The week of Oct 12–16, 2026: tech drags the Nasdaq down 4.5% while the average stock rises

The S&P 500 lost 1.95% in the five sessions to October 16, 2026, closing at 7,659, and the Nasdaq lost 4.48%, to 26,140. The decline was narrow. The equal-weight S&P 500 (RSP) gained 0.49% and the Dow 0.67%, and 98 of the 165 companies worth at least $100 billion ended the week higher, with a median gain of 1.94%. The S&P fell in four of the five sessions; Wednesday (−1.11%) and Friday (−1.09%) did most of the damage.

Technology down, staples and energy up

Among companies worth $100 billion or more, the biggest decliners were hardware, chip and security names: Dell (−22.9%), Applied Materials (−19.3%), SK hynix (−19.3%), Seagate (−18.4%), Arista Networks (−18.3%) and Palo Alto Networks (−18.3%). The biggest gainers were Accenture (+9.9%), ConocoPhillips (+9.3%), Equinor (+9.2%), BP (+8.6%) and Lockheed Martin (+8.3%). None of the twenty filed an 8-K during the week except Accenture, whose filing announced its October 14 investor day, and the filings do not explain the moves; most of Accenture’s gain came on October 12 and 15.

The twelve largest companies lost $1.20 trillion of market value between them. Nvidia fell 6.6%, a loss of $366 billion, followed by SpaceX (−10.2%) and TSMC (−9.0%). Eli Lilly (+6.6%), Berkshire Hathaway (+3.2%) and Apple (+2.0%) rose.

Earnings season opens with the banks

JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs reported third-quarter results on October 13; Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, BlackRock and State Street on October 14; BNY on October 15; and Truist, M&T, Regions and Travelers on October 16. Charles Schwab and Interactive Brokers reported after the close on October 15, so their first trading reaction came on Friday: Schwab fell 2.3% and Interactive Brokers 3.9%. Johnson & Johnson reported on October 13 — earnings of $0.09 a share, after a one-time charge tied to its proposed talc settlement and two acquisitions — and its stock fell 5.7% that day.

Among the deals, Penske Automotive Group agreed on October 15 to be taken private by Penske Corporation and Mitsui at $212.00 a share in cash; Flex completed its $4.4 billion purchase of EPC Power; and Copart completed its acquisition of ACV.

Insider buying filed with the SEC

The largest open-market purchases filed during the week were by GameStop chief executive Ryan Cohen, who bought 844,130 shares for $22.8 million on October 13, and by Borr Drilling founder Tor Olav Trøim, whose holding company filed four purchases worth $25.1 million in total. Two larger filings were not open-market buys: a PepsiCo director’s $23.7 million was an exchange of cash for shares with his own family trusts, and a $35.1 million Pampa Energía filing covered more shares than traded in New York that day, without saying where they were bought.

Prices are Yahoo Finance closes; oil and gold use the official settlement for the same contract on both dates, and bitcoin the UTC-day close confirmed against Coinbase. The documents behind each company fact are listed below. This is a description of the week, not a forecast and not investment advice.