US natural gas was the single biggest mover in the tables, up 12.09 percent to 3.13 dollars per million British thermal units after trading near 2.79 dollars earlier in the week. No single US supply headline in this morning’s reporting explains a move of that size on its own; it arrived alongside the European spike, colder forecasts and the broader energy risk premium, and it unwinds most of the autumn slide in one session (see today’s European gas story).
Tanker freight rose 11.99 percent, corroborating tight shipping as tanker capacity is repriced for Gulf risk and longer routes, while dry bulk freight fell 4.16 percent on soft grain and Chinese industry demand signals. Brent touched a five-month high intraday after the Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and Aramco’s evacuation of its Dhahran headquarters, even though the tables’ earlier snapshot closed Brent down 3.06 percent at 109.71 dollars (see today’s Brent story for the timing reconciliation).
Meta fell 6.98 percent to 648.85 dollars, the largest megacap decline, inside a broad technology selloff driven by AI spending worries: Meta’s negative free cash flow of 2.12 billion dollars and the sector’s capital intensity were the reported triggers, with the Nasdaq 100 down 2.90 percent (see today’s tech selloff story). Semiconductors fell 6.79 percent as a group, and Lam Research dropped about 11.8 percent despite record quarterly revenue of 8.22 billion dollars, citing supply constraints and a 35 percent China revenue share (see today’s Lam Research story). Amazon fell 4.57 percent in the same liquidation, with no company-specific driver in this morning’s reporting beyond the sector move.
The miners sold off far harder than the metals they produce. Silver miners fell 6.65 percent, copper miners 6.27 percent and gold miners 5.80 percent, while gold itself fell only 0.54 percent to 4,038.30 dollars, silver fell 1.61 percent and copper actually rose 1.24 percent to 6.44 dollars. Gold traded near a three-month low as tech liquidation and higher-for-longer rate expectations outweighed the safe-haven bid, and the equity leverage to that modest metal move did the rest (see today’s gold story and the mining brief’s market frame).
The cross-market read is a two-sided risk event, not a simple risk-off day. Energy and shipping priced a supply shock, growth equities and the miners priced liquidation, and bonds priced safety: the 10-year Treasury yield fell 19.3 basis points to 4.95 percent, below 5 percent for the first time since September 23, in its largest one-day fall since March 2023, with the 5-year down 20.4 basis points to 4.77 percent. That rally is being driven by equity risk rather than inflation relief, which makes it fragile heading into the Federal Reserve’s October 27 to 28 meeting.