Tesla Shatters Sales Record | FICO Cuts Out Middlemen | Rivian Guidance Cuts Bite | Credit Risks Echo 2007

Stocks drifted to fresh records Thursday, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq logging their 30th record closes of the year and the Dow rising for a fifth straight session. 

The Nasdaq led with a 0.4% gain, powered by Nvidia’s all-time high. 

The advance came even as Washington’s funding fight entered its second day without resolution.

The shutdown means no jobs report Friday, leaving markets without their most reliable labor gauge. 

Prediction markets now give better-than-even odds the stalemate stretches into mid-October, extending the data blackout. For now, traders are betting momentum matters more than missing statistics.

Semiconductors provided the spark. 

Samsung and SK Hynix’s tie-up with OpenAI’s Stargate project reignited AI enthusiasm, lifting chip names worldwide. Nvidia, Broadcom, and AMD rallied, while Europe’s ASML hit new highs. 

Outside tech, banks and energy lagged, and gold snapped its streak with a 1% drop to $3,879. Bitcoin topped $120,000, showing speculative appetite remains alive.

Investor Signal

Markets continue to treat the shutdown as noise, not signal. The risk is what happens when the Fed has to steer without fresh labor data, every secondary release will take on exaggerated importance. 

Until then, semis are the high-beta ride, but breadth is thinning and volatility protection is cheap. Traders can stay long tech momentum, but it’s time to start paying for downside insurance.

Most people have no idea, but a single, unelected group of Americans...

Through a series of questionable decisions over a period of 40 years...

Now holds the future of the entire country and the world - in their hands. 

Click here to see how this small group could destroy the U.S. market… and how the White House is fighting back to stop them.

Tesla stunned markets with its strongest delivery surprise since 2021, reporting 497,099 vehicles in Q3, a 7.4% jump from last year and well above even the most bullish forecasts. 

The rush came from U.S. buyers racing to lock in the $7,500 federal EV tax credit before it expired in September.

The rebound marks a sharp reversal from Tesla’s first-half slump, but the story isn’t just subsidies. Weaker sales at Chinese rivals BYD and others gave Tesla relative lift, while its refreshed Model Y kept demand intact in China despite brutal price competition. 

Even so, Tesla produced fewer cars than a year ago, a reminder that the balance between supply and demand remains fragile.

Elon Musk is already steering Tesla toward a post-EV future. 

The Cybercab robotaxi is slated for next year, kicking off a pivot into autonomy and robotics. 

Shareholders will also vote on a pay package for Musk worth up to $1 trillion, tied to an $8.5 trillion market-cap target, a moonshot that redefines Tesla’s long-term narrative.

Investor Signal
Shares fell more than 3% Thursday despite the blockbuster beat, showing the market had priced in a surge. 

The near-term test is whether Tesla can maintain momentum without subsidy fuel. Longer term, the company is asking investors to underwrite a risky shift from carmaker to autonomy platform. 

That pivot could deliver outsized returns if successful…but it also stretches investor patience at a moment when execution risk is rising.

Rivian has always carried oversized expectations. Since its blockbuster 2021 IPO, the EV truck maker has been positioned as Tesla’s heir in the U.S. pure-play EV market. 

The brand has earned praise for design and engineering, but Wall Street remains skeptical about its cash burn, production scale, and reliance on fresh capital. 

The company has already cut jobs, slowed expansion, and leaned on price cuts in a crowded field led globally by China’s BYD.

That context set the stage for Thursday’s selloff. 

Rivian reported 13,201 deliveries in Q3 — a 30% jump year over year and well above analyst estimates. Production at its Illinois plant hit 10,720 vehicles. 

On the surface, a clear beat. But management narrowed full-year guidance to 41,500–43,500 deliveries, down from a prior 40,000–46,000 range. 

The midpoint move lower was enough to flash caution and rattle confidence.

Investor Signal

Rivian shares fell nearly 8% on the day, extending a six-session slide and erasing about 15% of market value in a week. 

Analysts see the guidance cut as a reminder of the core risks: heavy cash burn, a new Georgia factory poised to weigh on free cash flow, and uncertain demand once subsidies fade. The R2 midsize SUV, slated for 2026 at $45,000, remains the swing factor. But until Rivian proves it can scale profitably, each guidance tweak reinforces the bear case. 

The near-term trade is less about growth than survival — whether Rivian can stretch its cash runway until the R2 arrives, or whether dilution risk re-enters the story.

Corporate debt spreads have squeezed to their tightest levels since 2007, with junk bonds paying just 2.8 points over Treasurys. 

Even top-rated issuers like Microsoft now borrow at yields below the U.S. government. It’s a setup where investors are getting paid almost nothing for taking on mounting risk.

Cracks are already showing. 

