Yields Hit a 24-Year High as Oil Falls and Apple Trails Meta

Today's Mood

U.S. stocks closed lower for a second straight session on Sept. 29, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 0.26% to 51,349.92, the S&P 500 off 0.17% to 7,670.84, and the Nasdaq Composite slipping 0.09% to 26,797.54. The moves were modest, and the VIX actually eased 0.19% to 16.04 even as long-dated Treasury yields kept climbing.

Underneath the calm headline numbers, two markets pulled in opposite directions: bonds sold off while oil fell sharply, and a single AI rivalry split individual stocks far more than the index moves suggest.

Yesterday's Checkpoint, Revisited

Monday’s close left three things to watch: whether the 10-year Treasury yield would climb past 5.24%, how Micron’s Sept. 30 earnings guidance would read, and whether there was any follow-up on Bloom Energy’s Project Jupiter dispute.

The first is confirmed. The 10-year yield closed at 5.26%, and the 30-year yield reached 5.59%, its highest since 2002. The second is still pending — Micron doesn’t report until after Wednesday’s close. The third is partly resolved: Oracle reaffirmed its commitment to Project Jupiter despite the force-majeure notice tied to a delayed pipeline, now pushed back to February 2027, and Bloom Energy shares recovered on the news.

Treasury Yields Hit Their Highest Since 2002

The 10-year Treasury yield closed at 5.26%, up from 5.24% a day earlier, while the 30-year yield rose to 5.59% — its highest level since 2002. New York Fed President John Williams said in a speech that “there is no need for urgency” after September’s rate increase, but added that “one further upward adjustment” could be appropriate later this year, according to Investing.com.

Bond investors appeared to focus more on the second half of that message. Yields that keep climbing put more pressure on the valuations of stocks priced for future growth.

Oil Reversed Course, Falling 4.3%

WTI crude fell 4.30% to $88.62 a barrel. CNBC reported that crude exports from Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea terminals at Yanbu and Muajjiz are nearing a full operational recovery for the first time since a pipeline was hit earlier this month, easing supply concerns. JPMorgan estimated that total Middle East crude exports have rebounded to 98% of pre-war levels.

Rising yields and falling oil made an unusual pair. It suggested some of the pressure on rates is coming from policy expectations rather than inflation fears alone.

Consumer Confidence Fell to a 12-Year Low

The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index dropped to 81.9 in September, well below the forecast of 89 and its lowest level since 2014. CNBC reported that the Present Situation Index fell 7.9 points to 109.3, while the Expectations Index fell 5.9 points to 63.6 — its third straight monthly decline. For the first time since the question was introduced four years ago, more respondents called their family’s financial situation “bad” than “good.”

The survey period, Sept. 1-23, overlapped with a Fed rate hike and the seventh month of the Iran war — both weighing on how households described the economy.

Meta and Apple Moved in Opposite Directions

Meta rose 3.24% to $738.79 while Apple fell 2.66% to $329.40. According to Yahoo Finance, Bank of America analyst Wamsi Mohan warned that Meta’s agentic AI app, Muse, threatens to capture the product-discovery, referral and payment activity that surrounds an iPhone purchase, even if Apple keeps selling the phones themselves.

Muse launched Sept. 8 and topped 2.5 million downloads within two weeks, reaching No. 1 on the U.S. iOS free chart. It’s already linked to commerce tools from Shopify, Expedia and PayPal. Siri, by contrast, still lacks persistent background tasks and the broad third-party integrations that could match it.

Oracle Rose on New AI Cloud Products

Oracle gained 3.91% to $137.79 after unveiling Fusion Claw, a new offering that pairs AI reasoning with enterprise computation, along with 25 new agentic applications built on it. The company’s most recent quarterly cloud revenue rose 62% to $11.6 billion, with cloud infrastructure revenue more than doubling to $7.4 billion — numbers that kept investor attention on the stock.

Moderna and SpaceX Also Moved Sharply

Moderna rose 3.13% to $203.46, touching a 52-week high after positive Phase 3 melanoma data for its personalized cancer vaccine, developed with Merck’s Keytruda. SpaceX rose 2.59% a day after its Starship reached orbit for the first time and deployed 26 next-generation Starlink satellites.

Neither move is directly tied to AI or semiconductors, but both show how single-company catalysts can move stocks we follow even on a quiet index day.

AMD, Broadcom and Others Also Traded Heavily

AMD was flat (-0.05%) but stayed among the day’s most heavily traded names. Barron’s noted that AMD is paying a steep price to keep pace with Nvidia, pointing to its recently announced $8.2 billion acquisition of World Labs. Broadcom (+1.58%), SanDisk (+0.98%) and MongoDB (+0.75%) also saw heavy trading — three different layers of the AI infrastructure stack: chip design, memory and databases.

