Everything you need to know about price action, regardless of asset class. We analyze stocks, bonds, currencies, and commodities based on supply and demand, momentum and trend.
In this scan, we look to identify the strongest growth stocks as they climb the market-cap ladder from small- to mid- to large- and, ultimately, to mega cap status (over $200B).
Once they graduate from small-cap to mid-cap status (over $2B), they come on our radar. Likewise, when they surpass the roughly $30B mark, they roll off our list.
But the scan doesn't just end there.
We only want to look at the strongest growth industries in the market, as that is typically where these potential 50-baggers come from.
Some of the best performers in recent decades – stocks like Priceline, Amazon, Netflix, Salesforce, and myriad others – would have been on this list at some point during their journey to becoming the market behemoths they are today.
When you look at the stocks in our table, you'll notice we're only focused on Technology and Growth industry groups such as Software, Semiconductors, Online...
I've got some good news, some not so good news, and some outright bad news.
Let's dive in.
First of all, these are all concepts that were discussed at length on our LIVE Monthly Charts Strategy Session last week, so check out the full video here.
As an update, here's the most bullish thing happening in stocks right now. Both Germany and Hong Kong closed the week at new highs. These are new 3-year highs for the Hang Seng and new all-time highs for the DAX:
If there was some sort of Global Crisis or Credit Event of any kind, my bet is NOT that these two major indexes would be breaking out to new highs.
These are not safe havens where investors can hide out and wait for the storm to pass. It's quite the opposite actually.
So strength out of these areas above points to bullish and healthy...
We've had some great trades come out of this small-cap-focused column since we launched it back in 2020 and started rotating it with our flagship bottom-up scan, Under the Hood.
For the first year or so, we focused only on Russell 2000 stocks with a market cap between $1 and $2B.
That was fun, but we wanted to branch out a bit and allow some new stocks to find their way onto our list.
We expanded our universe to include some mid-caps.
Nowadays, to make the cut for our Minor Leaguers list, a company must have a market cap between $1 and $4B.
And it doesn't have to be a Russell component — it can be any US-listed equity. With participation expanding around the globe, we want all those ADRs in our universe.
The same price and liquidity filters are applied. Then, as always, we sort by proximity to new...
There's never a dull moment in the market. It's always something.
The mixed messages are a feature, not a bug.
That's just how it's always been. So it's our job to weigh all the evidence and make the best decisions we can make, knowing full well that we have incomplete information.
Today I want to talk about 2 theories that may or may not be playing out, but it's something I'm thinking about.
First, is this thing about investor sentiment. How is it possible that individual investors in America are the most bearish they've been since the bottom of the last bear market back in 2022?
I think it's because of what they own.
They're not in China, which is making new 3-year highs.
The broadening of participation all over the world continues.
Meanwhile, the pessimism is stronger than ever.
I'm noticing the most angry of people are the ones who want stocks to fall because they don't like the Trump and all his buddies.
But their anger is not the market's concern. If anything, it's just more fuel to drive stocks much higher, which would enrage them even more.
It's pretty hilarious to watch actually.
Laughing is good for you. But laughing at people who haven't bothered to count and actually see how well stocks are doing, is all the more amusing.
You know, you can dislike Trump, and still recognize how strong this bull market continues to be, and how much stronger it's getting week over week.
Here is one of the most important stock market indexes in the world. I would argue that after the S&P500, Dow and Nasdaq, this one is right there behind it, and arguably right along there with it in the same category of importance.
EFA represents developed markets outside of North America. So think a ton of European stocks, United Kingdom, Japan and...
Today I'm going to share a little trick that I like to use to help put the current market volatility into perspective.
The math is like this. I take the value of the VIX and divide by 16. And that's what the market is pricing in for a normal daily move.
For example, if the VIX is at 24, then I would expect a 1.5% move in the S&P500 each day.
So if the VIX is at 16, then I would expect a 1% move.
If the VIX is at 32, then I would expect a 2% move.
Simple.
Now, many people wonder why it's 16, and that's where we get way above my paygrade. If you don't understand how the math around options works, don't worry. No one else does either.
I'm not even joking. Options math is next level impossible. Just ask any of the best options traders. They'll be the first to tell you.
The 16 number I believe has something to do with the square root of the number of trading days in a year, but I'm confident there's more to it than that.
Also, for you statistics majors, I believe there is technically like a 67% probability of these results, or something along those lines.
So keep in mind that The Rule of 16 is just a back of...
Stock market bulls have been watching the homies like hawks.
It's a vital industry right now.
Alfonso recently wrote about the Home Construction ETF $ITB breaking to new lows relative to its defensive peer group, the Real Estate ETF $IYR.
He said, "This ratio has historically been a leading indicator for the broader market. During prior cycles, you can see clear divergences where ITB/IYR tops or bottoms ahead of major turns in the S&P 500."
Our Hall of Famers list is composed of the 150 largest US-based stocks.
These stocks range from the mega-cap growth behemoths like Apple and Microsoft – with market caps in excess of $2T – to some of the new-age large-cap disruptors such as Moderna, Square, and Snap.
It has all the big names and more.
It doesn’t include ADRs or any stock not domiciled in the US. But don’t worry; we developed a separate universe for that. Click here to check it out.
The Hall of Famers is simple.
We take our list of 150 names and then apply our technical filters so the strongest stocks with the most momentum rise to the top.
Let’s dive right in and check out what these big boys are up to.
Here’s this week’s list:
*Click table to enlarge view
We filter out any laggards that are down -5% or more relative to the S&P 500 over the trailing month.