A Jin10 briefing notes that U.S. President Donald Trump has long tied the stock market's performance to his political standing. The S&P 500 rose to a fresh high this week, driven mainly by a small group of AI beneficiaries, while broader signals of weakness in the economy and financial markets persisted.

With the midterm elections less than a month away, market gains that Trump has associated with Republican support could instead pose political risk.

Shares in the consumer, travel, transportation, real estate and financial sectors have posted declines, and the median S&P 500 stock is down about 4.3% over the past month.

Notable strength in Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Nvidia and the broader semiconductor sector has masked weaknesses across much of the market.

On Tuesday the S&P 500 reached a record high even as only 30% of its components traded above their 50-day moving averages, a breadth narrowness that compares unfavorably with even the weakest record highs during the 1998-2000 internet bubble, when 41% of members were in uptrends.

Keyrock's analysis indicates that Strategy's share repurchases represented more than 20% of STRC's weekly trading volume in nearly every week of September.

NS3.AI reports that about $1.45 billion of Strategy's $2 billion buyback authorization had been utilized by October 4, leaving roughly $547.2 million available.

STRC typically sees around $150 million in daily trading volume, yet market depth appears to weaken sharply when the price moves away from the $100 level.

The study did not assess how much liquidity might vanish in the absence of Strategy's purchases, nor whether the buybacks were the cause of the observed trading-volume relationship.

Shareholders are set to vote on October 28 on daily dividend payments, which Strategy says could bolster price stability and attract institutional demand.

Christian Mueller-Glissmann, head of asset allocation research at Goldman Sachs, said investors are evaluating whether ongoing AI capital spending will yield monetizable products, Bloomberg reports.

Mueller-Glissmann delivered the remarks on Bloomberg Television while discussing the market's skepticism toward AI.

Albert Edwards, Societe Generale's global chief strategist based in London, warned that today's AI enthusiasm carries echoes of the mid-1990s period of excess and cheap capital that bred misallocation of resources.

Torsten Slok, Apollo Global Management's chief economist, published a note arguing that total factor productivity remains weak, even as AI-driven investment activity and lofty equity valuations suggest a boom in progress.

Edwards drew a parallel with Asia's late-1990s crisis and the later U.S. internet bubble, cautioning that the current AI rally could be vulnerable to a similar reevaluation. He acknowledged the possibility that the AI dividend has not yet shown up in productivity data because the phenomenon is still early, but remained skeptical of the non-bubble view.

He also referenced Rob Parenteau, formerly of Allianz, whose analysis indicates gross corporate investment rising quickly while net investment has moved little. If U.S. corporate investment strength is mostly nominal rather than real, Edwards argued, that would support his cautious stance on the AI rally.

In market performance, State Street's technology sector ETF has gained about 40% this year, while the semiconductor-focused ETF has nearly doubled.

MARA Holdings reportedly sold 996 bitcoin for a total of about $81.13 million, according to on-chain monitoring from Lookonchain.

Odaily reports that Lookonchain confirmed the disposition of the bitcoin by MARA Holdings, whose ticker is @MARA.

SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won says demand for semiconductors is expected to rise rapidly in the near term.

Odaily reported that his comments were delivered in a brief statement carried by Jin10.

Digital asset miner MARA Holdings reportedly sold 996 BTC, a move tracked by Lookonchain's on-chain monitoring data.

Foresight News estimates the sale value at about $81.13 million.

SlowMist reported an attack on BitBay that resulted in losses of about $14,000.

Foresight News attributes the issue to the Vault's withdraw() function, which transfers the contract's full token balance when liquidity is zero instead of restricting redemptions to the caller's share.

The attacker used reposition() to drive liquidity to zero, then redeemed a single minimum share unit and withdrew roughly 14,838.47 DAI.

Citing Jin10, Iran has intensified maritime attacks, and the Houthis conducted a strike on Riyadh for the third day in a row as they seek to break the Strait of Hormuz stalemate and seize the initiative.

U.S. President Donald Trump has said he would refrain from attacking Iran ahead of the U.S. midterm elections.

Observers say the risk of a broader confrontation could increase if another serious incident occurs.

Odaily cites a post from the Bitcoin whale Set Ten Big Goals on X, saying macro headwinds—rising U.S. Treasury yields, expectations for further rate hikes, and higher oil prices—have coincided with a roughly 5% pullback in BTC.

The trader reportedly does not expect BTC to fall directly to 78,000 or 74,000, but has set risk controls: trim positions if BTC trades below 79,000 and close all remaining long positions if the daily close falls below 78,000.