A sharp rise in volatility and a tech sell-off cut the account 13.16%
On Thursday the market fell despite supportive productivity and claims data. Preliminary third-quarter nonfarm productivity rose at a 3.6% annualized rate (consensus about 2.8%), and unit labor costs fell 0.7% — the first decline since the second quarter of 2025. Initial jobless claims for the week ended 31 October fell 6,000 to 189,000, matching a 57-year low. The S&P 500 lost 4.36% to 7,353.73, SPY 4.41% to 733.00, QQQ 6.49% to 647.05 and the Nasdaq-100 6.36%. The equal-weight S&P 500 (RSP) fell 2.89% — less than the cap-weighted index. Chipmakers and AI-infrastructure names led the decline: the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index lost about 12.2%, Nvidia 9.26%, Broadcom 10.43%, AMD 17.26% and Tesla 10.77%; Microsoft fell 3.58%, Meta 3.96%, Amazon 2.19% and Apple 1.53%. The 2-year Treasury yield fell to 4.46% and the 10-year to 4.84%.
Volatility rose sharply. VIX jumped 11.57 points to 28.18 (+69.7%) and VXN 13.18 points to 38.26; 30-day QQQ implied volatility (own calculations) rose from 22.80% to 34.21%. Puts rose more than calls: 25-delta puts gained 14.85 volatility points to 40.13%, and 25-delta calls 8.72 points to 28.47%. The 25-delta skew widened to 11.67 from 5.53 points, and the skew index to 34.1 from 24.3. The front of the curve inverted again: VIX9D/VIX was 1.159 (prior 0.915) and VIX/VIX3M 1.103 (prior 0.884). On the Convexa scale the regime moved from Normal to Stress, and the event modifier returned. The negative-gamma modifier remained: QQQ closed 8.25% below the model zero-gamma level of 705.23. The cheap-premium modifier was replaced by rich premium, as 30-day implied volatility rose above 20-day realized volatility (32.09%).
The account closed the session 13.16% lower, against a 4.41% decline in SPY. The main pressure came from the rise in implied volatility and the sharpness of the market move against short volatility; the directional decline in the Nasdaq-100 also weighed. Long lower-wing and 9 November puts offset part of that pressure. Intraday, the account result started lower, moved into positive territory by midday, fell again, briefly returned near the session high toward the close and finished lower. Week-to-date and November-to-date, the result was +1.07%, against −3.01% for SPY. Since the start of the public record on 5 August the result was +6.38%, against −4.75% for SPY.
At the close the weekly QQQ straddle priced a move of ±2.45% to the Friday 6 November expiry (range 631.21–662.88), against ±1.67% a session earlier. QQQ closed 4.94% below its 200-day average (680.71); the long-term regime under section 2.9 moved from Bullish to Bearish. Ahead was the October employment report on 6 November at 08:30 ET and the weekly QQQ options expiry the same day.
Editor’s Note reflects the author’s market perspective at the time of publication and should be read as commentary, not investment advice.