The artificial-intelligence trade is ripping once again, with tech stocks cresting fresh all-time highs, Wall Street bosses touting the scale of the investment race, and key players in the ecosystem downplaying existential risks from the world's most important technology.
But it might not be powerful enough to keep stocks from stalling over the final months of the year, as myriad risks tied to the Iran war, the surge in global crude prices, and looming midterm elections cast a shadow over markets into the end of a challenging third quarter.
After a debate over AI safety, tied to a series of security concerns and the hacking of Hugging Face by agents created by OpenAI, investors are slowly turning the corner on the new technology, and taking stocks higher along with it.
Comments from JPMorgan's Jamie Dimon on AI spending, pushback from Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang on AI risks, and surge in popularity of Meta Platform's new AI agent Muse have all played a role in the tech resurgence.
The Nasdaq Composite hit a fresh all time high on Monday, with modest gains in Tuesday trading, while the S&P 500 finished within a few points of its record August peak. Chip maker AMD ended the session with a $1 trillion market value and an index of Magnificent Seven tech giants traded at a fresh record high.
"There were lots worrying investors last week, and there still are," said Ed Yardeni, founder and CEO of Yardeni Research. "But the stock market has a habit of climbing a wall of worry. It seems to be doing so now."
The gains can't be put down to low trading volumes on Yom Kippur, either, with some 16.5 billion shares changing hands across all U.S. exchanges, and just under 5 billion on the three primary venues.
But they have come at a cost.
Market breadth has narrowed once again, with two tech-heavy sectors, alongside energy, pacing overall gains for the past month. Everything else, including summer stalwarts such as healthcare, financials, and consumer staples, having been trading in the red.
Digging deeper, however, shows that just seven stocks hit fresh 52-week highs on Monday, while more than four times that amount printed 52-week lows.
Meanwhile, the percentage of S&P 500 stocks trading above their 50-day moving average, a key factor in determining near-term trends, has dropped from 58.5% in late August to 30% this week.
That has led to a 7.2% decline for an equal weighted index of S&P 500 stocks over the past month, compared with a 1.5% advance for the cap-weighted benchmark over the same period.
How that informs the rest of the year, however, remains to be seen.
If stocks tether themselves to the AI trade, while broader influences linked to inflation, Fed policy and growth prospects act has headwinds for the rest of the market, end of year gains will grow increasingly one-sided.
Wall Street has already backed away from the higher end of its 2026 S&P 500 price targets, with an increasing number of analysts suggesting stocks could suffer a mid-autumn pullback before resuming gains into the end of the year.
Midterm elections and a Federal Reserve rate decision will need to be navigated, as will a third-quarter earnings season expected to be dominated yet again by tech profits.
AI darling Anthropic, meanwhile, will probably target its massive market listing in mid November, with analysts expecting an overall valuation of around $1.5 trillion.
At the same time, markets are attempting to understand the developments in the Gulf region, and whether signs of early detente between Washington and Iran can reopen the Strait of Hormuz and retrace some of the 30% gains seen in global crude prices over the summer months.
Bond markets remain skittish, meanwhile, with the 10-year Treasury only a few ticks from the 5% threshold and the 2-year note trading at levels that suggest more Fed rate hikes over the coming year.
Investors are also wondering if talks between President Donald Trump and his China counterpart, Xi Jinping, slated for later this week, will thaw trade relations, and AI competition concerns, between the world's two largest economies.
For Mark Malek, chief investment officer at Siebert Financial, autumn performance could boil down to a simplified question: "How much of what you own depends on AI *and* diplomacy working out at the same time?"
"This rally isn't really a bet on AI," he added. "It's a bet that two of the hardest negotiations on the planet go well in the very same week."
Malek could be right, and the market's focus on AI winners might be the result of questions surrounding the rest of the market, and the major risks events that need to be cleared over the coming weeks, than a full-throated endorsement of the tech trade.
Anthony Saglimbene, chief market strategist at Ameriprise, sees it differently.
"Economic growth, earnings, and interest rates all fall into the same AI story, just from different angles," he said. "We expect these dynamics to be mostly supportive of the S&P 500 through the rest of the year, but unexpected volatility can't be ignored."
Saglimbene thinks investors will need to see improving earnings, a pullback in crude prices, and a neutral Fed to solidify the market's newfound bull case.
"If these conditions aren't met, or the AI capex engine slows as financing costs rise, stocks will move lower."
It's an AI market once again.
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