Intel Sinks 25% as High-Beta Stocks Slide; Staples Head for Best Month Since 2019

Chipmaker Intel is down 25% in pre-market trading after warning that it probably won't generate positive free cash flow next year, as spending on new factories rises sharply. Its fourth-quarter sales forecast also fell short of estimates, overshadowing a third-quarter beat. Online retailer and cloud provider Amazon is down about 6% after missing profit and revenue forecasts, even though its AWS cloud business grew 39%. The selling is heaviest in the stocks most sensitive to market swings: a basket of 50 high-beta stocks is down about 7%, one of its worst 1.5% of days since 2020, while the rest of the market is roughly flat. The S&P 500 is down 1% and the Nasdaq-100 about 2.4%.

Chip stocks are falling with them, sorted more by how much they swing with the market than by how much chip business they do. Chipmaker AMD and South Korean memory maker SK hynix are each down about 8%, after South Korea's Kospi fell 3.5% overnight. Flash-memory maker Sandisk is down about 9% even after beating estimates, raising its forecast and announcing an 8-for-1 stock split. Good results have earned little this season: big gains after earnings have been rarer than at this point in any of the past eight seasons. The drop comes after a rough stretch for hedge funds. Goldman Sachs's prime brokerage said systematic long/short funds lost 2% in the week to October 23, their worst week since 2024, as hedge funds cut single-stock positions by the most since late July. A FactorPulse gauge of hedge-fund pain has given back part of its rebound and has now won back only about 13% of its October loss.

Money is moving into steadier corners of the market. The consumer staples fund XLP is up about 2% today and nearly 12% for October, on pace for its best month since 2019. The health care fund XLV is up almost 2%, and snack maker Mondelez is up nearly 9% after its results, though medical-device maker Stryker is down 10% after missing revenue forecasts and cutting its outlook. Treasuries are rallying, with the 10-year yield down about 8 basis points to about 4.9%. Bitcoin is down 4% after crypto exchange Binance reported a $6.3 billion theft. The next test comes at 8:30 a.m., when the Employment Cost Index, a key gauge of wage growth, is expected to show a 0.8% quarterly rise.

Beta is down 2.59% (z=-2.7) so far today and 12.37% over 20 sessions (z=-2.9). It is up just 0.26% over five sessions, so this week's early bounce is gone.

Intel Sinks 25% as Guidance Misses

Intel is down 25.2% in pre-market trading. Its fourth-quarter revenue guidance of $15 billion to $16 billion fell short of estimates Economic Times. CFO David Zinsner said 2027 is unlikely to generate positive free cash flow. He also said capital spending will rise sharply next year after $20 billion in 2026 FinanceFeeds. The third quarter beat estimates, with adjusted earnings of 52 cents a share Economic Times.

Amazon is down about 6% in early trading on light volume. Its overall results missed consensus even though AWS revenue growth sped up to 39% WSJ. For both companies, AI growth was not enough to hold the stock up.

Sandisk shows how much of the damage comes from factors. It is down 8.7% after beating estimates, raising guidance and announcing an 8-for-1 split Investing.com. Its beta and other style exposures account for more than the whole decline, and its stock-specific part is +2.1%. Good results are earning little this season. Weighted by size, 23% of reporters have risen 2σ or more on a stock-specific basis. That is below every one of the past eight seasons at this point.

Earnings reactions in early tradingReporters worth over $100 billion, or moving more than 10% with a value above $5 billion

Company	Move	Stock-specific	Market cap	Revenue YoY	Margin YoY	What drove it
Intel INTC	-25.2%	-16.6%	$487B	+21%	+8.4 pts adj. operating	Q4 guidance miss, 2027 cash flow warning Economic Times
Reddit RDDT	-19.0%	-16.8%	$25B	+53%	+5.5 pts operating	—
Twilio TWLO	-17.2% light volume	-12.0%	$37B	+20%	+2.9 pts adj. operating	—
Illumina ILMN	-14.0% light volume	-11.3%	$44B	+4%	+1.4 pts adj. operating	Beat and raised guidance
Stryker SYK	-10.0% light volume	-11.4%	$120B	+8%	+0.6 pts adj. operating	Revenue miss, trimmed EPS guidance
Sandisk SNDK	-8.7%	+2.1%	$192B	+378%	+69.8 pts adj. operating	Beat, raised guidance, 8-for-1 split Investing.com
Amazon AMZN	-6.2% light volume	-3.6%	$2.6T	+12%	+4.2 pts operating	Overall miss despite 39% AWS growth WSJ
Starbucks SBUX	+0.7% light volume	+0.1%	$120B	-4%	+4.6 pts adj. operating	—
Chevron CVX	+1.4% light volume	-0.9%	$454B	+35%†	+9.0 pts† operating	—
ExxonMobil XOM	+1.6% light volume	-0.5%	$754B	—	—	—
Gilead Sciences GILD	+4.3% light volume	+3.0%	$205B	+7%	-0.3 pts adj. operating	—

