WSJ Your Money Briefing - What’s News in Markets: CoreWeave Selloff, Apple Milestone, Borrowing Boom

Episode Date: October 17, 2026

What does the CoreWeave selloff signal for the AI trade? And will the iPhone Duo revive Apple’s sales? Plus, why are brokerages like Charles Schwab cracking down on margin loans? Host Imani Moise discusses the biggest stock moves of the week and the news that drove them. Sign up for the WSJ's free Markets A.M. newsletter. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Your money briefing is still on a break, but we'll be back with more personal finance information for you in the future. Until then, here's the news moving the markets this week. Hey listeners, it's Saturday, October 17th. I'm Imani Moise for the Wall Street Journal. And this is what's news in markets. Our look at the biggest stock moves of the week and news that drove them. Let's dive in. The bull market turned four years old this week.

Happy birthday. Very cute age. But fears of higher interest rates crash. the party. As of Monday, the S&P 500 had more than doubled since October 12, 2022, marking the longest run for stocks since the rally that followed the 2008 crisis and ended in 2020. Remember that pandemic thing? But by Wednesday, investors weren't celebrating. Inflation came in hotter than economists expected, adding to bets that the Federal Reserve could raise interest rates again this month. And those worries spilled over into the AI trade,

where companies have been borrowing heavily to drive growth. All those forces collided this week, leading the S&P 500 and NASDAQ to have their worst single-day performance since July. Investors fleeing the stock market found refuge and bonds. The benchmark 10-year treasury yield notched its biggest weekly decline since February as investors piled in.

The NASDAQ led the declines following about 4.5% for the week. The S&P 500 lost just under 2%. and the Dow bucked the trend, eking out a 0.7% gain. Corweave has become a weather vein for one of the riskiest corners of the AI trade, and this week, it weathered or a tornado, making it our laggard of the week. Shares plunged more than 25% this week, as investors grew increasingly nervous about the mountain of debt supporting the AI boom. That's particularly bad news for Corweave.

The former crypto mining company now rents out powerful computer chips, to AI developers. But building that infrastructure is expensive, and Corleave has racked up at least $35 billion in debt to finance its growth. And it's projected to burn through around $80 billion of cash over the next three and a half years, at least according to one analysis. One of its biggest backers, Nvidia, came to its defense Thursday. CEO Jensen Huang said Cori's strength was improving every day. But Wall Street is getting more selective about which AI companies it's willing to finance. The anxiety spread across the AI trade with the most heavily indebted AI companies leading the sell-off. Shares and rival infrastructure companies, Nebius and Iran, also tumbled, falling 25% and 23%

respectively. Our leader of the week is Apple, which finally joined the exclusive $5 trillion dollar club. Apple had flirted with a $5 trillion market value six times since July, but couldn't hold on to the milestone through the closing bell. That changed Wednesday, when it became just the second company ever, after Nvidia, to close above that threshold. Overall, the iPhone maker shares rose more than 2% this week, standing out against a broader tech sell-off to reach that record high. One reason investors are excited about Apple right now? It's new $2,000 foldable phone. Pre-orders for the iPhone duo opened Friday, and early demand appears strong. Barron's is reporting that delivery dates for the duo are already stretching into late January.

That's raising hopes that Apple's expensive new device could help revive sales, particularly after signs that consumers weren't necessarily rushing to get their hands on new models. Analysts noticed shorter wait times for the iPhone 18 Pro. And finally, our number of the week is, $188 billion. That's how much investors owed Charles Schwab at the end of September, through what's called margin loans. And those balances are nearly double the amount from a year ago. Margin loans let investors borrow against stocks and other investments they already own, boosting potential upside, but also magnifying potential losses. The borrowing binge is being

fueled by one strategy in particular. It's called long-short tax-aware investing. Here's how it works. Investors borrow money to buy stocks they expect to rise and bet against stocks they expect to fall. This creates opportunities to realize losses that offset taxable gains. While the strategy can generate savings for clients, its rapid growth creates risk for brokerages like Schwab, which carry the loans on their balance sheets. The surge prompted the company to, quote, throttle growth by raising the minimum investment for some new accounts from $1 million to $10 million. rival fidelity has stopped opening new accounts altogether. But Schwab is already developing its own version of the strategy that's easier to manage, because it doesn't see demand slowing.

As Schwab's CEO put it, saving money on taxes is something clients love to do. And now you know what's news in markets this week. You can read about more stocks that moved on the week's news and our live markets coverage on WSJ.com. Today's show was produced by Michael LaValle with Deputy Editor Chris Sinsley. I'm Imani Moise. Have a great weekend and see you next Saturday.