Markets

Nasdaq Climbs 1.3% as Anthropic's IPO Filing Lifts Chip Stocks and Oil Retreats From Six-Month Highs

U.S. stocks rose Monday morning as Anthropic's public S-1 filing revived interest in chipmakers and oil eased, ahead of a Fed decision and 163 S&P 500 earnings reports this week.

Oct 26, 2026 - 12:13

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U.S. stocks opened the final week of October higher on Monday, October 26, 2026, as a public initial public offering filing from artificial intelligence developer Anthropic revived demand for semiconductor shares and a pullback in crude prices eased some inflation worries. The move followed back-to-back weekly losses for the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite.

In late-morning trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 210 points, or 0.4%, the S&P 500 had gained 1% and the Nasdaq Composite was 1.3% higher, according to CNBC's live markets coverage updated at 11:41 a.m. ET. Yahoo Finance reported similar gains, with the S&P 500 up about 0.8% to 0.9% and the Nasdaq up 1.1% to 1.2% in updates around 11:30 a.m. ET. The figures are intraday and will change before the close.

Anthropic's S-1 lands

Just before the opening bell, Anthropic, PBC, the developer of the Claude AI models, announced that it had filed a registration statement on Form S-1 with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a proposed IPO of its Class A common stock. The company intends to list on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol "ANT." It said the number of shares and the price range have not yet been determined, and named Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley as contacts for the preliminary prospectus.

The filing showed revenue of $16.29 billion for the six months ended June, up 1,304% from $1.16 billion a year earlier, CNBC reported. CNBC's coverage of the filing also noted that 48% of first-half revenue came through Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, that international revenue reached $4.5 billion, and that Anthropic had about $6.2 billion of debt at the end of June against losses of nearly $81 billion in the first half. The prospectus includes more than 90 pages of risk factors, according to CNBC.

Chipmakers lead, neoclouds lag

The iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) rose more than 3%, with Nvidia up 2.6%, Broadcom up 2.2%, Micron up 2% and Advanced Micro Devices up 1.1%, CNBC reported. The rebound came from a depressed level: CNBC said the SOXX was roughly 25% below its high and down 13% for October, placing chipmakers in a bear market.

Shares of Micron gained after a Bank of America research note in which analyst Vivek Arya said he was "incrementally more positive" on the memory industry following meetings with Micron management. Bank of America kept its buy rating and its $1,550 price objective, CNBC reported.

"The market needed this, just like it needed SpaceX," Jay Woods, chief market strategist at Freedom Capital Markets, told CNBC, referring to the Anthropic filing. "This is a big confidence booster."

Not all AI-linked stocks participated. Specialized AI cloud providers known as neoclouds extended last week's decline, with CoreWeave down 1.7% and Nebius Group down 3.7%, according to CNBC.

Meta's $95 billion plan and other movers

Meta Platforms said Monday it plans to raise a total of $95 billion to fund AI infrastructure, starting with $35 billion in underwritten public equity offerings followed by a $60 billion at-the-market program, CNBC reported. Meta said Nvidia, AMD and Broadcom were interested in buying up to $5 billion of shares. Meta's stock was down 1.6% in morning trading after the announcement.

Communication services was among the weakest sectors. CNBC said the Communication Services Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLC) hit its lowest level since June 2025, while Verizon fell 3.2% after reporting third-quarter results. Consumer discretionary and information technology led the S&P 500, up 1.7% and 1.1% respectively, with nine of 11 sectors higher shortly before 11 a.m. ET.

In deal news, Range Resources rose about 15% before the open after EQT agreed to buy the natural gas producer in an all-stock transaction, CNBC reported.

Oil, the Fed and earnings

Brent crude futures fell 1.8% to $114.57 a barrel and West Texas Intermediate slid more than 2% to $100.60, CNBC reported, after Brent hit its highest level since April on Friday. Fed funds futures implied about a 90% probability that the Federal Reserve will hold its target range at 3.75% to 4% when it announces its decision on Wednesday.

This is the peak week of third-quarter earnings season, with 163 S&P 500 companies scheduled to report, including Alphabet and Microsoft on Wednesday and Amazon on Thursday, according to CNBC.

Overseas markets and Friday's close

In Asia, Japan's Nikkei 225 closed 0.80% lower at 62,189.65, while the Topix gained 0.18%. South Korea's Kospi fell 1.46% to 5,469.47 and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.17% to 8,809.9. European markets opened broadly higher, with France's CAC 40 up 0.5% at the open, CNBC reported.

On Friday, the Dow fell 652.82 points, or 1.23%, to 52,215.16, the S&P 500 lost 0.52% to 7,623.68 and the Nasdaq slipped 0.21% to 25,955.34, according to Reuters. For that week, the S&P 500 fell 0.5% and the Nasdaq dropped 0.7%, while the Dow rose 0.4%.