Weekly Market Outlook 2/22/26
Dormant semiconductor stocks, tariff winners, charts, and more.
Iran headlines, tariffs being overturned, GDP coming in lower than expectations, and Claude crushing software and cybersecurity.
Did I miss anything?
There was no shortage of volatility this week, largely in part to the factors I listed above.
Not to mention we have Nvidia earnings this coming Wednesday, which could also add another layer of volatility.
Volatility can be an opportunity, but it can also be a trap. It’s easy to believe volatility is fun and easy to trade but reality is that in this environment, former leaders are failing and current leaders are one headline away from being hit down themselves.
One thing I’ve been discussing in this Substack is that the former leaders like Palantir, Robinhood, etc. have been taking a break while plenty of new leaders emerged.
Anyone who’s been a subscriber of this Substack knows I’ve largely ignored names like Palantir and Robinhood. My trading portfolio has been dominated by names like GE Vernova and NextPower, there’s been no signs or reasons to get involved in the former leaders. Could that change? Maybe, but in the market it always makes more sense to swim with the current vs. against it.
Something to note is that companies with high valuations can go down on little to no news just as they go up on little to no news. When vibes and sentiment are good, these types of stocks can explode higher on earnings beats that still make the stock look expensive. When sentiment changes, it doesn’t take much for these stocks to go down.
It doesn’t make them bad companies, all it means is stocks tend to over react in both directions, up or down. Is the long term top in on former leaders like Palantir? I highly doubt it, but with software fears spreading and the sector itself getting hit, it’s difficult for a single stock to overcome the tidal wave of fear and narratives.
In the remainder of this article I’m going to discuss which “dormant” theme I believe has a potential major near term catalyst to reignite, the strongest earnings gaps of the past quarter and what they could say about future leadership, a smaller cap AI stock that sold off after earnings and may be presenting an opportunity, a very under the radar AI winner that reported great earnings last week, the semiconductor groups nobody is talking about, which stocks benefit most if tariffs are definitively rolled back and the two with the best charts, cybersecurity stocks, my favorite charts and setups heading into next week, and more.