the U.S. is close to the historical peak reached in the third quarter of 2021.

High City Sawae elected Prime Minister, Japanese stocks hit new highs again, Nomura: The key for Japanese stocks is how long she can hold on. High City Sawae has officially been elected as Japan's new Prime Minister, becoming the country's first female leader. Japanese stocks opened to new highs, but the gains receded in the afternoon. However, behind this rally known as the "High City Trade," investors and analysts are shifting their focus from initial expectations of stimulus policies to examining the political stability of her new government, which is seen as key to determining whether market enthusiasm can be sustained.

• High City Sawae's inauguration imminent, Bank of Japan may delay interest rate hike schedule. Bank of Japan officials stated that even if the economy makes progress toward achieving price targets, there is no urgency to raise interest rates next week. This stance echoes High City Sawae's advocacy for monetary easing as she takes office. Many central bank observers believe that the central bank does not want to act too quickly after High City Sawae's inauguration to avoid a repeat of past conflicts with the government over interest rate hikes. Market expectations for a rate hike at the Bank of Japan's policy meeting on October 30 have significantly cooled. Traders currently estimate the likelihood of a rate hike this month at about 25%.

U.S. investment intentions boost Australian rare earth mining companies. After the U.S. and Australia signed a key mineral cooperation agreement, Australian rare earth mining companies saw a collective surge in stock prices. On Monday, Arafura's U.S. stock price soared by 29% at one point, and the optimistic sentiment continued into Tuesday's Australian stock market opening, with Arafura's Australian stock price rising over 8%. VHM rose by 18%, and gallium producer Alcoa increased by 9.6%. The U.S.-Australia cooperation agreement aims to reshape the rare earth supply chain, but analysts point out that most projects are still in the early stages and will take years to reach production.

Wall Street prophet Yardeni: Falling oil prices will drive 10-year U.S. Treasury yields down to 3.75%. Ed Yardeni predicts that if oil prices continue to decline and the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates next week, the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury yield could fall to 3.75%, a level not seen in over a year. Boosted by expectations of rate cuts and concerns over bank risks, U.S. Treasuries have recently rebounded, with current yields around 3.96%. U.S. Treasuries and U.S. stocks are rising in tandem, with bets on a "Goldilocks" soft landing making a comeback.

Bitcoin whales turn to Wall Street: Over $3 billion flows back into the traditional financial system through ETFs. Large investors are exchanging Bitcoin for ETF shares through "physical swaps." By converting Bitcoin into ETF shares, investors can maintain the same exposure to cryptocurrencies while transforming it into a form recognized by the financial system Ironically, Bitcoin was born as a decentralized rebellion against mainstream financial institutions, but it has now been quietly absorbed by these institutions.

Overseas Companies

Apple's foldable iPad development encounters obstacles, expected release date postponed to 2029 or later. Apple is developing an 18-inch foldable iPad, expected to be priced around $3,000, three times that of the regular iPad Pro. The current prototype weighs about 1.59 kilograms, comparable to the MacBook Pro. Apple is collaborating with Samsung Display to develop OLED panels, aiming to eliminate the crease issue in foldable screens, but large seamless foldable displays face significant challenges in technical complexity and cost.

AI-generated videos have become the "traffic ace," and Meta AI downloads have surged. With the launch of its short video feature "Vibes," Meta has achieved explosive growth in user data: daily active users surged from 775,000 to 2.7 million within four weeks, with daily downloads reaching 300,000. This growth contrasts with the user decline of competitors like ChatGPT. OpenAI's Sora's "invitation-only" strategy may also drive users towards alternatives like Meta AI.

Barclays looks ahead to the US AI industry earnings season: beware of "good news fully priced in," hold tight to "Nvidia, Broadcom, and AMD". Barclays states that while still in the early stages of the AI investment cycle, some stocks have fully priced in the benefits of AI deployment, and the earnings season may see a "good news fully priced in" scenario. Investors are advised to be more selective with AI concept stocks, focusing on the three leaders Nvidia, Broadcom, and AMD, while downgrading Marvell, Astera Labs, and Lumentum to neutral ratings and upgrading KLA to an overweight rating.

OCP conference focus: manufacturing and packaging have significantly expanded, AI chip bottlenecks have shifted downstream, including memory, racks, and power. Morgan Stanley's research report points out that the chip manufacturing and packaging stages have expanded significantly and are no longer the core constraints on AI development. The real bottlenecks have shifted to data center power, liquid cooling, HBM memory, racks, and optical modules. Investment opportunities are spreading from wafer foundries to the downstream supply chain, and data centers with power and space resources will have an advantage in the AI computing power competition.

Dalio has replicated "AI Dalio": discussing investments achieves "80% effectiveness of the real person". Dalio has launched his AI clone "Digital Ray." This digital avatar, based on his forty years of thought training, can achieve 80% effectiveness when discussing investments, and even reaches 95% effectiveness in life principles He emphasized that, unlike general AI, his clone replicates its unique values and decision-making logic, aiming to become an always-available "thought partner."

Surge in demand, depleted inventory, storage has become a "seller's market", Morgan Stanley: Investors should not exit due to "fear of heights". Morgan Stanley stated that the AI wave is driving storage chips into a strong upward cycle. The surge in demand and supply lag have caused DRAM inventory to drop below two weeks, and the market has turned into a "seller's market," with manufacturers' price increases reaching as high as 25%. This round of price increases is far from peaking, with prices having the potential to double, and it emphasized that "staying in the market is more important than timing," urging investors not to miss subsequent trends due to "fear of heights."

The center of the cryptocurrency storm—Hyperliquid: No board, no investors' "leverage tool". The decentralized exchange Hyperliquid, with only 11 members, has become the center of the cryptocurrency storm with daily trading volumes exceeding $13 billion due to its anonymity and high leverage. This boardless platform, which rejects venture capital, saw over $10 billion in liquidations in a single day during the recent market crash. However, this model has also plunged it into controversy, as mysterious and precise short-selling on its platform before the recent market volatility has sparked speculation of insider trading.

Coca-Cola's Q3 revenue grew 5% year-on-year, exceeding expectations, but sales stagnated in key markets like North America. Coca-Cola's Q3 net income increased by 5% to $12.5 billion, with organic revenue growing by 6%, mainly due to a successful price mix increase of 6% and strong growth in health beverage products. However, the unit case sales, which measure consumer demand, only slightly increased by 1%, and sales in the two core markets of North America and Latin America saw zero growth, indicating that high living costs continue to suppress consumer demand. The company reaffirmed its full-year performance guidance.

An unexpected surprise under tariff clouds: General Motors Q3 performance exceeded expectations, price increases passed on costs, full-year profit guidance raised. General Motors' adjusted EBIT for Q3 was $3.4 billion, a year-on-year decrease of 18%, but higher than the average analyst expectation of $2.7 billion. The impact of U.S. tariffs is expected to reach $4.5 billion, lower than the previous forecast of $5 billion, while the full-year profit expectation has been raised to $12 billion to $13 billion, higher than the previous expectation of $10 billion to $12.5 billion. After the earnings report was released, General Motors' U.S. stock rose over 9% in pre-market trading.

Today's News Preview

Tesla, SAP, IBM earnings reports.

China Solid-State Battery Conference.

UK September CPI.

European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde's speech U.S. EIA crude oil inventory changes last week.