Closing Bell: 10/30/26

Anthropic

Across the shows: 71 speakers in other episodes, 80 bullish and 61 bearish calls, past 30 days

• Dan Ives · Yorkville Ives & Co.Bullish

  Anthropic's ~$1.5T IPO valuation will hold despite funding strain; bullish on its growth runway.

  Ives calls Anthropic foundational to the AI buildout and expects significant growth over the coming years given its position in enterprise. He thinks the roughly $1.5 trillion valuation will still be there even though the company must raise a large amount of money, which he compares to the Oracle arms race. That capital need puts Anthropic in the penalty box with bond investors for now, and he expects it can regain investment-grade status as it proves out its model. Investors are already giving it the benefit of the doubt.

  “I continue to think that sort of 1,500,000,000,000 valuation will continue to be there.”at 6:16

• Aswath Damodaran · NYU Stern School of BusinessBearish

  Anthropic is borrowing before it is ready; contractual commitments without equity put its story at risk.

  Damodaran says it has never made sense to him that young companies enter contractual commitments, as Anthropic is doing, without putting in equity. Such firms risk their whole story to lock in commitments. He sees the credit-rating news as biting Anthropic because it is using debt before it is ready to use debt. He thinks the rating story matters more for lenders than for equity holders.

  “It's never made sense to me that young companies which go out and enter into these contractual commitments as Anthropic is doing... So I think that's what's biting them is essentially the use of debt before they're ready to use debt.”at 9:02

• Aswath Damodaran · NYU Stern School of BusinessBearish

  Anthropic's $1.5T IPO price assumes a royal-flush outcome; intrinsic value only about $1.4-1.5T.

  Damodaran models Anthropic reaching about $1 trillion in revenue in ten years, a royal-flush scenario he says is not even his base case. He gives it margins near the top of the software business and assumes compute gets cheaper and more accessible. That yields roughly $1.4-1.5 trillion before any discount for governance issues. Pricing the company at $1.5 trillion therefore means pricing in that best case. He sees a plausible path but worries the company will have to change course, and notes its founders effectively control it, which makes adaptability a test.

  “I think that even if you go with the royal flush, but this is not even a base case. A royal flush, a trillion dollar revenues in ten years, which would be huge... I get to about 1.4 to 1,500,000,000,000.”at 17:50

• Jeremy Siegel · WisdomTreeNeutral

  Anthropic should float about $30B more equity instead of borrowing from skittish bond markets.

  Siegel argues Anthropic could issue about $30 billion more stock, only about 2% of its market value, avoiding the bond market and sub-investment-grade status, so everyone could buy it. He says bondholders take the downside without the upside, while equity holders share in the upside. Given a skittish bond market, he thinks the company should raise more equity rather than debt.

  “Why doesn't it just, float $30,000,000,000 more of stock? That's only two more percent of its market value. Then it wouldn't have to tap the bond market, then it wouldn't have to be noninvestment grade...”at 20:48

• Jeremy Siegel · WisdomTreeBullish

  Anthropic's IPO will be the SpaceX of the fall; investors should want a small piece.

  Siegel calls Anthropic's IPO the SpaceX of the fall. He notes that companies worth more than $2 trillion going public is unprecedented, and that OpenAI could follow early next year. He argues investors should want a little piece of it. He still expects Anthropic to go ahead in November despite the Feet report, and says IPO prices track enthusiasm for the industry being floated.

  “it's gonna be the, you know, the SpaceX of of of the of the fall... you want a little a little piece in that”at 28:08

Invesco QQQ Trust (Nasdaq-100 ETF)

• Dan Greenhaus · Solus Alternative Asset ManagementUncertain

  Nasdaq 100 nears its 200-day average; a bounce there could mark a basing area for a year-end rally.

  Greenhaus notes the Nasdaq 100 is coming up on its 200-day moving average. He says that doesn't automatically mean a bounce, but the level is often important. He expects a little more downside before reaching it. If the level holds and there are no other terrible headlines, it could be a basing area for a rally into year-end.

  “the [QQQ] are coming up on the two hundred day moving average. And not that that automatically means a bounce, but it quite often is important.”at 42:24

VanEck Semiconductor ETF

Across the shows: 4 speakers in other episodes, 1 bullish and 3 bearish calls, past 30 days

• Oliver Renick · CNBCBearish

  Options traders are heavily buying puts on the semiconductor ETF, signaling bearish positioning.

