November 13, 2026

Stock futures are drifting higher this Friday morning. S&P 500 futures are up 0.19% at 7629.50 and Dow futures are up 0.14% at 52461. The Nasdaq is lagging, with futures off 0.06% as the market continues to process Jensen Huang's departure from Nvidia. NVDA is up 1.58% pre-market in an attempt to stabilize after its recent tumble. Second-derivative pressure, however, is migrating to the rest of the semiconductor complex: AMD is down 2.38% and AVGO is down 2.20%. MSFT is off 1.03% despite news that Cerebras landed a deal with the software giant. The read-through is that investors are reassessing leadership and execution risk across the AI hardware supply chain rather than abandoning the theme outright.

Rotation beneath the surface is notable. Communication Services (+0.49%) is catching a bid, with GOOGL up 1.17% and GOOG up 1.29%. AMZN is up 1.04%, suggesting mega-cap capital is shifting toward platform names rather than leaving the cohort. Energy (+0.74%) leads all sectors, paced by refiners VLO (+1.13%) and MPC (+0.53%). WTI crude is steady at $88.71 as the Iranian blockade remains in place; Polymarket assigns only a 26% probability that the U.S. announces an end to the blockade by year-end. Financials (+0.33%) are benefiting from the backup in yields, with MS up 0.70% and JPM up 0.47%. Rate-sensitive retailers HD (-0.77%) and TJX (-0.79%) are on the wrong side of that trade.

The macro focus is squarely on this morning's Producer Price Index, the final major inflation print of the week following Tuesday's CPI. The rates backdrop is decidedly hawkish. Prediction markets put 98% odds on no Fed cuts in 2026 and 88% odds on a 25-bp hike at the December meeting, with an additional 9% on a 50+ bp move. Treasury yields are pushing higher again in the pre-market. A firm PPI, particularly in the services components, would likely validate the December hike pricing and pressure long-duration growth names further. A benign print could spark a relief rally in tech, which is already oversold on the Nvidia headlines. Gold is up 0.15% at $3891, holding near record territory as a hedge against both policy and geopolitical risk.

Options positioning argues for caution around the open. SPY at-the-money implied volatility is a modest 12.1% (IV rank 37), and the nearest-expiry implied move is ±1.0%. Dealers, however, remain in negative gamma territory for a 22nd straight session, with an estimated -$7.3 billion of exposure per 1% move. That means hedging flows are likely to accelerate rather than dampen any PPI-driven move. Key SPY reference levels are: - Zero-gamma flip: 762, the line in the sand for regime change. - Put wall: 755, the downside support. - Call wall: 775, the upside resistance. The 25-delta skew of -1.0% shows calls being bid, which suggests some participants are positioning for upside convexity even as the 1.06 put/call ratio reflects persistent hedging.

Overseas, the tone is mixed. The Nikkei rose 0.53% to 61142, while the Hang Seng fell 1.55% and the DAX (-0.20%) and Euro Stoxx 50 (-0.27%) are softer. Eurostat GDP is also on today's docket. With the midterms now behind the market, strategists are leaning on historically favorable post-election seasonality, but the near-term path runs through inflation data and the December FOMC. Next week's calendar includes: - Monday: Empire State Manufacturing. - Tuesday: retail sales, industrial production and import prices. - Wednesday: housing starts. - Thursday: Philly Fed survey. - Friday: University of Michigan sentiment.