Many Big Tech stocks were hit hard but the S&P 500 showed strength under the surface, with a majority of stocks showing gains for the month
Intel was the worst-performing stock in the S&P 500 during October with a 43.5% decline, while Alphabet was down 18.5%.
October has seen a lot of carnage in tech stocks, but you might not guess that from the S&P 500's performance.
The S&P 500 SPX was down 0.5% for October through Friday morning, even though 75% of stocks in the large-cap benchmark index were up for the month.
The S&P 500 is about 40% concentrated in its largest 10 stocks by market capitalization. Meanwhile, the Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF RSP was up 5.5% for October - reflecting the underlying strength in stocks, even as many of the largest technology companies have fared poorly as investors question the AI infrastructure build-out. And as you can see below on the list of the month's worst performers, even non-IT companies, such as Caterpillar (CAT), were hit hard during what might be a temporary backlash against the rapid pace of data-center construction.
Among the largest 10 components of the S&P 500, Nvidia (NVDA) (the largest of all) was down 8.7% for October, while Alphabet (GOOGL) (GOOG) was down 18.5%, Amazon.com (AMZN) was down 6.9%, Broadcom (AVGO) was down 5.6%, Meta Platforms (META) was down 14.7% and Micron Technology (MU) was down 16.8%. (All price changes in this article exclude dividends.)
Also: Amazon's stock drops - even in the face of a bold new cloud forecast
Rounding out the largest 10 components of the index, Apple (AAPL) was up 4.2% for October through early trading Friday, while Microsoft (MSFT) was up 1.8% for the month, Tesla (TSLA) was up 10.5% and Eli Lilly (LLY) soared 23.5%.
One more Big Tech tidbit: SpaceX (SPCX) is not yet a component of the S&P 500, but its stock was down 8.6% for October through early trading Friday.
The S&P 500's best October performers
These were the 20 best-performing stocks in the S&P 500 for October, through early Friday:
Company October price change 2026 price change Decline from 52-week high PTC 38.7% 11.7% -3.6% Accenture 38.2% -5.5% -12.9% Hasbro 36.6% 46.0% -1.1% Crown Castle 34.5% 0.9% -5.9% Equifax 34.0% -15.3% -19.6% Roper Technologies 32.2% 3.8% 1.3% Gen Digital 30.2% 5.5% -9.4% Lockheed Martin 27.4% 34.2% -6.2% Charles River Laboratories International 25.7% 85.9% -2.3% APA 25.5% 113.1% -0.5% Pentair 25.5% -36.2% -39.6% Intuit 23.5% -48.6% -50.1% Eli Lilly 23.5% 33.0% 1.5% CDW 23.2% 15.9% -5.0% Allegion 22.9% 18.7% 0.8% Gartner 22.4% -9.5% -11.1% Dow 22.3% 44.0% -21.2% Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings 21.9% -19.9% -28.9% ConocoPhillips 21.5% 62.4% -0.5% FactSet Research Systems 21.1% 12.7% -3.8% Source: FactSet
October's worst S&P 500 performers
Here were the 20 components of the S&P 500 that were down the most for October as of early trading on Friday:
Company October price change 2026 price change Decline from 52-week high
Intel -43.5% 84.2% -52.3%
Twilio -36.1% 31.4% -39.4%
Teradyne -30.7% 43.6% -43.0%
Sandisk -30.0% 412.9% -48.3%
Seagate Technology Holdings -29.4% 136.5% -43.1%
Reddit -29.3% -56.2% -61.8%
Lam Research -26.7% 40.7% -45.1%
Coherent -26.0% 15.3% -51.6%
Bloom Energy -25.8% 136.4% -41.5%
Robinhood Markets -25.5% -25.9% -44.3%
Comfort Systems USA -24.6% 33.7% -39.8%
Skydance -23.7% -41.2% -54.1%
Fortinet -23.6% 72.1% -30.7%
Dell Technologies -23.2% 228.1% -30.6%
Caterpillar -22.4% 9.8% -41.4%
Marvell Technology -22.2% 141.8% -37.7%
Applied Materials -22.0% 55.3% -46.1%
Coinbase Global -21.7% -35.5% -59.6%
F5 -21.2% 37.4% -27.4%
Super Micro Computer -21.1% 10.7% -40.1%
Source: FactSet
Intel (INTC) was the S&P 500's worst performer for October, with its shares plunging early Friday after the company disappointed investors with its revenue forecast.
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-Philip van Doorn
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