Stock-specific: the part of a stock's move not explained by the market, style or thematic (industry and theme) factors in the FactorPulse risk model.

Revenue and margin from the company's earnings release, year over year; margin change in percentage points; — where the release is not parsed or the figures failed checks.

† The company's year-ago figure differs from the one originally filed, usually a restatement; growth is on its current basis.

Light volume: the company's earnings filing confirms the report, but trading volume has not caught up yet, so the move is an early read.

Of the 500 largest companies, 271 have reported (58% of market cap), on day 22 of the season.

How earnings reactions split, day 22 of the seasonThe 500 largest US companies with a confirmed earnings reaction so far (243), vs the same day in the past eight seasons and in four-season stretches back to mid-2020

Earnings reactions this season vs the past eight seasons, day 22 — Weighted by size, 23% of this season's reporters rose 2σ or more on a stock-specific basis, against 34% at this point in the past eight seasons; 28% fell 2σ or more (past: 34%).

Earnings reactions this season vs the past eight seasons, day 22
Season	≤ −5σ	−5 to −2σ	−2 to 0σ	0 to 2σ	2 to 5σ	≥ 5σ
This season	9%	19%	26%	22%	20%	4%
Past 8 seasons	15%	18%	16%	17%	18%	16%
Q2 2026	16%	21%	16%	13%	19%	15%
Q1 2026	12%	20%	12%	19%	19%	17%
Q4 2025	17%	17%	20%	14%	18%	14%
Q3 2025	12%	20%	18%	18%	16%	16%
Q2 2025	17%	20%	14%	15%	15%	19%
Q1 2025	18%	12%	15%	22%	22%	11%
Q4 2024	18%	14%	18%	19%	17%	13%
Q3 2024	15%	20%	15%	13%	20%	18%
Q3 '23–Q2 '24	17%	17%	16%	15%	19%	17%
Q3 '22–Q2 '23	12%	19%	19%	18%	20%	11%
Q3 '21–Q2 '22	13%	19%	14%	19%	23%	12%
Q3 '20–Q2 '21	7%	21%	29%	22%	17%	4%

σ: a stock's earnings-day stock-specific move divided by its typical daily stock-specific move over the past year. Each bar is cut at the same business day of the season; companies weighted by the square root of market cap.

Beta Falls 2.6% as Chip Exposure Barely Registers

The Semiconductors factor is down only 0.64% (z=-1.0) on a day Intel lost a quarter of its value. The selling follows market sensitivity, not chip exposure. Chip stocks are falling on their beta. AMD is down 8.4% and SK hynix 7.7%, and their stock-specific moves are small. Asia sold off first, with South Korea's Kospi down 3.5% Morningstar.

Factor	Return	Z-Score	5d Z	20d Z	63d Z	Category	Direction
Beta	-2.59%	-2.7	+0.1	-2.9	-0.9	Style-Risk	High-beta names lagged
Semiconductors	-0.64%	-1.0	+0.9	-1.7	-0.5	Thematic	Chip-exposed names lagged
Liquidity	-0.31%	-1.2	-0.5	-0.5	+0.8	Style	Lowest-turnover names outperformed
Medium-Term Momentum	+0.31%	+1.1	-2.2	-1.1	-0.6	Style-Momentum	Past month's winners beat its losers
One-Day Momentum	+0.30%	+1.1	+0.8	+0.2	-1.7	Style-Momentum	Yesterday's moves continued
Short-Term Momentum	-0.26%	-0.9	-0.6	+1.7	-0.3	Style-Momentum	Last week's winners lagged
Morning Activity	+0.13%	+1.1	-0.6	-0.4	+0.5	Style-Flow	Habitually morning-heavy names outperformed
Hedge-Fund Ownership	-0.09%	-0.8	-0.4	-0.4	-0.8	Style-Positioning	Heavier HF ownership lagged

The losses pile up at the top of the beta range: the highest-beta twentieth of stocks is down 6.1%, led by AI, data-center and memory chip names.

