Wall Street ended lower on Thursday as a record fall in Alphabet shares dragged down technology stocks and revived investor anxiety about the cost of the artificial intelligence boom.
The Nasdaq Composite fell 1.37% to 26,184.72, the S&P 500 lost 0.30% to close at 7,720.39, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.25% to 52,342.56.
Alphabet, Google’s parent company, plunged around 13% — its biggest one-day fall on record — after quarterly results that missed expectations and pointed to sharply higher cash burn from AI spending. The drop wiped roughly $500 billion off the company’s market value. Communication services stocks fell 6.6%, their biggest drop since February 2022, while healthcare shares rose 2.5%.
The sell-off came on a day when the economic news was strong: official figures showed the US economy grew at a 3.4% annual rate in the third quarter, powered by consumer spending and business investment in AI. Investors, however, focused on what the AI buildout is costing the companies funding it.
Selling continued after the closing bell. Amazon and Intel both reported heavy cash burn in late earnings, and Intel shares tumbled around 18–20% in extended trading, pulling chip stocks lower across Asia on Friday morning.
What to watch: whether Friday’s session stabilises once the Bank of Japan’s rate decision is out of the way, and how the remaining big-tech results land next week.
Sources: Reuters — “Trading Day: Communication breakdown” (30 Oct 2026); Reuters market wrap via Business Today Malaysia (30 Oct 2026).
