Overview

• The government shutdown entered a second day, halting releases such as weekly jobless claims and the September payrolls report, creating a temporary data blackout.
• The S&P 500, Dow and Nasdaq closed at record highs, with semiconductor leaders driving the advance after OpenAI’s employee share sale reportedly valued the firm near $500 billion.
• Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix signed letters of intent to supply memory for OpenAI data centers, a development that boosted chip stocks in the U.S. and Europe.
• Intel shares rose on reports it is in early talks to add AMD as a foundry customer, extending a chip-led rally that helped offset broader shutdown concerns.
• Berkshire Hathaway agreed to buy Occidental’s OxyChem unit for $9.7 billion, as economists warned that furloughs in the hundreds of thousands and delayed data could complicate the Fed’s late-October policy meeting.