US stocks fell on Oct. 30, with the S&P 500 dropping 1.8% after technology earnings deepened concerns about spending on artificial intelligence and weaker core businesses, Bloomberg Television reported.
The decline was the biggest since June and pushed the index below its average over the previous 100 trading days. The Nasdaq 100 entered its third correction of 2026.
The account aired on Bloomberg Television's “AI Spending Fears Hammer Big Tech Stocks,” published Oct. 31. Disappointing earnings from Amazon, Alphabet and Intel added to questions about whether AI investments will pay off.
Concern had spread earlier in October to companies that rent AI computing power to developers, including CoreWeave. Investors questioned the returns from those businesses while examining their shares and the debt they were taking on.
Attention then shifted to large cloud computing companies and whether their earnings would support continued AI spending. Meta, Google and Amazon were pressing ahead with investment plans despite doubts about the returns.
Results over the previous week and a half showed weakness in established businesses, including online shopping and advertising. That weakness added to concerns about the money companies were committing to AI.
Alphabet's sales and advertising revenue fell short of expectations. The company brought the head of its cloud business onto its earnings call to explain how AI could contribute to results.
AI also created difficulties for Google's search advertising business. Incorporating AI into search made placing and displaying advertisements harder and reduced the time users spent viewing or near advertisements.
That left open how Google would earn money from AI-generated searches. The discussion gave no timetable for resolving that question or figures showing how much revenue those searches could generate.
Intel shares fell more than 25% after its earnings. The company faced difficulty obtaining memory chips as demand from AI developers and chipmakers increased competition for supplies.
Memory components help AI systems store the data used to train models and produce answers. Apple and Intel competed with AI businesses for those components, complicating efforts to meet customer demand and keep prices affordable.
The shortage added another obstacle to Intel's turnaround under Chief Executive Lip Bu Tan. Tan expressed disappointment with the results and identified memory supplies as a weakness for the company.
Separately, the FBI and US Secret Service were investigating a roughly $6.3 billion cryptocurrency theft from Binance. The theft was described as the largest on record, exceeding a $1.5 billion theft in 2025.
North Korean hackers were considered possible suspects, but responsibility remained unresolved. Binance said it would do everything it could to reimburse customers and had a reserve fund for such events, alongside more than $137 billion in assets.
