The Club’s top 10 things to Thursday, Oct. 2 — Matthew J. Belvedere and Kevin Stankiewicz wrote this morning’s newsletter. 1. The S & P 500 was heading for a higher open this morning. The index reversed yesterday’s early declines on the government shutdown and weak ADP jobs concerns and closed at a record high. Tesla is headed for a strong session after third-quarter deliveries came in ahead of expectations this morning. 2. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC today that U.S. economic growth and the labor market could be hurt by the government shutdown. Republicans and Democrats are still at odds on how to end it. 3. Due to the shutdown, 8:30 a.m. ET came and went today, with no weekly jobless claims data. Tomorrow’s big nonfarm payrolls report is also set to be delayed. Future economic numbers from government sources could also be impacted. On the other hand, the Chicago Fed’s new real-time unemployment rate tracker suggests the unemployment rate stayed steady at 4.3% in September. 4. Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway announced plans to buy the petrochemical unit of Occidental Petroleum . The price tag for OxyChem is $9.7 billion in cash. Berkshire already has a major stake in Occidental. 5. KeyBanc upgraded Nike to a buy from hold, with a $90-per-share price target. The analysts cited solid quarterly results and progress in the company’s turnaround. We agree and have been slowly building our Club position. 6. JPMorgan released its favorite stocks for October after a strong September for the market. Club names Amazon and Broadcom were among them. Carvana , General Motors , and PulteGroup also made the list. 7. Taiwan rejected Washington’s proposal to make half of the chips it supplies to the U.S. on American soil. The idea had been floated by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. 8. OpenAI was valued at $500 billion in a recent secondary share sale by current and former employees, who offloaded $6.6 billion worth of stock to a group of investors, CNBC reported . That puts the ChatGPT creator ahead of Elon Musk’s SpaceX as the most valuable privately held company. OpenAI has inked a flurry of deals lately, including a cloud agreement with Oracle and a $100 billion investment from Club name Nvidia . 9. Morgan Stanley raised its Apple price target to $298 from $240, citing stronger sales for the new iPhone than originally thought. Meanwhile, UBS said that demand is past peak for the new devices. 10. Honeywell announced plans late yesterday to divest its asbestos liabilities, which should help cash flow. The Club name also set Oct. 30 as the day for its spinoff of its Solstice Advanced Materials unit. Sign up for my Top 10 Morning Thoughts on the Market email newsletter for free (See here for a full list of the stocks at Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust’s portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.
The top 10 things we’re watching in the stock market Thursday
