Today’s Market Recap: U.S. Stocks Mixed as CXMT's New Architecture Weighs on Memory Chip Stocks; SanDisk Down Nearly 6%, SK Hynix Off Over 4%

Tracking the Market Trend

TradingKey - On October 12, Eastern Time, as tensions in the Middle East escalated, the three major U.S. stock indices posted mixed results, with memory stocks falling after Chinese DRAM manufacturer Changxin Memory Technology announced a new memory architecture.

At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.38% to 51,850.55 points; the Nasdaq Composite fell 0.44% to 27,245.90; and the S&P 500 fell 0.06% to 7,807.24.

Memory chip stocks fell across the board. SanDisk (SNDK) closed down 5.97%; SK Hynix (SKHY) fell 4.02%; Micron Technology (MU) fell 3.88%; Seagate Technology (STX) fell 3.80%; Western Digital (WDC) fell 2.60%.

In the crude oil market, the WTI November contract rose 2.06% to close at $93.74 per barrel; the Brent December contract rose 1.84% to close at $106.65 per barrel, with both closing at two-week highs.

In the precious metals market, COMEX gold futures fell 0.48% to $4,195.9 per ounce; COMEX silver futures fell 0.78% to $60.57 per ounce. A stronger U.S. Dollar Index put pressure on gold prices, as investors awaited inflation data to be released later this week to assess the direction of monetary policy.

Market Headline

Mortgage rates have returned to 7%, and pending sales of existing homes in the U.S. have fallen to a nearly 12-year low. According to Redfin’s seasonally adjusted data, pending sales of existing homes fell 4% month-over-month in September—the largest single-month decline in more than three years—hitting the lowest level since 2014; the supply of homes listed for sale rose to its highest level since March 2020. The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate rose to 7.4% on October 8, a sharp jump from 6.66% at the end of August, with pending sales declining across all 50 major metropolitan areas.

Microsoft（MSFT） will deploy its in-house AI chips on a large scale next year, aiming to improve inference efficiency by 40%. On the 12th, Microsoft announced that its next-generation Maia 300 chips will begin deployment in data centers next year. Designed specifically for AI inference tasks, they can process 40% more tokens per megawatt than mainstream GPU systems. Unlike Google and Amazon, Microsoft will not lease Maia computing power to external customers for the time being, but will first use its in-house chips to meet its own massive AI service demands.

Meta（META） launched its new model, Muse Wonder, with Zuckerberg stating it ranks among the industry’s leading AI technologies. On the 12th, Meta released Muse Wonder and the full version, Muse Wonder Full, claiming they have reached industry-leading levels in personal and professional agent tasks; users must subscribe to a paid service costing $20 or $100 per month to use Muse, marking Meta’s new attempt to generate AI revenue beyond advertising.

Marvell（MRVL） launches second-generation CXL memory expanders, supporting up to 9TB of DDR4 memory. Marvell Technology officially launched the second-generation Structera X 3406 and 3506 CXL memory expanders. The company stated that these are the industry’s first six-channel CXL 3.2 memory expanders, with a single controller supporting up to 9TB of DDR4 or 6TB of DDR5 memory—a 50% increase in memory channels compared to the previous generation. Samples of both products are expected to be available to customers beginning in the first quarter of 2027.

AMD（AMD） has introduced the Helion Agent AI Rack. Designed based on Open Compute Project (OCP) specifications, the platform is equipped with AMD’s proprietary computing chips. Dan McNamara, AMD’s senior vice president, stated that Agent AI encompasses a wide range of scenarios, including personal agents, enterprise applications, code execution, and complex workflows, with significant variations in computing power requirements across different tasks. Helion aims to meet these diverse needs through its flexible architecture. Helion features a built-in integrated token router that automatically routes AI agent model invocation requests to front-runner or open-source models and adapts to different inference backends. AMD also plans to contribute the Helion specifications to the OCP community, opening them up to the industry to drive further development and adoption by ecosystem partners.

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