International Business Machines notched its best weekly performance in 25 years after a federal bet on the company’s quantum technology sent shares into overdrive.
The stock gained nearly 16% this week, marking its best performance since October 2002, according to Dow Jones Market Data. Shares closed up 0.3% on Friday.
The hot streak began after IBM announced the creation of a stand-alone quantum foundry called Anderon, backed by a $1 billion investment from the Commerce Department.
The investment is part of a broader directive by the Trump administration to pour $2 billion into the quantum industry and take equity stakes in smaller players such as Rigetti Computing, $D-Wave QuantumQBTS)$, and Infleqtion.
IBM’s recent surge is unusual—the shares have been largely unmoved this year by the company’s wealth of quantum research. The stock barely reacted to results of an experiment with the Cleveland Clinic at the start of the month, and didn’t budge when IBM released data from a neutron scattering experiment in March.
In fact, the shares haven’t moved sharply on quantum-related news since June 2025, when IBM unveiled its plans to build a large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum supercomputer before the end of the decade. At the time, the stock hit a record.
Volatility is par for the course for pure-play quantum stocks. In the case of names such as IonQ, Rigetti, or D-Wave, good news of any magnitude can boost them significantly.
Sometimes no news is needed at all. When IonQ CEO Niccolo de Masi dubbed the company “the Nvidia player” of quantum in a Barron’s interview last year, shares spiked 35%. In this corner of the market, sentiment is king, and often the primary driver of performance.
That isn’t to say Thursday’s news wasn’t significant. On the contrary, it was a much-needed endorsement of quantum technology. The funding commitment marks a serious effort by the government to bolster the domestic supply chain, likely fueled by national security concerns as countries like China pull ahead in the race.
Just last week, a peer-reviewed paper in Nature showcased the power of Jiuzhang 4.0, a record-shattering photonic quantum computer. The breakthrough was led by scientists at the state-sponsored University of Science and Technology of China.
For now, leadership in the sector remains up for grabs, but quantum investors are riding a multiday high courtesy of the Commerce Department’s latest move.
After rising sharply on Thursday, quantum stocks built on those gains in Friday’s session. D-Wave Quantum jumped 14%, Infleqtion added 11%, and Rigetti Computing surged nearly 20%. IonQ got a boost as well, rising 8.1%.
