The S&P 500 rose 0.59% and the FTSE 100 rose 1.06% on Friday 9 October, while single-stock moves were large. A SpaceX spectrum deal dominated the session, sending US carriers and cable operators sharply lower and tower owners sharply higher. The AI infrastructure and nuclear power trades that ran through the previous week carried on with less conviction.
Carriers and Cable Sell Off on SpaceX Spectrum Deal
SpaceX disclosed on Thursday after the close that it had agreed to buy Grain Management's nationwide 800 MHz low-band spectrum, and the market read it as a step toward a standalone Starlink mobile carrier. TMUS (-13.27%) fell furthest, followed by T (-9.81%) and VZ (-8.75%). Verizon's session was its worst since July 2002, and volume ran at roughly four to five times the 50-session average across the three. CHTR (-5.74%) set a new 52-week low of $102.37 intraday as cable names were marked down with the carriers.
The deal still needs FCC approval and no price has been confirmed. Scotiabank left its T-Mobile estimates unchanged, and MoffettNathanson's Craig Moffett argued that spectrum alone does not make SpaceX a direct rival. In London, AAF.L (-6.27%) fell on what one source tied to the same telecom selloff and another to the 196p listing of its Airtel Money unit. Nothing separates the two effects, and the link from a US spectrum purchase to Airtel Africa's African markets is an inference.
Tower Owners Rally on the Same Deal
Towers took the opposite view. A terrestrial network on that spectrum would need sites, so the purchase keeps alive the chance that SpaceX becomes a paying tenant. CCI (+15.60%) gained most on 4.3x average volume, with AMT (+9.30%) and SBAC (+7.34%) behind it. AMT closed above both its 50-day and 200-day averages for the first time in the window, and SBAC has recovered 15.14% from its October 2 close after touching a 52-week low on October 5. No lease exists, so the rally prices an option.
Power Producers Recover Their Footing
The independent power group is back after Thursday's profit-taking, with CEG (+15.76% wk), VST (+15.33% wk) and NRG (+13.38% wk) all up on the week. Almost all of it came on 6 and 7 October, when the Google nuclear agreement and Vistra's conditional $4.2bn DOE loan lifted the group. Constellation gained 4.56% on Friday for a reason no source establishes, after falling 4.85% on Thursday. It remains 18.25% lower for the year, and NRG is 34.39% lower and below both its 50-day and 200-day averages. The PJM regulatory timeline is still unresolved.
Chips and Hardware Diverge
Names that rallied earlier in the week are now sorting by their own news. CIEN (+14.93% wk) closed at $449.77, holding most of the gain from Marvell's investor-day outlook despite a pullback on Thursday. INTC (-12.26% wk) is down for the week on the Terafab and TSMC story, and Thursday's sector selloff, with no sourced driver for Friday's 2.22% decline. Intel reports on October 29.
SWKS (-5.45%) fell on a single-source report that Apple cut October iPhone 18 Pro component orders by 15% to 20%, while the semiconductor ETF rose about 2%. HPQ (-6.91%) followed IDC's preliminary third-quarter data, which showed HP shipments down nearly 31%, the steepest fall among the top five PC vendors.
Cloud Software Bounces
DDOG (+7.11%) reached a new 52-week high after CIBC lifted its target from $280 to $315, with AI-related software rebounding broadly. The price sits above the Street's consensus target of roughly $288 and trades at 98.6 times forward earnings. AKAM (+6.00%) recovered most of a 7.1% two-day decline with no sourced trigger. The Anthropic contract from late September remains the lens for the stock.
Medicare Ratings and a Cancer Vaccine Lift Healthcare
HUM (+11.56%) rose after CMS 2027 star ratings put 95% of its Medicare Advantage members in plans rated 4.0 stars or above, against 20% in 2026 and a J.P. Morgan expectation of 60% to 70%. Baird upgraded the stock the same day. MRNA (+14.21%) hit a new 52-week high of $225.00 on Nasdaq-100 re-entry and a New York Times report of an NIH cancer vaccine partnership. The company remains loss-making and sits far above the Citigroup and Morgan Stanley targets, so the price rests on the melanoma data due at ESMO.
One-Offs: PTC and Fair Isaac
PTC (+35.01% wk) trades as a deal spread, $10.55 below Schneider Electric's $205 cash offer, with closing expected by the third quarter of 2027. FICO (-5.63%) fell without a confirmed reason, still under the weight of the FHFA decision on VantageScore. The replacement pricing grid and its implementation date remain unpublished.
What to Watch:
- October 21: Q3 results from AT&T (T) and Crown Castle (CCI).
- October 24: Moderna (MRNA) presents the full melanoma dataset at ESMO.
- October 27: Q3 results from American Tower (AMT).
- October 28: T-Mobile (TMUS) earnings.
- October 29: Intel (INTC) third-quarter earnings.
- October 30: Airtel Africa (AAF.L) earnings.
- November 5: Datadog (DDOG) and Akamai (AKAM) results.
- November 6: Charter (CHTR), Humana (HUM) and Vistra (VST) report.