US stocks surged higher in the three major indices. $Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC.US)$ up by 1.12%, $S&P 500 Index (.SPX.US)$ up by 0.91%, $Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI.US)$ up by 0.92%.

E-commerce giant Amazon's stock price has risen, driven by strong growth in its cloud and advertising business, exceeding profit expectations.

Intel's performance exceeded expectations, with revenue guidance higher than analysts' expectations.

U.S. stocks fell on Thursday. Dragged down by Microsoft and Meta's financial reports, both the S&P 500 index and the Nasdaq recorded their largest single-day declines since early September. The Dow fell more than 300 points. Microsoft, Intel, and Amazon led the decline.

Jay Hatfield, Chief Investment Officer of Infrastructure Capital Management, commented on the stock market's decline on Thursday: "Obviously, this is mainly driven by technology. I would also like to say that people may have started to hedge risks before the U.S. presidential election."

Thursday was the last trading day of October, with all three major U.S. stock indexes posting declines for the month: the Dow fell 1.3%, the S&P 500 index and the Nasdaq fell 1% and 0.5% respectively.

The market's focus turned to labor market data on Friday. Affected by storms and strikes, U.S. non-farm payroll employment in October increased by only 0.012 million.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Friday that non-farm payroll employment increased by 0.012 million last month, with figures for the previous two months also being revised downward.

The unemployment rate remained at 4.1%, while average hourly wages remained solid.

The average hourly wage in the United States increased by 4% year-on-year in October, as expected, with the previous value revised from 4% to 3.9%. The average hourly wage in October increased by 0.4% month-on-month, expected 0.3%, with the previous value revised from 0.4% to 0.3%. The average weekly working hours in October were 34.3, expected 34.2, with the previous value revised from 34.2 to 34.3.

Economists have warned that the Boeing machinists' strike and two strong hurricanes that hit the southeastern United States at the end of September/early October will have a more negative impact on non-farm payrolls than the unemployment rate survey. Therefore, the surveyed economists have a wide range of estimates for non-farm employment numbers, ranging from a decrease of 0.01 million to an increase of 0.18 million.

Recruitment pace of U.S. businesses slowed down in October to the slowest since 2020, however, the unemployment rate remained low in this month hit hard by severe hurricanes and large-scale strikes.

According to statistics, in October, 0.512 million people in the United States were unable to work due to severe weather conditions, while historically, the number of people unable to work due to severe weather in this month was 0.056 million.

Furthermore, due to climate reasons, in October this year, 1.409 million workers who usually work full-time could only work part-time, compared to the historical average of 0.264 million for October.

The U.S. economy added only 0.012 million new jobs in October, making it the weakest jobs report under this administration so far, reflecting the severe impact of hurricanes and the Boeing strike on the closely watched employment data.

This data is also far below the economists' average expectation of adding 0.1 million new jobs.

The employment data released on Friday was collected within a week of Hurricane 'Milton' making landfall in Florida, shortly before Hurricane 'Heleni' hit the southeastern United States. Boeing's ongoing strike resulted in 0.033 million employees stopping work, dragging down this number. This employment report will be published the week before the Federal Reserve makes its next interest rate decision on November 7. It is expected that the Fed will cut rates by 25 basis points next week.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that the landing and impact of Hurricane Helen occurred before the reference period of the household survey (unemployment rate) and the business survey (non-farm employment). Hurricane Milton, however, took place within the survey reference period. The response rate of the household survey in October was within the normal range. The collection rate of the business survey in October was well below average. Employment estimates in some industries are likely to have been affected by the hurricanes, however, it is not possible to quantify the impact of hurricanes on non-farm employment, average hourly wages, and other data. The national unemployment rate was not significantly affected by the hurricanes.

Jacobson, Chief Economist at wealth management firm Annex, believes that the employment situation in the U.S. is uncertain. The impact of hurricanes is difficult to quantify, so most people tend to overlook these numbers. There have been significant revisions to data from previous months that should not be ignored.

Jacobson remarked that the response rate to this non-farm report survey is low, with a wide margin of error. The Federal Reserve may choose to disregard this information, hoping they can stick to the path they outlined in the previous economic forecast summary, which implies that the Fed will cut rates by 25 basis points in November and again in December.

Analyst Casselman pointed out, 'It is worth noting that recruitment in many industries we expected to be affected by storms and strikes has been weak. Manufacturing employment has decreased by 0.046 million, possibly mainly due to Boeing's strike. Employment in retail, leisure, and hotel industries has declined, with these sectors being vulnerable to hurricane damage.'

Investors are also keeping an eye on the U.S. presidential election to be held next week. Currently, many major polls still show a neck-and-neck race between Trump and Democratic candidate Harris.

Despite Republican presidential candidate Trump being neck and neck with Vice President Harris in several opinion polls, investors are still betting on the possibility of Trump's reelection. Increased uncertainty is prompting investors to turn to safe-haven assets, boosting the U.S. dollar and gold prices, with the latter reaching record highs this week.

Both Bank of America and Citigroup advise that if Trump wins and the stock market rises thereafter, investors should sell their stocks immediately.

Bank of America analyst Michael Hartnett said that if Trump wins the election, investors should consider exiting the stock market when it rises, aligning with Citigroup's view earlier this week.

Hartnett wrote in a report that if Trump wins the presidency, along with Republicans winning the majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives, it may lead to tax cuts and immigration control. He stated that this would drive inflation and interest rates up, causing a risk-off sentiment in the stock market.

The current market consensus is that Trump's victory will boost the U.S. stock market. His plan to lower corporate taxes will benefit companies' profits; however, the views of the two major Wall Street banks differ from this.

Citi analyst Scott Chronert stated in a report earlier this week that a Harris victory combined with the sell-off resulting from the divided Congress would be a buying opportunity.

Focus stocks

$Tesla (TSLA.US)$ Rising by 0.61%, Tesla recently updated its roadmap for autonomous driving technology, confirming that the highly anticipated FSD (Full Self-Driving) v13 update will be delayed until next month, and making more commitments to future features.

$Microsoft (MSFT.US)$ Rising by nearly 1%, a Morgan Stanley research report indicated strong demand signals for Microsoft, with order growth reaching 23%, and remaining performance obligations (cRPO) growing by 17% year-on-year, but supply constraints continue to limit the growth of AI-related businesses.

$Apple (AAPL.US)$ Falling by 0.56%, the profit decline was dragged down by a tax retroactive payment of 10 billion, with Greater China's fourth-quarter revenue at 15.033 billion US dollars, slightly lower than the 15.084 billion US dollars in the same period last year.

$Alphabet-A (GOOGL.US)$Decreased by 0.25%, UBS Group believes that Alphabet's cloud business revenue in the third quarter has also significantly increased. The bank expects cloud business revenue to increase by about 10 billion US dollars for the full year, compared to about 7 billion US dollars for 2022 and 2023, and the current cloud business growth rate has surpassed that of YouTube.

$Amazon (AMZN.US)$ Up 6.55%, approaching historical highs, third-quarter operating profit increased by over 55% year-on-year, far exceeding expectations and guidance.

$Meta Platforms (META.US)$ Falling by 0.36%, the Morgan Stanley research report pointed out that Meta Platforms continues to demonstrate outstanding performance in driving user engagement and monetization through innovation, and has sufficient GPU-driven product projects to be launched in 2025 or later. The bank pointed out that the company remains the best early winner in the Generative AI (GenAI) field.

$Intel (INTC.US)$ Rising by 5%, the fourth-quarter revenue and adjusted EPS guidance exceeded expectations.

Editor/Rocky