Wall Street's afternoon rotation out of energy and chip winners into rate-sensitive laggards, sparked by hopes that Tehran's new negotiating mandate and a Qatari-mediated breakthrough would end the Hormuz standoff, ran into a complication late in the session. The Wall Street Journal reported the US struck Iran's Qeshm Island, after Fars had already flagged blasts off Bandar Lengeh and Iran's IRGC claimed it shot down a US MQ-9 drone near the strait. That sequence sits awkwardly against President Pezeshkian's comment that his government now has greater authority to pursue talks, and against Trump's earlier line that there is no rush to decide on restarting the conflict. The diplomatic track has not closed, with US-Ukraine-Russia talks set for Abu Dhabi on November 10-11 and a separate Brussels meeting this week with European and NATO officials, but the Qeshm strike report is the kind of headline that could test the oil-and-equity optimism priced in during the day session.

Earnings flow stayed heavy after the bell. Palantir Technologies beat on both lines and raised full-year revenue guidance to $8.53-8.534 billion, with CEO Alex Karp noting US commercial revenue topped government revenue for the first time, yet the stock fell 3.1% in the snapshot. Apple's fiscal Q4 revenue of $114.50bn missed expectations despite a per-share beat, and shares dropped 2.7%. Neurocrine Biosciences jumped 5.6% after beating estimates and raising INGREZZA sales guidance, while Fabrinet surged 11.1% and Revvity added 2.6%. Clorox rose 2.1% on a solid beat even as it flagged inflation pressure on margins. Vornado Realty slipped 2.8%.

Elsewhere, ON Semiconductor cut its Synaptics deal to roughly $5.7bn in cash from a $7bn stock deal and agreed to buy Ferric for up to $775m tied to AI power delivery. Diamondback Energy and Williams both posted solid quarters with raised guidance, Crescent Energy agreed to buy Eagle Ford assets from Devon Energy for about $3.85bn, and BioMarin slashed its EPS outlook. Oracle is reportedly nearing a $10bn share sale at an 11% discount, and Disney is said to be weighing thousands of layoffs.

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