By Mackenzie Tatananni and Nate Wolf
The year has just begun, but January already has left investors with a lot to digest.
Wall Street has rotated out of software stocks and piled into hardware companies supplying the artificial-intelligence boom. A look at the best and worst players in the S&P 500 this month as of Friday's open reveals the trend.
Forgive us if you've heard this before: Memory and data-storage stocks led the large-cap index in January. Sandisk was tops, rising 175% on positive signals about demand tied to AI. At the CES conference, Nvidia teased a memory platform for its new Rubin chip, which would require more flash storage. Then Sandisk reported better-than-expected earnings on Thursday and guided for explosive growth in the current quarter. Demand is surging, memory prices are rising, and Sandisk is the stock market's new AI darling.
Western Digital separated from Sandisk last February to focus on hard-disk drives. The divorce worked out well for both. Western Digital was the second-best performer in the S&P 500, rising 62%. The stock fell Friday after Western Digital breezed past earnings expectations, but that pullback came after a yearlong extended rally. Crucially, Chief Financial Officer Kris Sennesael told Barron's the company is in talks with its hyperscaler clients for long-term orders as far out as 2030.
Seagate Technology, Western Digital's primary rival, jumped 62% as well. Shares soared to a record high Wednesday after the company reported stronger earnings and issued better guidance than anticipated, along with 22% growth in revenue. Wall Street's last remaining Seagate bear waved the white flag on his Negative rating earlier this month.
Memory-chip giant Micron Technology rose 57%, riding the same wave of AI investment. In the past week alone, the company said it would invest $24 billion in a new chip fabrication facility in Singapore. It got a boost when chip maker Texas Instruments and chip equipment manufacturer ASML issued strong demand outlooks.
An outlier rounded out the top five: Moderna. The drugmaker surged 54%, breaking out at the beginning of the month in a pattern that Barron's technical analyst Doug Busch correctly predicted at the time would continue. Investors hope positive results from an autogene vaccine trial for melanoma treatment can revive a stock once associated with Covid shots.
Humana was the worst performing stock in the benchmark index in January. With a nearly 24% decline, it topped the list of health insurance stocks that were beaten down in the wake of the Trump administration's proposal to keep Medicare rates roughly flat in 2027. Humana was extending a recent bad run -- as of midday trading Friday, shares were down 34% over the past 12 months. Although it posted solid third-quarter earnings in November, shares tumbled, signaling Wall Street's wariness of managed-care stocks.
Intuit fell more than 23% in January, reflecting a broader shift out of software stocks. Investors have fretted over the higher costs associated with Intuit's artificial-intelligence spending, although the TurboTax maker has largely resisted the "AI eating software" narrative due to its successful integration of AI tools.
ServiceNow plunged 23% as fourth-quarter earnings did little to improve attitudes around software. On Thursday, ServiceNow posted quarterly earnings and revenue that topped analysts' estimates, though the size of the beats appear to have underwhelmed the Street. Shares ended the session down nearly 10%, only intensifying a recent bad run. The share price slipped below $120 for the first time since November 2023, according to Dow Jones Market Data.
Salesforce, down 19% this month, is another ill-fated enterprise software story. The customer-relationship management platform was selected as a Barron's stock pick last month. Since that Dec. 23 call, shares have fallen more than 18% through Thursday's close.
GoDaddy also sank 19% in January. The stock has steadily declined since the end of 2024. Cantor Fitzgerald analysts suggested earlier this year that they were eyeing GoDaddy as a candidate to go private, a move that would allow it to escape the pressure of the public market. On Jan. 20, shares clinched their longest losing streak on record as they fell for nine days straight.
Write to Mackenzie Tatananni at mackenzie.tatananni@barrons.com and Nate Wolf at nate.wolf@barrons.com
This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 30, 2026 14:19 ET (19:19 GMT)
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