Quick Read
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Gold dropped below $4,000 for the first time since July as institutions dumped liquid holdings to cover margin calls from last week's tech wreck.
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Tesla jumped to Overweight at Barclays with a $450 target while Lockheed Martin earned an $835 Overweight upgrade at Morgan Stanley.
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Oil pushed near 6-month highs with Brent at $116 and WTI at $103 as military escalation fears keep the inflation narrative burning.
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Pre-Market Stock Futures:
Futuresare trading higher as we head into a new week that will finish out October, with traders trying to rally stocks after last week's losing effort. With Halloween on Saturday, this week may be as scary as last week. All major indices closed lower again on Friday after a midday attempt to ignite a rally failed. The biggest loser Friday was the Dow Jones Industrials, which finished at 52,214, down 1.24%, while the S&P 500 closed at 7,622, down 0.52%. The Nasdaq, where traders tried to start the tech rally near noon, ultimately finished lower at 25,955, down 0.21%, while the small-cap Russell 2000 closed at 2,778, down 0.20%.
Earningsremain on the front burner this week, with 176 S&P 500 companies expected to report, including tech giants Microsoft Corporation( NASDAQ: MSFT ), Alphabet( NASDAQ: GOOGL ), and Amazon.com ( NASDAQ: AMZN ).
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Treasury Bonds:
Afterone of the wildest weeks in the U.S. Treasury market in years, normalcy returned on Friday, and so did the sellers, as yields rose across the curve. Despite last week's safe-haven buying, the same issues remain, chief among them inflation; with strong manufacturing output and historically low jobless claims, the path is clear for another 25-basis-point hike. It likely will not come at this week's meetings, but it will probably come before year-end. The 30-year bond closed the session at 5.33%, while the benchmark 10-year note was last seen at 5%.
Oil and Gas
The energycomplex keeps the inflation narrative alive, and it rose again Friday, as the threat of increased military activity pushed both benchmarks near 6-month highs. When the dust settled, Brent Crude closed at $116, up 3.05%, while West Texas Intermediate finished the day at $103, higher by 3.74%. Natural gas continued its surprising slide, closing lower by 6.01% to finish Friday's trading at $2.63.
Gold:
Preciousmetals continued their surprising slide on Friday, though they finished the day well off the lows. Instead of being the haven many investors expect, gold has been battered and closed Friday at $3,993, down 0.76%, while silver ended at $53.74, down 1.34%. Gold falling below $4,000 for the first time since July has baffled many retail investors, given weakness in other assets; top analysts say unique margin mechanics and structural shifts in interest rate expectations have driven gold's sell-off.
Whenbig tech and chip stocks got absolutely wrecked last week, it put heavy pressure on institutional funds. When these highly leveraged portfolios take massive losses, managers are forced to dump gold aggressively, since it's so liquid, to scramble for cash and meet margin calls.
Crypto:
Cryptowas mostly flat and range-bound on Friday, basically consolidating after getting slammed by the big tech sell-off earlier in the week. Total market cap just hovered right around $2.8 trillion. Bitcoin defended the $81,000 level, chopping tightly between $81,100 and $82,000 to hold its 50-day moving average, even as massive institutional whales like BlackRock( NYSE: BLK ) moved hundreds of millions onto exchanges. At 8 AM EDT, Bitcoin was trading at $80,220, while Ethereum was quoted at $2,327.
24/7 Wall St.reviews dozens of analyst research reports every day to identify fresh investment ideas for investors and traders alike. These daily analyst notes include recommendations on stocks to buy, sell, or avoid, as well as new coverage initiations. Important reminder: No single analyst report should ever be the sole basis for buying or selling a stock.
Here aresome of the top Wall Street analyst upgrades, downgrades, and initiations from Monday, October 26, 2026.
Upgrades:
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Kaiser Aluminum Corporation( NASDAQ: KALU ) was upgraded to Neutral from Underweight at JPMorgan, which trimmed the target price for the shares to $140 from $146.
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Lockheed Martin( NYSE: LMT ) was upgraded to Overweight from Equal Weight at Morgan Stanley, with an $835 target price for the defense giant.
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Roper Technologies( NYSE: ROP ) was upgraded to Neutral from Underweight at JPMorgan, which raised the target price for the stock to $490 from $415.
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Ross Stores( NASDAQ: ROST ) was raised to Buy from Neutral at UBS, which raised the target price for the discount retailer to $315 from $239.
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Tesla( NASDAQ: TSLA ) was upgraded to Overweight from Equal Weight at Barclays, which lifted the target price for the EV leader to $450 from $370.
Downgrades:
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Advance Auto Parts( NYSE: AAP ) was downgraded to Sell from Neutral at Rothschild & Co Redburn, which cut the target for the stock to $32 from $45.
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Block( NYSE: XYZ ) was cut to Equal Weight from Overweight at Morgan Stanley, which lowered the target price for the shares to $80 from $90.
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Boise Cascade Company( NYSE: BCC ) was downgraded to Hold from Buy at Loop Capital, which cut the target price to $85 from $98.
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Equifax( NYSE: EFX ) was downgraded to Sector Perform from Outperform at RBC Capital, which bumped the target price for the stock to $189 from $177.
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Spotify Technology( NYSE: SPOT ) was downgraded to Accumulate from Buy at Phillip Securities, with an unchanged $650 target price.
Initiations:
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FirstEnergy( NYSE: FE) was initiated with an Outperform rating at BMO Capital, with a $50 target price.
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Lumentum Holdings( NASDAQ: LITE ) was started with a Buy rating at StoneX, with a $1,200 target price objective.
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NetApp( NASDAQ: NTAP ) was initiated with a Neutral rating at Guggenheim, without a Target price.
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Nutanix( NASDAQ: NTNX ) was initiated with a Buy rating at Guggenheim, with a $100 target price.
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Oklo( NASDAQ: OKLO ) was started with a Hold rating at TD Cowen, with a $26 target price.
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