  Renick reports that the options market shows no buy-the-dip reaction in tech trades. In the memory ETF DRAM, puts outnumber calls. In SMH, more than two and a half puts traded for every call. Total put premium in the Nasdaq reached about $2.5 billion, against $1.5 billion in calls, while VIX hit its highest level since April.

  “In memory ETF DRAM... There's more puts trading than calls today, and in SMH, there were more than two and a half puts traded for every call”at 45:56

AI infrastructure & data centers

• Dan Ives · Yorkville Ives & Co.

  Hyperscalers and AI builders will spend $3-4T over three to four years despite bumps; focus on winners.

  Ives sees strong hyperscaler capex and cloud numbers, which show huge enterprise adoption. He acknowledges cracks such as CoreWeave, Oracle and Anthropic, and says capital is scarce, which could mean capital increases and a game of musical chairs in which some players are left without a chair. Fundamentally he expects $3-4 trillion of spending over the next three to four years, with bumps along the way. He says the market is underestimating the scale and scope of the build-out over the next 12 to 18 months and advises focusing on the winners in chips, hyperscale and software.

  “But my view fundamentally is you're gonna have 3 to 4,000,000,000,000 spent next three to four years. We'll go through bumps in the road.”at 10:19

• Aswath Damodaran · NYU Stern School of Business

  The rush on AI capex, agents and growth is dangerous; the market is right to force a slowdown.

  Damodaran sees three linked groups: AI builders spending trillions on capex, chip suppliers like Broadcom that supply them, and labs like Anthropic and OpenAI leasing the space. They are interconnected, so if one falls it drags the others down, as the market showed that day. He reads the sell-off as the market telling the sector to slow down. He argues the slowdown could be the best thing for the AI business, because the rush to capex, agents and growth is dangerous for AI as a business and for everyone else.

  “I think that that might actually be the best thing to happen to the AI business is for this process to slow down. The rush towards CapEx, the rush towards getting AI agents out there, the rush to grow, I think is dangerous for AI as a business and dangerous for the rest of us.”at 16:48

• Dan Greenhaus · Solus Alternative Asset Management

  Midterms and the following two years will be worse for data centers and AI than the prior two years.

  Greenhaus has long argued that the coming two years after the elections will be worse for data centers and AI than the preceding two. He says clarity on the election outcome would help investors move past it. But he thinks the core problem is that the names were held into the election as long as they kept performing. This quarter's slowdown in core businesses makes them less desirable to hold into a series of negative headlines from Washington.

  “elections and the coming two years are gonna be worse for data centers and AI than the [preceding], let's say, two years.”at 42:56

• Stephanie Aliaga · J.P. Morgan Asset Management

  AI buildout is shifting to external financing, so investor sentiment will shape how much gets built.

  Aliaga says the AI investment boom is moving from a cash-funded phase to one that is much more externally financed. That makes investor sentiment a huge factor in how much gets built and how these companies are rewarded. She says sentiment has been skittish because of many worries, but she expects a better position going forward.

  “Big picture, we're shifting from what has been a very cash investment boom to one that is much more externally financed, which means that investor sentiment can be a huge factor when it comes to how much gets built”at 48:18

• Kevin Simpson · Capital Wealth Planning

  Data center spending faces tougher prospects under the next Congress; he expects selling to continue into Tuesday.

  Simpson expects a possible sell-the-news event around Tuesday. He then points to uncertainty over data center spending under the next government and Congress, and says things are going to be more difficult. He says a 20% decline does not give the all-clear, since the stocks may have been up a lot before. He wants more patience and more news next week.

  “data center spend and what that might look like in terms of the next government, the next congress. I think things are gonna be a little bit more difficult.”at 50:16

AI: overall outlook

• Jeremy Siegel · WisdomTree

  AI uncertainty, both upside and downside, has never been greater; investors should diversify beyond AI.

  Siegel says the uncertainty about AI, for both upside and downside, has never been greater, which is why the market moves so sharply on AI news. That argues for diversifying into non-AI stocks and not forgetting them, and for holding bonds, which have done well over the period. He frames the rotation into utilities, staples, health care and energy as hedges, the kind of insurance investors buy against an AI slowdown, which would also bring interest rates down.

