Wall Street's Make-or-Break Week: Apple and Palantir Earnings Land as Traders Try to Shake Off Big Tech's Ugly Selloff
After a week that erased billions in minutes on disappointing Big Tech numbers, two of the market's most-watched names report Monday — and investors are bracing either way.
Wall Street closed out October nursing a hangover, and the first trading day of November brings the names that could either cure it or make it worse. Apple is scheduled to report fiscal fourth-quarter results Monday at 5 p.m. ET, with Palantir reporting its own third-quarter numbers the same day, capping a brutal earnings stretch that has already seen Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta move markets sharply in both directions over the past week.
Apple is walking in with specific numbers to defend. On its July call, the company guided to 9-11% year-over-year revenue growth for the September quarter, which on last year's $102.5 billion base implies roughly $111.7 billion to $113.7 billion, with gross margin guidance of 47-48%. It's the first full quarterly report under new CEO John Ternus, who took over September 1 when Tim Cook moved into the executive chair role; investors will be listening for any sign of supply or memory-pricing strain heading into the holiday quarter, and for whether Ternus changes the company's tone on AI, where Apple has lagged peers' spending and messaging.
Palantir's Growth Story Faces Its Next Test
Palantir, meanwhile, arrives off one of the most dramatic growth quarters of any large-cap stock this year. Second-quarter revenue hit $1.935 billion, up 93% year-over-year, with U.S. commercial bookings up 153%. The company guided to $2.16-2.164 billion for the third quarter and raised its full-year 2026 revenue outlook to $8.15-8.158 billion — a bar that, if cleared, would extend a run that has made Palantir one of the defining AI-infrastructure stocks of the cycle.
TWO EARNINGS CALLS, ONE QUESTION: DOES THE AI TRADE STILL HOLD?
The backdrop is the point. Last Friday the Nasdaq shed more than 600 points as investors reassessed Big Tech's AI spending against softer guidance from some of the sector's biggest names, and Alphabet's own report earlier in the week wiped out billions in market value within minutes of its release. Whether Monday's results from Apple and Palantir calm that anxiety or deepen it may decide the market's tone heading into a holiday-shopping season that retailers are counting on, and into a week that also includes the Federal Reserve's next read on where rates go from here.