Stock Market Today

It seems the Wednesday rally came too late to save the American Association of Individual Investors’ (AAII) retail focused weekly investor survey, which edged more bearish:

AAII Bulls (those who see higher stock prices in six months, blue line) fell to 34.1%, the least in six weeks, from 37.8% the prior week (still though above the 28.8% seven weeks ago, which was the least since September 2025), and falling back below the long-term historical average of 37.5% after a week above.

Bulls also remained below the level of the Bears (who see lower stock prices in 6 months, red line), as the Bears rose to 48.4%, the most in seven weeks, from 41.4% the prior week (still though below the 53.3% seven weeks ago, the highest since May 2025). That leaves Bulls above Bears just twice in the last 16 weeks. Bears also remain above the long-term average of 31.0% for a 38th straight week (and they’ve only been below it 9 weeks since Dec 12, 2024).

The Neutral camp (yellow line) dropped to 17.5%, the least in two weeks, from 20.7% (just above the 17.3% two weeks ago, which was the least since early April). It remains under the long-run average of 31.5% and has been over that only twice since July 2024.

In U.S. economic data, Thursday brings us Q3 productivity and unit labor costs, plus October Challenger job cuts/hires. We’ll also get the weekly unemployment claims.

Cleveland Fed President Hammack (voter) speaks on stablecoins and safe-haven currencies in Zurich at 8:50am ET, Richmond Fed President Barkin (non-voter) participates in a moderated Q&A at 9:10am ET, and Dallas Fed President Logan (voter) moderates a discussion on AI and the workforce at 7pm ET.

The Bank of England announces its decision at 7am ET.

There are no non-Bill (>1yr in maturity) U.S. Treasury auctions, but Treasury holds a buyback of up to $4 billion of 1-month to 2-year securities at 1:40pm ET.

Also, a White House committee is scheduled to hold a closed hearing on allegations against Fed Governor Lisa Cook and whether there’s cause for her removal, per Bloomberg (via @C_Barraud).

38 S&P 500 components report, three of them with market caps over $100bn:

Before the open: ConocoPhillips (COP), Parker Hannifin (PH), Southern Co. (SO), Duke Energy (DUK), Cigna (CI), Air Products (APD), Cummins (CMI), Targa Resources (TRGP), Cardinal Health (CAH), Sempra (SRE), Becton Dickinson (BDX), Rockwell Automation (ROK), Kimberly-Clark (KMB), Iron Mountain (IRM), Zoetis (ZTS), DTE Energy (DTE), Verisk Analytics (VRSK), Ralph Lauren (RL), Tapestry (TPR), Viatris (VTRS) and Evergy (EVRG)

After the close: Airbnb (ABNB), Monster Beverage (MNST), EOG Resources (EOG), Simon Property (SPG), Devon Energy (DVN), Consolidated Edison (ED), Microchip Technology (MCHP), Live Nation (LYV), Axon (AXON), Mettler-Toledo (MTD), Ameren (AEE), Steris (STE), Solventum (SOLV), Regency Centers (REG), Camden Property (CPT), Akamai (AKAM) and Wynn Resorts (WYNN)

Outside the S&P 500, Sony (SONY), National Grid (NGG) and ArcelorMittal (MT) report before the open, Cloudflare (NET) after the close, and Toyota (TM) at a time not yet announced.

Ex-U.S. highlights include U.K. October new car registrations and construction PMI, Japan September labor cash earnings, Germany September factory orders and October construction PMI, France September industrial production, Italy September retail sales, Eurozone September PPI and Sweden October CPI.

Besides the BoE, Norges Bank, Malaysia and Mexico announce rate decisions, ECB President Lagarde speaks, the ECB opens its annual money markets conference, Canada releases its 2026 federal budget and the China International Import Expo begins in Shanghai.