Fear over spending on AI brings down big techs, and Nasdaq 100 enters correction for the third time in 2026

Wall Street recorded another day of sharp decline, driven by concern about the billions invested in artificial intelligence. According to Bloomberg Television, the Nasdaq 100 entered correction for the third time in 2026, while the S&P 500 fell 1.8% and missed the 100-day moving average. It was the biggest drop in the index since June.

The trigger was the disappointing balance sheets of technology giants, including Amazon, Alphabet and Intel. Os investidores questionam o retorno potencial dos trilhões de dólares que vêm sendo injetados em IA, e há também inquietação sobre a saúde da economia.

An anxiety that is not new

Mike Shepard, senior editor at Bloomberg for technology and strategic industries, said the current movement looks different from previous episodes of the year. According to him, the loss of confidence in the so-called AI operation already appeared at the beginning of the month, with the apprehension surrounding "neo clouds", companies that rent computing power to large AI developers, such as CoreWeave. Investors began to look not only at the equity of these companies, but also at the debt they take on.

The next question fell on the large cloud providers, such as Meta, Google and Amazon. In Shepard's assessment, they continue to move forward with investment plans in AI, but traditional businesses, such as e-commerce and advertising in the case of Amazon and Alphabet, show more weakness than the market is willing to accept.

Alphabet and Intel under pressure

In the case of Alphabet, Google's parent company, sales and advertising revenue were below expectations. Shepard highlighted the cloud division, led by Thomas Curian, as the company's way of demonstrating that AI can translate into results. Mas ele apontou um dilema: o modo de IA integrado à busca dificulta a exibição de anúncios e reduz o tempo gasto em publicidade, o que levanta a questão de como monetizar essas buscas geradas por IA.

Intel had, according to the presentation, its worst day since 1974, with a drop of more than 25%. Shepard linked the result to a shortage of memory chips, components that AI needs to train models and perform inferences. Manufacturers such as Intel and Apple begin to compete for this input with developers and producers of AI chips, which makes it difficult to meet demand and maintain acceptable prices for consumers. The company is undergoing restructuring under the new chief executive, Lip Bu Tan, who said he was more than a little disappointed with the numbers and pointed to memory as a weak point.

Attack on cryptocurrency broker

In the digital assets market, Bloomberg Television reported the largest cryptocurrency theft ever recorded: US$6.3 billion from the Binance exchange. The value easily surpasses the previous record, of US$ 1.5 billion, set by the 5 bit platform, in 2025. The FBI and the US Secret Service are investigating the case, and North Korean hackers are identified as possible responsible, as they have been linked to previous attacks.

Binance stated that it will do its best to reimburse customers and maintains a reserve fund for situations like this. The company has more than $137 billion in assets. Bitcoin was trading up around 0.5%, close to US$77,000. According to Shepard, it remains to be seen how the episode will affect confidence in the sector and the regulatory scenario.

Automatically translated from Portuguese.