Today's Return by Beta Exposure z=-2.7
Bucket	Avg Ret Pct
1	0.82
2	0.91
3	0.45
4	0.56
5	0.48
6	0.29
7	0.20
8	-0.32
9	0.06
10	-0.38
11	-0.44
12	-1.11
13	-0.73
14	-1.71
15	-2.07
16	-2.07
17	-2.77
18	-3.94
19	-5.27
20	-6.13

The top 50 high-beta momentum names are down 7.2%, in the worst 1.5% of sessions since 2020. The rest of the universe is up 0.02%. The broader high-beta momentum group is down 5.0%, so the more closely a stock fits the profile, the harder it is falling.

High-Beta Momentum Cohort — Today's Session Path
Series	Ret Pct
joint	-5.04
tight50	-7.22
market	-1.04
rest	0.02

20-day momentum (Medium-Term Momentum in the table) rose 0.31% (z=+1.1) as part of the same selloff: after October's slide, the high-beta names rank among the past month's losers, so their fall lifts this factor. Its five-day z of -2.2 reflects those names' early-week bounce. Yesterday's losers also kept falling: One-Day Momentum rose 0.30% (z=+1.1).

Hedge-Fund Pain Index Has Won Back Only 13%

In its note covering the week to October 23, Goldman Sachs Prime Brokerage reported that systematic long/short funds had their worst week since 2024. The same note showed the heaviest single-stock de-grossing since late July. So far today, our HF de-risking score sits at the 96th percentile since 2020 over 20 days. Two legs are firing: 12-month momentum winners are falling, and last week's relative moves are continuing instead of reverting.

So far today, the hedge-fund pain index has won back about 13% of its fall from the October 6 peak to the October 22 low, down from 20% at Thursday's close. That fall is the 7th-deepest of 32 such events since 2020. Three of eight legs have confirmed a turn, including beta on October 27, but beta is falling again pre-market. The factor pattern is consistent with a de-gross that has not reversed.

On a raw basis, stocks with heavy hedge-fund ownership are lagging by 0.22% (z=-1.5). Net of beta and momentum, the gap shrinks to 0.09%, so these stocks are being hit through their style exposures more than for who owns them.

Staples Head for Their Best Month Since 2019

HF pain index vs its Oct 6 peak, in daily σ
Date	Sigma Vs Peak
2026-09-24	-1.05
2026-09-25	-0.4
2026-09-28	-0.97
2026-09-29	-0.52
2026-09-30	-0.98
2026-10-01	-0.37
2026-10-02	-0.03
2026-10-05	-0.47
2026-10-06	0.0
2026-10-07	-0.18
2026-10-08	-0.86
2026-10-09	-0.62
2026-10-12	-1.47
2026-10-13	-1.46
2026-10-14	-2.82
2026-10-15	-4.07
2026-10-16	-4.86
2026-10-19	-4.55
2026-10-20	-5.45
2026-10-21	-4.86
2026-10-22	-9.42
2026-10-23	-9.29
2026-10-26	-8.57
2026-10-27	-7.57
2026-10-28	-6.98
2026-10-29	-7.52
2026-10-30	-8.22

Consumer staples (XLP) are up 2.3% today and 11.9% month to date, on pace for the fund's best month since 2019. Health care (XLV) is up 1.7%. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 is down 1.0% and the Nasdaq-100 2.4%. Memory chips, South Korea and semiconductors led last week's bounce and are now falling hardest.