  “the uncertainty about AI, both for upside and downside, has never been greater. ... how important it is to be diversified into the non AI stocks and not forget about them.”at 23:14

• Stephanie Aliaga · J.P. Morgan Asset Management

  AI demand and monetization visibility is improving; this week's stock moves are not justified by the news.

  Aliaga argues the market now has much more visibility on AI demand and monetization. She says the size of the stock moves after this week's earnings reports is not justified given the good news in AI-native sectors. She sees the AI monetizers, semiconductors and hyperscalers as the clearest winners at this phase.

  “We are getting a lot more visibility around AI demand and AI monetization, which the magnitudes of the moves and stocks that we saw this week following some of these earnings reports, I don't think is really justified”at 48:46

US stock market outlook

• Jeremy Siegel · WisdomTree

  The market pullback is mild; value and equal-weight indexes are near highs, so no big decline is coming.

  Siegel puts the selloff in perspective. The Nasdaq is down about 9% from its all-time high, which is only pullback territory, the mildest form of decline. The S&P 500 is down about 2%, while S&P value indexes are at all-time highs and the equal-weight index is within about 1% of its high. Tech entered correction territory, but it is still up about 17% for the year, ahead of the S&P's roughly 11-12% gain, which is above its historical average. Overleveraged investors will be hurt, but he does not see the broader market and economy heading into a big decline. Wapner pushed back that about 60% of S&P 500 constituents are down 20% or more from their highs.

  “But when I take a look at the entire market and what's going on in the entire economy, I don't feel that this is a [sign] of something that's gonna be a big decline.”at 24:22

• Stephanie Aliaga · J.P. Morgan Asset Management

  Stays positive on the US market; valuations look attractive given fundamentals and earnings power.

  Aliaga says she is positive on the market. She cites lower interest rates and better visibility on AI demand and monetization. She says current valuations, given the fundamentals and earnings power beneath the market, make it an attractive time to invest.

  “I am. And I think where valuations are today, I mean, given the fundamentals and the earnings power beneath this market, it's an attractive time.”at 48:53

Software & SaaS

• Dan Ives · Yorkville Ives & Co.

  AI is disrupting advertising, memory and software incumbents; a near-term disruptive period lies ahead.

  Ives says the monetization of the AI spend is starting, but investor patience is wearing thin. He points to disruption in advertising at Alphabet, memory at Intel, and software at ServiceNow and Fortinet as evidence that the reset is real. He still believes this is a near-term disruptive period for these businesses. Spending and cloud strength coexist with this disruption, which is why he sees the week's sell-off as nervousness.

  “the monetization is starting, but patience, as we've always talked about, is wearing thin. And when you look what's happening on the advertising side with Alphabet, on the memory side with Intel, on the software side with ServiceNow and Fortinet, it's disruption. I still believe this is a near term disruptive period,”at 19:52

US rates & the Fed

• Dan Greenhaus · Solus Alternative Asset Management

  Fed likely hikes again in December; odds are at least 50-50 after officials' hawkish remarks.

  Greenhaus says several Fed officials are reminding markets that another hike is probably coming in December. He does not see it as a foregone conclusion, but he puts the odds at at least 50-50, and possibly a bit higher. He says the Treasury market is a corollary to what is happening in equities, so yields are moving with the risk-on, risk-off trade.

  “we're probably gonna get another hike in December. I don't think that's a foregone definitive conclusion, but at this point, it's probably at least fifty fifty, if not a bit higher.”at 43:53

Pharma & biotech

• Stephanie Aliaga · J.P. Morgan Asset Management

  Health care earnings should grow in the upper teens next year, and its valuations are not demanding.

  Aliaga says health care is supposed to see solid, upper-teens earnings growth next year. She argues its valuations have not been very demanding, so the sector looks attractive. She sees it as part of a broader rotation away from concentrated tech names.

  “[Health] care is supposed to see really solid, you know, upper, the teens earnings growth next year. And those valuations have not been super demanding.”at 51:15

Market sentiment, positioning & volatility

• Kevin Simpson · Capital Wealth Planning

  Absence of retail dip-buying suggests the tech selloff is not over yet.

  Simpson says retail investors are not buying the dip, which tells him the selloff is not over. He is not a bear and is not going to cash, but he advises patience. He would rather pay a bit more for something he is more comfortable with than try to get in before the selling ends.

  “But you're not seeing the dip buying, Scott, by the retail investors, so that tells me it's not over yet.”at 51:53