Welcome to Markets Desk, here's what's moving the needle this Saturday.
Berkshire Hathaway more than doubled its share buybacks in the third quarter, even as both operating and overall earnings declined. The acceleration signals that Warren Buffett sees Berkshire's own shares as among the most attractive places to deploy capital right now, a telling posture from one of the market's most disciplined allocators.
Shifting to the semiconductor space, Intel, Arm, and Marvell have each shed roughly half their value since June, and Intel's guidance isn't helping sentiment. The company is projecting fourth-quarter adjusted earnings per share of twenty-five cents, less than half what it posted in the third quarter. Of the three names, analysts are parsing carefully which, if any, represents a genuine value entry rather than a falling knife.
And a story with long-term consequences for tens of millions of Americans — Social Security's retirement trust fund is now projected to exhaust its reserves in the fourth quarter of two thousand thirty-two. After that point, an automatic benefit cut of roughly twenty-two percent would kick in by law, no vote required, no legislative action needed. A recent TIAA survey found more than one in five Americans are unaware that cliff is approaching.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
