Daily newsletter · Fri 30 Oct 2026
 | Sharespective Wall Street, before morning tea | Daily newsletter Fri 30 Oct 2026 |
 Half a Trillion Plus: Eli Lilly closed at a record after its weight-loss drugs lifted sales 39%. |
Good morning, and welcome to Friday. Alphabet had its worst day as a listed company on Thursday. The shares fell 12.64%, and about US$500 billion of market value went with them. The NASDAQ Composite dropped 1.38%, while the S&P 500 lost only 0.30%.
Amazon reported after the close and slid in late trading, so the argument over what AI spending is worth runs into a second day. Money left tech for drugmakers, and Eli Lilly rose 6.63% to a record. It was a better day to own a weight-loss drug.
In other company news, ServiceNow fell 26.96% after it forecast slower growth in new bookings, its worst day since listing in 2012. Elsewhere, ADT jumped 33.20% because Thrive Holdings agreed to buy the home-security company for US$10 a share in cash. Finally, Crocs rose 25.54% after its HeyDude brand returned to growth and it raised its full-year outlook.
Ouch, Mountain View.
Market snapshot
S&P 500 7,720.39 ▼ 0.30% | | NASDAQ 26,184.73 ▼ 1.38% | | NZX 50 13,710.17 ▲ 0.14% |
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ASX 200 8,891.80 ▲ 0.50% | | Alphabet US$283.82 ▼ 12.64% | | Eli Lilly US$1,373.70 ▲ 6.63% |
| BIG TECH |
Alphabet had its worst day since listing in 2004, and Amazon's cash flow sank further below zero
Alphabet shares closed at US$283.82 on Thursday, the day after its results. The fall erased about US$500 billion, the second-largest one-day loss for any US-listed company. Only Nvidia, which shed US$593 billion in January 2025, has lost more.
The problem is the cash. Free cash flow, the money left after running the business and paying for equipment, was negative US$9.1 billion in the September quarter. It was Alphabet's second quarter in a row below zero.
Chief financial officer Anat Ashkenazi said spending would rise significantly again in 2027. She gave no number. Alphabet already expects to spend between US$195 billion and US$205 billion this year.
Amazon reported after Thursday's close and hit the same nerve. AWS, its cloud business, grew 39%, the fastest pace in nearly five years. But free cash flow over the past 12 months was an outflow of US$42.4 billion, against an inflow of US$14.8 billion a year earlier.
Amazon's earnings and advertising sales also came in below forecasts. The shares fell as much as 10% in late trading before recovering some ground.
The open question our read is that the market has stopped paying for cloud growth on its own. Both companies grew their cloud businesses faster than forecast, and both are spending faster still. Neither said on Thursday when that spending turns back into cash. |
| HEALTH CARE |
Eli Lilly closed at a record after its weight-loss drugs lifted sales 39%
Eli Lilly rose 6.63% to US$1,373.70 on Thursday, a record close. Revenue grew 39% to US$24.4 billion in the September quarter, against the US$22.62 billion analysts expected.
Two versions of one medicine did most of the work. Mounjaro, sold for diabetes, brought in US$10.7 billion, up 65%. Zepbound, the same drug sold for weight loss, made US$5.3 billion, up 49%.
Lilly is selling far more doses for less money each. Its prices fell 15% worldwide in the quarter and 29% outside the US. Part of that came from China adding Mounjaro to the list of drugs its national health insurance pays for.
Lilly raised its full-year revenue forecast to between US$91 billion and US$92 billion, from US$85 billion to US$87 billion. It trimmed its profit forecast by 50 cents a share, to between US$35 and US$36.
Health care stocks closed at a record as investors moved money out of tech. Lilly is now worth about US$1.2 trillion.
The catch each new market Lilly wins comes at a lower price per dose, and that works only while volumes grow this fast. AbbVie reports before Friday's open in New York, and its results will show whether the move into drugmakers runs wider than Lilly. |
| ECONOMY |
The US economy grew 3.4% last quarter, but September's spending went on higher prices
The US economy grew at an annualised 3.4% in the September quarter, the Commerce Department said on Thursday. That was faster than economists expected, and up from 2.2% in the June quarter.
So where did the money go? In September, most of it went on higher prices. Americans spent 0.5% more than in August, and prices rose 0.5% too. After inflation, spending barely moved.
Incomes are falling behind. Personal income rose only 0.2% in September, and income after tax and inflation fell 0.3%.
Inflation is also moving the wrong way for the Fed. The PCE price index, its preferred measure, rose 3.6% in the year to September, up from 3.4% in August. Core inflation, which leaves out food and energy, rose to 3.1%.
Next up traders put the chance of a December Fed rise at 84.6% after Thursday's figures, up from 82.6% after Wednesday's decision. I'd want to see incomes catch up with prices before reading strong growth as a sign of a strong consumer. Until they do, the extra spending is coming out of savings. |
Newsworthy numbers
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US$17 billion what DoorDash agreed on Thursday to pay for Instacart, at US$65 a share. The deal is not expected to close before the end of 2027. | | US$184 million sales of Foundayo, Lilly's new pill, in its first full quarter on sale. |
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42 minutes the daily dose of bright light, at 5,000 lux or more, linked to about a 17% lower risk of dementia in a study of 87,577 UK adults wearing wrist trackers. | | 3.8% the share of after-tax income Americans saved in September, down from 4.0% in August. |
Worth a read
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01 | Up to three interest rate hikes and a recession on the cards as inflation woes persist — David Taylor asks economists how far the RBA might go. Former NAB chief economist Alan Oster warns that two or three more rises would cause a recession. |
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02 | How hoop dreams became a $20m reality — Bill Meincke on Huupe, which makes basketball hoops that track every shot and coach you live. Its prototype was trucked 2,000 miles to a Shark Tank pitch that never aired. |
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03 | Could the ban on card surcharges lead to a rise in tax evasion? — Md Akhtaruzzaman of Australian Catholic University on why the ban, in force since 1 October, may tempt shops to push cash. Cash fell from 69% of Australian payments in 2007 to 15% in 2025. |
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04 | A 700,000-year-old Elephant Tooth Reveals a Lost World Where Early Humans Lived — University of Haifa researchers read the wear on a straight-tusked elephant's molar from northern Israel. It points to forests, rivers and wetlands that early humans shared with the giants. |
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05 | Road Trip at the Borderland — Aube Rey Lescure drives China's border with North Korea with her father, a month after his cancer surgery, and her 81-year-old grandmother, who hides cash under relatives' photo frames. |
Wrapping up
US clocks go back an hour on Sunday, 1 November. From Tuesday, the New York close lands at 10am in Auckland and 8am in Sydney, an hour later than now. US data due at 8.30am in New York arrives at 2.30am in Auckland, 12.30am in Sydney.
Americans vote in the midterm elections on Tuesday, 3 November, for all 435 House seats and about a third of the Senate. The first results arrive around noon on Wednesday in Auckland, 10am in Sydney.
USD/NZD held at 1.78 and USD/AUD at 1.42, both little changed on Thursday.
Get the Melbourne Cup sweep sorted, Australia. See you tomorrow.