Good afternoon and welcome to Markets Desk. Here is what is moving the tape right now.
Nvidia and Micron are positioned to dominate this earnings season in a way few individual companies ever have. According to Goldman Sachs and FactSet estimates, these two chipmakers alone are expected to account for more than a third of the S&P five hundred's earnings-per-share growth for the third quarter. For index fund holders, that concentration is impossible to ignore.
Adding fuel to the semiconductor rally, a new report painting OpenAI's financial picture in a more optimistic light sent both Nvidia and Micron shares bouncing Friday. Investors had been watching OpenAI's funding dynamics closely, given how central the company is to AI chip demand. Clarity on that front was enough to lift sentiment across the complex.
Meanwhile, on the AI theme heading into bank earnings, watch for Bank of America's October fourteenth call. CEO Brian Moynihan already told a Barclays conference that the bank's AI program spans over one hundred thirty projects at a cost of four hundred million dollars, generating eight hundred million in benefits. Whether that number lands on the earnings call could set a new benchmark for how financial institutions quantify AI returns.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
