The S&P 500 index extended its losses to 4%, while the Nasdaq fell more than 5%.

Against the backdrop of today's sharp pullback in U.S. stocks, reports have emerged that some hedge funds are shutting down or streamlining their internal stock long-short teams and proactively reducing their assets under management (AUM). These moves are being interpreted by the market as signals of institutional deleveraging and risk reduction amid heightened volatility. According to a client confirmation letter disclosed by Bloomberg, multi-strategy hedge fund Walleye Capital, which manages $17 billion in assets, sent a letter to investors on Thursday stating it will streamline its internal stock long-short business and plans to return part of the capital. Walleye Capital said it has evaluated the fund's optimal size and decided to proactively return some funds. The news was made public during U.S. stock trading hours. Another market rumor claims that Engineers Gate, a New York-based quantitative multi-strategy hedge fund founded by Glenn Dubin, is also shutting down its stock-related teams, with AUM reaching $23 billion.

Before Thursday’s U.S. stock market plunge, Dan Bin, chairman of Oriental Harbor Fund, disclosed on social media that his firm’s Oriental Harbor Overseas Fund reduced its storage sector holdings by 10% and Intel positions by 3%, while adding to Meta Platforms (META) stakes. The remaining nearly 10% Intel holding will stay unchanged. Meanwhile, proceeds from its "double high sell" strategy will not be reinvested in hardware, but instead allocated to application-oriented areas, with additional positions in SpaceX (SPCX) and Amazon. The overseas fund will also maintain its SK Hynix holdings. Additionally, about 10% of the fund’s total assets are contractually restricted to investing only in A-shares and Hong Kong-listed equities, and have seen significant drawdowns after heavy positioning in the AI industrial chain. Dan Bin said he remains optimistic about the overall AI sector, including related companies in A-shares and Hong Kong, but admitted he did not anticipate such sharp declines, hoping the current level marks a low point and the AI sector will return to a major bull market. He also noted that with the Democratic Party controlling both U.S. congressional chambers, environmental reviews, water use approvals, and grid connection permits for data centers may tighten, slowing growth in new computing power supply. This will benefit cloud giants like Google, Amazon, and Microsoft that have already secured land, power, server racks, and GPU resources. While high short-term capital expenditure may pressure free cash flow, if the entire industry is forced to curb spending, improved pricing power is expected to restore cash flow.

Google has pledged to invest $17 billion to build its first data center in Wyoming, and has signed binding agreements with Tallgrass Energy, Black Hills Energy, American Electric Power, and Related Digital, bringing jobs and infrastructure to Laramie County. Google will contribute $17 billion in capital, while Bloom Energy will provide fuel cell technology. The project includes a 702-megawatt fuel cell development project equipped with carbon capture and storage, and has already signed a deal with American Electric Power (AEP).

Beating AI News Flash: OpenAI has recently released the GPT-6 Cyber model to a small group of vetted customers. Designed specifically for discovering and exploiting security vulnerabilities, OpenAI has raised the model’s cybersecurity risk rating from "High" (assigned to its predecessor) to "Critical" under its security framework. OpenAI noted that amid a surge in malicious cyber actors’ attempts to misuse AI, the model is built to help security researchers proactively identify vulnerabilities and test their exploitation, enabling fixes before attackers can act. In test results, OpenAI researchers used the model to uncover 81 previously unknown Firefox vulnerabilities, all classified as "High Severity" by Mozilla and already in the process of being fixed. Additionally, the model assisted in developing working exploit tools for 948 Linux kernel vulnerabilities (including 588 unknown ones), and disclosed 304 critical Linux vulnerabilities along with patch recommendations to maintainers. Currently, GPT-6 Cyber is available to select customers on the "Daybreak Red" advanced authorized security service tier, and will be expanded to all approved customers in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, OpenAI will roll out the early GPT-5.6 Cyber model to relevant customers starting November 5.

US stocks suffered a sharp sell-off, with tech stocks bearing the brunt of the decline. According to data from BIT Stock Platform, intraday maximum drops for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500, and Nasdaq Composite reached 2.38%, 3.57%, and 5.35% respectively. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index’s slump widened to 11.6% at one point, triggering concentrated sell-offs across the AI hardware supply chain. Nvidia fell as much as 9% at one point, while TSMC, SpaceX, and Tesla each dropped 11% at their lows. The Forbes Real-Time Billionaires List shows that the US stock slump caused massive net worth losses for multiple global tech billionaires. Elon Musk’s net worth decreased by $91.2 billion in a single day, a 10.50% drop; Michael Dell, founder of Dell Technologies, lost $20.5 billion (down 9.60%); Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, lost $15.1 billion (down 8.70%); Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle, lost $13.2 billion (down 8.05%); and Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Meta, lost $12.9 billion (down 5.98%). The combined net worth of these five billionaires shrank by $152.9 billion in one day, with Musk’s single-day loss accounting for nearly 60% of the group’s total combined loss.

According to data from the BIT stock platform, Apple's stock rose more than 1.6% intraday, hitting a record high of $355.38, and is now down 0.8% at $346.5. On the news front, Apple has launched a seven-tranche U.S. dollar investment-grade bond issuance, aiming to raise up to around $70 billion, joining the recent wave of frequent bond issuances by tech giants.