The CB Weekly Market Recap (Sept 27th - Oct 3rd, 2026) ⚡️
🔴 The Nasdaq was the only major index to finish the week higher, closing Friday at 27,190.86 for a gain of about 0.5%. The S&P 500 ended at 7,722.72, down roughly 0.3%, while the Dow fell 1.3% to 51,176.96. The Nasdaq-100 set a record on Friday as tech caught a strong bid. The S&P closed out September down 0.4% and now sits about 1.9% below the record high it set in August.
🔴 September payrolls came in at just 29,000 against the 84,000 Wall Street expected. The unemployment rate ticked up to 4.2% from 4.1%, partly on a growing labour force. Revisions did further damage, with July and August cut by a combined 60,000 and July flipping from a gain into a loss of 10,000. Average hourly earnings rose 0.1% on the month and 3.0% over the year.
🔴 Odds of a quarter-point hike at the October 28th meeting fell to roughly 15% after that report, down from about 70% earlier in the week. Fed-dated swaps no longer price a full increase for the remainder of 2026. Kalshi had pause odds at 85% by Friday afternoon. That is a full reversal from two weeks ago, when the dot plot showed 16 of 18 officials expecting another move before year end.
🔴 The 10-year Treasury yield pushed above 5.34% on Wednesday, its highest level since 2002. It closed Friday at 5.27% once the jobs report took some pressure off the front end. Yields had climbed all week on oil and on ISM manufacturing data showing building cost pressures. We also saw bonds swing hard enough on Thursday to drag the Dow nearly 360 points below water intraday before it clawed back to a flat close.
🔴 WTI settled Friday at $91.11, down 1.4% on the week. Brent settled at $102.25, though the benchmark rolled contracts mid-week so the weekly comparison is not a clean one. Thursday brought a violent spike, with Brent jumping $4.28 and WTI $2.45 after Chinese refiners suspended petroleum product exports for October and reports emerged of additional US forces heading to the Middle East. The Brent-WTI spread finished around $11.14, still an unusually wide premium for international crude.
🔴 The G7 announced on Friday that it will release 100 million barrels of oil and fuel products through the IEA over four months. The release is frontloaded with a substantial diesel component inside the first 20 days, after US diesel hit record prices. Trump had spent the week pressuring France and Germany to tap their emergency diesel reserves, threatening a US export ban if they refused. The statement also confirmed that G7 members agreed not to restrict energy exports to one another.
🔴 Bitcoin climbed above $86,000 on Friday for a third consecutive weekly gain of roughly 2%. It touched $86,857, its highest since September 23rd, after buyers cleared a band of sell orders sitting around $85,000. Ether traded near $2,745. The bigger number is the quarter, with Bitcoin up about 40% across July to September, its strongest three months since late 2024.
🔴 Spot Bitcoin ETFs pulled in $6.34 billion across the third quarter, including $2.65 billion in September alone. The funds flipped back to inflows on October 1st with $102.7 million, reversing a $148.7 million outflow the day before and lifting combined net assets to $109.3 billion. Ether ETFs went the other way with three straight sessions of outflows totalling around $118 million. We also saw the SEC propose new crypto custody rules on October 1st, with a 60-day public comment period to follow.
🔴 As for next week, the Fed meets on October 27th and 28th and the market has effectively taken a hike off the table. The G7 barrels start moving inside 20 days, so the question is whether diesel prices actually respond or whether the physical shortage simply swallows the release. Iran and Hormuz remain the wildcard on oil and on everything downstream of it. Stay sharp lads.
@TradingNews
