BY MARK SEBASTIAN
October 12, 2025
Markets got absolutely destroyed on Friday. The Nasdaq was down 3.47%, the S&P 500 down 2.71%, the Dow 1.9%. But if you think the selling is over, not so fast. If historic patterns hold, the market is going to plunge in a major way come Monday.
Friday was bad enough. That day was all it took for the Nasdaq to wipe out almost the entire months gains
There are reasons we saw hints of this coming, VIX (as I said in the post that went out Saturday) was firm throughout this rally.
A month ago VIX was 14.98. Leading into Friday, even with the market moving up, the VIX hit 16.43,. When the VIX goes up with the market, that’s a sign that the market is not buying into a rally.
Clearly, the VIX was right.
Looking at Friday’s action, I don’t think the selling is over. The market is still up a lot this year and a lot of stock holders are going to lock in some gains.
So first thing’s first: On Monday’s State of the Market live show, I want to give you some clarity around what is happening in the market and why.
I expect more selling. But the good news is that shift down is going to create opportunities for us to go ‘option shopping’ as Licia would say.
With that out of the way…
One Stock I Love
Andrew likes Crisper Therapeutics (CRSP). Like most stocks, it was down on Friday but not NEARLY as much as the rest of the market. When Andrew deep dives volatility the way he does, he comes up with some great plays. I’m not going to start doubting him now.
This should be a fun one.
Hans likes the Russell 2000 (IWM). It had a very bad day on Friday, like all indexes. But with rates falling I view any selling in this as a buying opportunity. Hans is right: a data center won’t mean anything if it doesn’t have the power to run it or the plumbing to keep it cool. This is becoming more and more important.
I like it.
But I want to show you something different.
It’s a play that’s more mechanical in nature. It’s a move on how money shifts from one asset to another as interest rates go up and down.
It’s the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond (TLT).
Here are two reasons why:
1)When interest rates fall, bond prices go up. The FOMC is in a rate cut cycle. It’s that simple.
2)If the market is going to fall, new money will find its way back into bonds, raising their prices.
Whether the S&P 500 was tanking or not, I think the bottom is in for the bond market and TLT is on its way back to 100.
As you can see above, the TLT is about to break over the highs from the FOMC and is likely to rally into the next meeting at the end of the month.
One Stock I Hate
On the downside Andrew thought Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) was overdone… he was right
AMD was already down BEFORE Trump’s tweet. At the very least, I see it falling to $200 a share before buyers step in. But if it breaks under that, Andrew will be proven correct as it may fill its gap and fall another $20-$30.
Hans, our AI whisperer, has been riding names like NVIDIA Corp (NVDA) and (Micron Technology (MU) to big wins. But if Hans is anything, he’s rational. He thinks a top might be in near term and wants to short the .
SOXX is sitting on its 21-DMA, but given how strong this index has been, I like it for a short. We might cherry pick a single name like AMD out of this index, but I think it is a smart play.
Again, I like Hans and Andrew’s downside picks. But I’ve got something different up my sleeve…
One of the few names that did not absolutely collapse on Friday was Oracle Corp (ORCL).
Right now it’s below its 21-DMA and I think it is set to fall towards its 50-day like it did on Tuesday.
Oracle is a great short-term put play.
The options are cheap (for a $292 stock).
We will take a look at this one on Monday as well.
Don’t miss our live session Monday at 10 AM, where we’ll reveal our next Ticker Highlight Trade.
See you there!
Mark
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