ETF	Theme	Today	1d Ago	5d Ago	20d Ago	63d Ago
DRAM	memory chips & storage	-6.0%	-4.4%	+13.3%	-16.6%	+2.7%
WGMI	crypto miners	-5.3%	-5.2%	+4.3%	-30.0%	-39.6%
EWY	south korea	-4.9%	-2.5%	+8.6%	-13.1%	+3.0%
SMH	semiconductors	-4.8%	-1.1%	+7.3%	-9.1%	+3.9%
MTUM	momentum	-3.2%	-1.7%	+3.4%	-7.0%	-0.2%
QQQ	large cap growth	-2.4%	-1.4%	+1.5%	-3.6%	+4.1%
SPY	large cap	-1.0%	-0.4%	+0.7%	+0.7%	+3.2%
XLE	energy	+1.2%	+0.4%	+1.7%	+9.6%	+16.1%
XLV	healthcare	+1.7%	+2.4%	+1.5%	+10.7%	+13.7%
XLP	consumer staples	+2.3%	+1.5%	-2.0%	+9.8%	+4.4%

Mondelez is up 8.6% after its results, and 3.4% of that gain comes from style exposures, mainly its low beta. Stryker is down 10.0% even as the health care fund rises. Crude is up too, with WTI at $104.24 at 7:14 AM ET, up 2.2% CNBC. Bitcoin is at $77,572 at 7:25 AM ET, down 4.0% CNBC, after Binance reported a $6.3 billion theft Morningstar. The crypto miners fund WGMI is on pace for its second-worst month since 2022.

Treasuries are rallying, and short-dated bonds are leading. The 2-year yield is down 9.1 basis points to 4.565% CNBC. The 10-year yield is at 4.908%, down 8.1 basis points CNBC. Over the past 20 sessions, SMH fell about 9% while the 10-year yield dropped about 25 basis points. Chip stocks have moved this closely with yields only rarely since 2019. Corporate bonds are lagging the rally, a sign that credit spreads are widening again. LQD is up 0.3%, about 0.4% less than the drop in yields alone implies, and HYG is flat.

Realized correlation among stocks remains near its lows: 7.9% over 20 days, in the 3.5th percentile since 2020. The options market expects it to stay low. Implied correlation among the 50 largest S&P 500 stocks (Cboe COR1M) is 10.38, in the 4.8th percentile since 2006. That is how the top 50 high-beta names can fall 7% while the index falls only 1%. The movement is running through style exposures rather than the market as a whole.

Economic Context

The third-quarter Employment Cost Index is due at 8:30 AM ET. Consensus expects a 0.8% quarterly rise, with annual compensation growth near 3.4%.

Realized 20-Day Volatility vs Implied — Since 2025
Series	Today Vol Pts	Prev Close Vol Pts
total	44.10	43.12
market	11.00	10.68
style	25.10	23.70

Factor Regime Reference

Variance decomposition: live intraday — 20261030 session, bracketed against its trailing-year range. Factor returns are trailing through last close. Total cross-sectional dispersion: 85%ile of the past year.

Variance mix — % of total, today vs 1d ago vs 1-yr avg

market 65%ile style 99.6%ile thematic 5.6%ile idiosyncratic 2.4%ile

Today (live)

56%34%

1d ago

15%79%

1-yr avg

23%65%

Variance explained — today vs. factor's trailing-year range

Marker = the factor's share of today's total variance, placed in its own trailing-year range (box 25–75%ile, ticks 90%ile and max). Amber marker = unusually load-bearing today (≥90%ile of its own year). Factor name green = up today / red = down.

Correlation & dispersion — realized vs implied

Pairwise realized correlation (20d): 7.93% 3.5%ile since 2020 · 22%ile 3m

Top-500 pairwise: 9.42% 6.6%ile since 2020 · 27%ile 3m · implied (Cboe COR1M): 10.38 4.8%ile since 2006 (gap -1.0pp)

Realized 20d vol (ann. pts): all stocks 44 vs VIXEQ 40 · index 11 vs VIX 18 · style factors 25 88%ile

20-day window (19 completed days + today); percentiles vs model history since 2020; '3m' tokens rank vs the trailing 63 trading days; definitions in Terms below. Implied prints (Cboe) are delayed ~15 min. as of 07:21 ET

Top 50 high-beta momentum names (eq-wt, since-2020 rank): -7.2% 1.5%ile · rest of market +0.0%

HF de-risking score (since-2020 rank so far today): 60%ile today · 32%ile 5-day · HF pain index 7.5σ below peak (7th-deepest of 32 since 2020), 13% won back · selling only: no short-covering leg