Micron Reports Tomorrow Night

Micron rose 1.05% to $1,065.08 and reports fiscal fourth-quarter results after Wednesday’s close. The company’s own guidance calls for revenue of $50 billion (plus or minus $1 billion) and adjusted EPS of $31 (plus or minus $1), with adjusted gross margin near 86%. Wall Street’s consensus sits slightly above that, at $50.8 billion in revenue and $31.50 in EPS, after Micron beat estimates in each of its last four quarters by an average of 21%.

By our valuation tracker, Micron trades at a forward P/E of 6.6 — the cheapest in the group relative to its price target, at 42.8% below it. A forward P/E compares a stock’s price with next year’s expected earnings, so the lower the number, the cheaper shares look relative to those estimates — though in a cyclical business like memory chips, the estimates themselves can swing sharply.

The Read-Through for Korean Chipmakers

Micron’s results and guidance will feed directly into how SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics trade at Korea’s next session. If DRAM and NAND revenue grow anywhere near the consensus pace — up 330% and 435% year-over-year, respectively — it would confirm that the memory pricing cycle, including high-bandwidth memory, remains strong. Micron’s unusually low forward P/E also feeds directly into the valuation debate around its Korean peers.

Gold Rose Alongside Everything Else

Gold rose 1.13% to $4,215.60 an ounce. Rising yields usually dull the appeal of an asset that pays no interest, but on Tuesday, demand for a hedge against geopolitical and policy uncertainty outweighed that drag. With consumer confidence sliding and another rate hike still on the table, the move into gold reads as a fairly natural response.

What to Watch Next Session

Three things to watch next session. First, whether Micron can guide above consensus (revenue $50.8 billion, EPS $31.50) when it reports after Wednesday’s close. Second, whether August core PCE inflation, due the same day, strengthens the case for another Fed rate hike. Third, whether Treasury yields keep testing their highest levels since 2002.

What Else We're Watching

Apple fell 2.66% to $329.40, among the largest declines of the stocks we follow. According to Yahoo Finance, Bank of America analyst Wamsi Mohan said Meta’s agentic AI app, Muse, could let Apple keep every iPhone sale while still losing the product-discovery, referral and payment activity that surrounds those purchases. Apple could sell just as many phones and still cede a meaningful share of the digital activity that happens on them.

Muse launched Sept. 8 and passed 2.5 million downloads within two weeks, reaching No. 1 on the U.S. iOS free chart. It’s designed to browse sites, fill out forms and keep working after a user leaves the app, and it’s already tied into commerce tools from Shopify, Expedia and PayPal. Siri, by comparison, still lacks persistent background tasks, broad third-party action coverage and a dedicated agent payment rail.

The rivalry isn’t limited to these two companies. OpenAI is expected to unveil its own consumer agent the same day, turning the race for agentic AI into a three-way contest. Meta’s steady climb since Muse launched and Apple’s decline are two sides of the same story.

The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index fell to 81.9 in September, well short of the 89 forecast and its lowest since 2014. CNBC reported the Present Situation Index dropped 7.9 points to 109.3, while the Expectations Index fell 5.9 points to 63.6, its third straight monthly decline. For the first time since the question was introduced four years ago, more respondents called their family’s financial situation “bad” than “good.” The survey period, Sept. 1-23, overlapped with a Fed rate hike and the seventh month of the Iran war.

The same day, New York Fed President John Williams told Investing.com that “there is no need for urgency” after September’s hike, but that “one further upward adjustment” could still be appropriate this year. Households are already worried about prices and jobs, and the Fed just kept the door open to tightening further.

The two stories landing on the same day isn’t a coincidence. That same mix — inflation pressure that hasn’t gone away, and a Fed in no rush but not done either — is part of why Treasury yields hit a fresh multi-decade high.

Sources

• CNBC Oil prices fall as crude exports recover at Saudi Arabia's Red Sea ports
• CNBC 30-year Treasury bond yield scales to highest level since 2002
• CNBC Consumer optimism slides to lowest since 2014 as fears escalate over rising prices and jobs
• Yahoo Finance Apple Stock Falls After Bank of America Flags a New AI Threat
• Yahoo Finance Oracle Stock Rises Although AI Revenue Faces an ROI Test
• Yahoo Finance BE Stock Eyes Best Month Since April: Oracle Reaffirms 2.4 GW Fuel Cell Deal Amid Project Jupiter Jitters
• Yahoo Finance Micron Q4 Earnings Preview: What To Expect From Upcoming Report
• Investing.com Fed's Williams sees no urgency for next Fed rate hike