Market-moving news for Monday, November 2, 2026

What happened

The Financial Times reported Friday, Oct. 30 that OpenAI cut the target for its latest funding round by $10 billion, to about $20 billion, and lowered the valuation it is seeking to $1.25 trillion from $1.4 trillion pitched last month. The Wall Street Journal separately reported Friday that only about $11 billion was committed by the Oct. 31 deadline, less than half the original $30 billion ask, with several investors reducing their allocations. OpenAI plans to raise additional money from family offices and high-net-worth individuals in the coming weeks to reach $20 billion.

What happened

After 13 days of U.S. strikes on Iran, President Trump paused further strikes over the weekend in the name of diplomacy, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Monday that Trump prefers a diplomatic solution and wants to avoid further military action. Oil prices fell in response: Brent crude dropped about 3% to $109.97 a barrel and WTI fell about 3.4% to $100.63. However, reports in the same coverage suggest both the U.S. and Iran are preparing for possible military action after the November 3 U.S. midterm elections, meaning the de-escalation is fragile and explicitly time-limited.

What happened

The People's Bank of China announced a structural shift in its short-term monetary policy framework toward the overnight rate, introducing daily overnight reverse repo operations at a fixed rate of 1.25%. The 1.25% overnight rate replaces the long-standing seven-day benchmark (currently 1.40%) as the primary policy anchor. The PBoC will use fixed-rate, quantity-based tenders to refine interest-rate management, modernizing its framework toward the corridor-style systems used by Western central banks.

What happened

SBI Research, the economic research arm of State Bank of India, reported overnight that the combined debt of the Magnificent Seven has risen nearly 45% to $578 billion by mid-2026, up from about $399 billion in 2025 and roughly 1.7 times the group's 2023 debt level. The report flags that balance-sheet debt is only part of the picture: the seven companies also carry substantial off-balance-sheet commitments tied to purchases and investments for AI data centers, chips and power. Using an equity-duration approach, SBI estimates that a rise in bond yields could cut the group's combined ~$23 trillion market value by $1.67-2 trillion. The note also calls Anthropic's expected listing around November 12 (targeting a $1.5-2T valuation) a 'high-stakes litmus test' for whether AI revenues can justify infrastructure costs.