Johnson & Johnson Slides 7% on Talc Charge as Markets Split on Earnings Tuesday

Johnson & Johnson fell roughly 7% on Tuesday after reporting Q3 2026 results that included a massive one-time charge tied to its proposed talc litigation settlement, even as the company posted quarterly sales of $25.4 billion, a 5.9% reported increase year over year, and raised its full-year guidance. Reported net income collapsed 95.9% to $210 million, reflecting the talc charge alongside costs from the acquisition of Firefly Bio and a strategic collaboration agreement. The adjusted earnings beat Wall Street estimates, but the size of the litigation hit overshadowed the raised outlook and sent shares sharply lower.

The semiconductor equipment sector also came under pressure Tuesday, with Applied Materials dropping about 7% after declining to issue an industry spending forecast at its investor day, leaving investors unsettled despite the company's bullish artificial intelligence narrative. Micron extended a multi-day losing streak, continuing to absorb fallout from China's ChangXin Memory Technologies, which announced at a Shanghai chip conference on October 9 and 10 that it expects to release a DDR5 RDIMM server memory module by year-end using a denser 4F-square design that competes directly with Micron's highest-margin products. Micron had already dropped about 3.9% on October 12 and fell again Tuesday. Caterpillar slid roughly 5%, Blackstone and KKR each retreated, and Cadence Design Systems and Keysight Technologies also moved lower.

Six Flags Entertainment shares collapsed more than 16% after a rider died and several others were injured Monday in an incident involving the Goliath roller coaster at Six Flags Over Georgia, near Atlanta. CoreWeave, IREN, Nebius Group, Super Micro Computer, AST SpaceMobile, and Citigroup were also among Tuesday's notable decliners.

On the positive side, Apple climbed to a new 52-week high and Chevron reached an all-time high. Meta Platforms rallied more than 3%. Salesforce, MongoDB, The Trade Desk, Oracle, and Garmin also moved higher. Alaunos Therapeutics surged approximately 200%, and Galaxy Digital, Bumble, BigBear.AI, and Fermi each posted significant gains. Vertex Pharmaceuticals fell about 4%, weighed down by sector sentiment heading into a key catalyst window in November.