Inflation Ran a Fever. Nvidia Caught Something Too.

Tuesday, November 10, 2026

The 30-second version: Prices rose faster than expected in October, so the Fed looks even more likely to raise interest rates in December, maybe by more than usual. Stocks slipped a little, and Nvidia slid again. Your 401(k) barely noticed. Overnight, a strong report from an AI company has stocks pointed higher this morning.

The fund rows (IWM, GLD, USO) are there for the move, not the price. The SOX is a basket of 30 big chip stocks. The VIX is the "fear gauge." USO tracks U.S. crude. Bitcoin trades all night, so its "day" ends at midnight UTC.

The $1,000 test: $1,000 in an S&P 500 fund lost about $4 on Tuesday. $1,000 in Nvidia lost about $55, which is a lot of money to spend learning about the CEO's personal life.

Consumer prices rose 0.4% in October, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Tuesday. Economists expected 0.3%. "Core" prices, which leave out food and energy because those bounce around like a toddler on soda, rose 0.3%. The forecast was 0.2%.

Where it hurt: gasoline up 1%, electricity up 0.9%, food up 0.5%. Housing made up more than 30% of the increase. Your grocery receipt could have told them this for free.

No yearly number this time: October 2025 prices were never collected during the shutdown. One month is all we get, and it ran hot.

The Fed's key rate sits at 3.75% to 4.00%. The next meeting is December 8-9.

Fed Governor Christopher Waller, one of the 12 officials who vote on interest rates, said Tuesday morning that a half-point hike should be considered if core prices came in "around 0.3." A few hours later, core came in at 0.3. Very good aim. He also said hiking only a quarter point "would put our credibility at risk." Dallas Fed President Lorie Logan, also a voter, sees two more quarter-point hikes ahead.

Futures, which are bets on where rates will land, treat a December hike as close to a sure thing. Half-point odds went from about zero to roughly 14% Tuesday, then about 11% early Wednesday.

The bond market moved first. The 10-year Treasury rate, the one mortgage rates tend to follow, rose to 4.98% from 4.88%. The 2-year jumped to 4.73% from 4.56%.

NVIDIA fell 5.47% Tuesday to $168.89, after a 4.27% drop on Monday. That's about 9.5% in two days.

The reason isn't chips. Independent board members hired a former top federal prosecutor from Manhattan and the law firm Wachtell Lipton to investigate CEO Jensen Huang's relationship with a woman U.S. intelligence agencies say passed information to Beijing. The Information reported that the relationship may have helped move at least $7.5 billion worth of chips to Chinese firms. Nothing has been proven.

Its market value briefly dipped below $4 trillion during the day. Earnings are due November 17. Before the market opened on Wednesday, the stock was up about 4%.

Microsoft fell 2.20% to $533.16 after Anthropic introduced Claude Sheets, Claude Whiteboards, and Claude Data, tools aimed straight at Excel and the rest of Office.

Same day, Anthropic's updated IPO filing set a price of $70 to $78 a share for 825 million shares. Depending on how you count all the shares, that values the company around $1.3 trillion to $1.4 trillion. The stock could start trading as soon as November 19 or 20, according to reports.

CoreWeave rents out data centers packed with AI chips, which makes it a "neocloud" (the new cloud companies built for AI, not your photo backups). After the bell on Tuesday, it reported $3.66 billion in quarterly sales, up 168% from a year ago. Wall Street expected about $3.55 billion.

It raised its 2026 sales forecast to $13.0 billion to $13.3 billion, from $12.4 billion to $13.2 billion, and said it expects an adjusted profit (one that leaves out some costs) in the first half of 2028. The stock was up more than 10% before Wednesday's open.

As of about 4 AM CT, futures (bets on where indexes will open) had the S&P 500 up about 0.7%, the Nasdaq 100 up about 1.7%, and the Dow flat.

Also on Tuesday, oil: Brent, the global benchmark, settled at $91.49 a barrel, down 1.2%. U.S. crude settled at $86.04, down 0.9%. Both were the lowest closes since late August, after U.S. officials played down new strikes on Iran. Iran says the Strait of Hormuz will stay shut until its demands are met. Nothing has been signed. At the pump, the national average for gas dipped under $4 a gallon Tuesday for the first time since July.

Wednesday, November 11 (Veterans Day). Times CT.

The one thing that could ruin everyone's day: Stocks get to celebrate CoreWeave today while the bond crowd is off. Thursday bonds come back to chew on hot inflation and Waller's half-point talk. If the 10-year rate pushes back above 5%, today's rally could turn out to be the fever breaking for about 24 hours.

Bottom line: The economy has a fever, the Fed has the prescription pad out, and the AI trade just took a big spoonful of CoreWeave. Get some rest.

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Disclaimer: This is not financial advice. We are a newsletter with opinions and a spreadsheet. Do your own homework, and please don't dump your index fund because inflation had one warm month.