Subprime auto lender Tricolor Holdings collapsed in September under fraud accusations, while car-parts maker First Brands unraveled with $10 billion in hidden liabilities. Both highlight growing stress in consumer-linked credit, where defaults are creeping higher. 

Auto loans 90 days past due hit 5% last quarter — the highest in five years — while truck sales, a proxy for freight and retail activity, have dropped 24% from their 2023 peak. 

It’s the kind of late-cycle weakness that blindsides lenders.

The real danger sits in private credit. With $1.6 trillion outstanding, the market now rivals junk bonds in size but comes with far less transparency. 

Roughly 11% of portfolio companies are paying lenders with IOUs instead of cash, a sharp jump since 2021. 

Business development companies tied to the space are already down 7% this year, signaling stress seeping into public markets.

Investor Signal

Pressure is likely to land first in subprime auto lenders, BDCs with heavy private credit exposure, and high-yield names dependent on low-income consumers. 

With spreads this tight, even a handful of defaults could reset the entire junk complex. Traders should be cautious reaching for yield, the payoff is asymmetrically negative. If exposure is unavoidable, stick to higher-quality investment grade or hedge through CDS and consumer discretionary indexes.

Right now, a rare window has opened in the Nasdaq…

A handful of high-potential stocks—some trading for $5 or less—are flying under the radar. These are quality companies with strong fundamentals that Wall Street has seriously overlooked.

But not for long.

Smart investors are already positioning themselves for potential triple-digit gains once the market catches on.

We’ve just released our FREE report revealing 4 of the most undervalued Nasdaq stocks with breakout potential.

Click below to get your free report now and receive two complimentary bonus subscriptions to help sharpen your edge in today’s fast-moving market.

Click Here to Download Your FREE Nasdaq Stock Report Now

(By clicking the links above, you agree to receive future emails from us and our partners. You can opt out at any time. - Privacy Policy)

For decades, the mortgage-credit ecosystem has been locked into a “tri-merge” system, bundling FICO scores from Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion…with each bureau taking a cut.

That structure has come under fire this year from Washington, where the Trump administration and FHFA have pressed for lower costs in a housing market already strained by affordability. 

Regulators even authorized rival VantageScore for government-backed mortgages, ending FICO’s monopoly.

FICO just countered with its boldest move in years. The company rolled out a direct pricing model that lets mortgage resellers buy scores straight from FICO at $4.95 apiece, bypassing the bureaus’ average $10 markup. 

The shift both answers political pressure and reclaims margin the bureaus have long captured. 

Investors noticed… FICO shares surged more than 20% Thursday, their biggest one-day gain in years, while Equifax, TransUnion, and Experian dropped between 4% and 10%.

Analysts caution adoption will take time. 

Lenders are notoriously slow to rewire workflows, and credit scoring is deeply embedded in mortgage operations. Still, with $13 trillion in mortgages on the line, FHFA chief Bill Pulte called the change a “first step” and urged the bureaus to cut fees as well.

Investor Signal

This is the most significant shake-up in credit scoring since the 1990s. FICO stock, long treated as a steady analytics play, suddenly has fresh growth potential and political goodwill. 

The bureaus, by contrast, face a direct hit to one of their most profitable franchises. The asymmetric trade is clear: long FICO, short the bureaus… provided lenders adopt the new model at scale. The pivot now hinges on whether inertia keeps the old system alive or if Washington’s pressure forces change.

Disney’s brand reputation has cratered. 

A Jefferies review of Morning Consult data shows sentiment toward both Disney and Disney+ sinking to the lowest in at least two years… 

…and this time, the blow came from both Democrats and Republicans.

The flashpoint was Disney’s handling of Jimmy Kimmel. 

ABC briefly pulled his show after controversial comments about slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk and pressure from FCC leadership, before reversing course. 

The whiplash managed to alienate everyone: conservatives angered at Kimmel’s words, liberals furious that Disney appeared to bow to political pressure. 

Layer on fresh price hikes at Disney+, and it’s been a two-week stretch that gutted goodwill across demographics.

Investor Signal

Shares are down 6% in the past month and remain negative on the year, but Jefferies suggests the damage may be more reputational than financial. 

Awareness of Disney+ even ticked higher, implying churn risk is limited. Still, the stock trades like investors are questioning Bob Iger’s ability to juggle political crossfire and pricing power at once. 

At $112, Jefferies keeps a buy rating with a $144 target — nearly 30% upside — but the near-term trade is about whether the PR storm dents subscriber growth.

Markets keep coasting on momentum while Washington drags its feet. 

With the shutdown sidelining payrolls, traders are leaning on sentiment and sector flows instead of hard data. 

Chips remain the engine, gold finally blinked after its record streak, and cheap hedges are quietly coming back into play.

It’s a market that still wants to grind higher, but each tick is riding on thinner conviction. 

Momentum can carry the tape only so far; without data, the next shock will decide whether this drift turns into a surge or a stumble.