The S&P 500 Just Had Its Worst Week Since the April 2025 Tariff Crash
A fourth straight weekly loss looks bad, but the S&P 500's record rests on a technicality, and the real damage hit one corner of the market. With CPI and NVIDIA earnings looming, your index fund may own more of that…
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The S&P 500 closed Friday, November 6, 2026, at 7,376.86, down from 7,580.07 a week earlier. That 2.68% fall was its worst Friday-to-Friday week since the week ending April 4, 2025, when the tariff crash drove a 9.08% correction.
The index has now fallen for the fourth straight week. The State Street SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSEARCA:SPY) lost 2.7%, moving from $755.72 to $735.29.
Most of the damage came on Thursday, November 5. Midterm results set off heavy selling in AI stocks, and the S&P 500 fell 4.36%, its worst day since the April 2025 crash.
Why a 2.68% Week Set a Record
The two weeks differ greatly in size. In the April 2025 week, the index fell from 5,580.94 to 5,074.08, a much steeper drop.
The November 6 week set the mark only because the two closest weeks since then just missed it: the week ended May 23, 2025 at -2.61% and the week ended June 5, 2026 at -2.59%.
The losing streak started small. The index fell 1.95%, 0.47% and 0.57% in the weeks ended October 16, 23 and 30. It now sits 5.65% below its October 6 record close of 7,818.93.
Only the S&P 500 can claim the worst-since record. The Nasdaq Composite fell 3.37% for its own fourth straight weekly loss. However, the week ending October 16 was worse for both the Composite, at -4.48%, and the Nasdaq-100, at -5.49%.
Chip Stocks Led the Selling While the Dow Held Up
The PHLX Semiconductor Index fell 12.15%, from 10,688.80 to 9,390.25. The Technology Select Sector SPDR (NYSEARCA:XLK) fell 7%, and the SPDR energy sector fund fell 11%.
The Dow, which the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF Trust (NYSEARCA:DIA) tracks, fell just 0.94% to 51,285.73. On Friday, the Dow lost 237.33 points, or 0.46%, while the S&P 500 rose 0.31% and the Composite gained 1.09%. That split shows the losses were concentrated in AI hardware and energy and did not spread across the wider market.
Your S&P 500 Fund Owns the Same AI Trade
The Invesco QQQ Trust (NASDAQ:QQQ) fell 4.98% to $656.10. SPY fell less, but it still carries much of the same risk.
As of SPY’s March 2026 fact sheet, NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA | NVDA Price Prediction) by itself made up 7.58% of the fund. The S&P 500 weights each company by its market value, so the AI stocks that pulled the Nasdaq-100 lower also have a large effect on a fund many investors consider “diversified.”
All of that AI expansion still has to be powered and cooled by someone, and we featured seven of those suppliers in a free report.
Strong Jobs Data Puts CPI and NVIDIA Earnings in Focus
Employers added 165,000 jobs in October, far above the expected 65,000. September’s gain was revised to 60,000, and unemployment fell to 4.1%. Traders raised the odds of a December rate hike to 78% from 70%.
Strong hiring can keep wage growth, and with it inflation, running hot, and that gives the Fed a reason to raise rates. Higher rates lower what investors will pay today for profits expected years from now, and highly valued tech stocks depend most on those future profits.
October’s consumer price index (CPI), the main inflation report, comes out Tuesday, November 10, at 8:30 a.m. ET. NVIDIA reports fiscal third-quarter results after the close on November 17. A hot inflation number would make a hike more likely, while strong NVIDIA guidance could help steady chip stocks.
What Strategists Are Saying About SPY After the Selloff
Keith Lerner, chief investment officer at Truist Advisory Services, said AI is still the main theme of this bull market and the selloff likely offers a longer-term buying opportunity. Adam Turnquist, chief cross-asset strategist at LPL Financial, called the week a knee-jerk reaction to the midterms.
SPY’s longer-term trend remains intact. The fund is still up 7.83% for the year, and a slow fall after a run to records looks like an ordinary pullback in a rising market.
Investors exploring ways to reduce AI concentration can compare an equal-weight S&P 500 fund. It gives NVIDIA the same weight as every other company in the index, so swings in chip stocks move it less.
This view would weaken if the S&P 500 closes November 13 below 7,376.86, a fifth straight weekly loss, and NVIDIA’s report fails to stop the fall.
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Omor Ibne Ehsan is a writer at 24/7 Wall St. He is a self-taught investor with a focus on growth, cyclical, and dividend equities that have strong fundamentals, value, and long-term potential. He also has an interest in high-risk, high-reward investments such as penny stocks.