Trailing factor returns

Factor	Today	1d	5d	20d	60d
Style-Risk
Beta	-2.59% z-2.7	-1.26%	+0.26%	-12.37%	-8.28%
Residual Volatility	-0.34% z-0.7	-0.55%	-1.07%	-0.73%	+2.45%
International	+0.01% z+0.0	-0.26%	-1.09%	-0.89%	-0.48%
Style
Liquidity	-0.31% z-1.2	-0.15%	-0.28%	-0.57%	+1.99%
Value	-0.12% z-0.5	-0.17%	-0.49%	-0.65%	-0.39%
Growth	-0.06% z-0.3	-0.17%	-0.26%	-0.43%	-0.20%
Dividend Yield	+0.04% z+0.2	+0.17%	+0.50%	+0.03%	+0.59%
Size	-0.07% z-0.2	-0.82%	-1.00%	-0.88%	+1.76%
Profitability	+0.02% z+0.1	+0.42%	+0.15%	+0.98%	+0.15%
Leverage	-0.01% z-0.0	+0.50%	+0.96%	+0.12%	-2.29%
Style-Momentum
Medium-Term Momentum	+0.31% z+1.1	+0.04%	-1.38%	-1.36%	-1.25%
One-Day Momentum	+0.30% z+1.1	+0.13%	+0.51%	+0.28%	-2.90%
Short-Term Momentum	-0.26% z-0.9	+0.24%	-0.41%	+2.35%	+0.30%
Long-Term Momentum	-0.38% z-0.6	-0.53%	-0.01%	-3.43%	+0.39%
Style-Positioning
Hedge-Fund Ownership	-0.09% z-0.8	+0.12%	-0.10%	-0.18%	-0.63%
Short Interest	-0.06% z-0.3	-0.04%	-0.30%	+0.35%	-0.68%
Style-Flow
Morning Activity	+0.13% z+1.1	-0.21%	-0.17%	-0.21%	+0.38%
Short-Sale Activity	-0.03% z-0.3	+0.25%	-0.08%	+0.19%	+0.82%
Thematic
Semiconductors	-0.64% z-1.0	-0.06%	+1.21%	-4.50%	-2.83%
Bitcoin / Crypto	-0.27% z-0.9	-1.03%	-2.29%	-1.05%	+1.04%
Gold	+0.22% z+0.7	-0.29%	+0.20%	-0.93%	+1.43%
China	-0.16% z-0.4	-0.36%	-1.03%	-0.83%	-0.78%
Treasury (Duration)	-0.06% z-0.2	+0.48%	+0.52%	+1.88%	-1.40%
Oil	-0.00% z-0.0	-0.67%	-0.53%	-0.62%	+4.31%

5/20/60d windows include today's session; 1d is the previous session.

Terms

Factor z-score. Today's factor return divided by its daily-return standard deviation over ~1,600 trading days.

High-beta momentum cohort. US names above $2B market cap in the top quintile of both raw beta and 12-month momentum; membership frozen at each month's first business day. “Top 50” = the 50 strongest by combined rank.

HF de-risking score. A FactorPulse measure of de-risking in factor returns: the average of four legs, each in its own daily-volatility units and counted only when it moves in the de-risking direction. They are the most-shorted names rising, 12-month momentum winners falling, names crowded in hedge-fund 13F filings falling net of their beta and momentum, and last week's relative moves continuing instead of reverting (counted only alongside another leg). A leg counts as firing at half its daily volatility or more, so a leg can show a small value without firing. Types: A, covering and selling together; B, selling only; C, covering only. Ranked against every session since January 2020. It reads factor returns only, never positions.

Stock-specific (idiosyncratic) return. The part of a stock's move not explained by the market, style or thematic (industry and theme) factors in the FactorPulse risk model.

VIXEQ / DSPX / COR1M. Cboe implied indices: single-stock volatility, dispersion, and 1-month implied correlation (top-50 S&P names). Quotes delayed ~15 minutes.

Data compiled by FactorPulse AI; edited and verified by Jeff Klein. For informational purposes only. Does not constitute financial advice, an investment recommendation, or an offer to buy or sell any securities. Always consult a qualified financial professional before making investment decisions.