{"id":28807,"date":"2026-08-05T17:42:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T12:42:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=28807"},"modified":"2026-08-05T17:42:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T12:42:11","slug":"investors-cant-stop-believing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=28807","title":{"rendered":"Investors can&#039;t stop believing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/graphics.axios.com\/hermesv2\/2026-08-04-1023-s-p-500-\/fallbacks\/2026-08-04-1023-s-p-500--fallback.png\" \/><\/p>\n<div>Data: FactSet; Chart: Matt Phillips\/Axios<\/div>\n<p>Who cares about war, oil prices, interest rates or an AI bubble? Investors apparently do not \u2014 for now at least \u2014 sending stocks back to record highs. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Why it matters:<\/strong> High stock prices are critical to keeping funds flowing to the AI buildout.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A significant erosion of investors&#8217; confidence in stocks would be a big risk to the AI flywheel of financial flows, capital expenditures and industrial activity driving the U.S. economy. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr>\n<p><strong>Catch up quick:<\/strong> Some analysts and investors had <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/27\/debt-data-center-oracle-goole\" target=\"_blank\">worried<\/a> that the markets were beginning to deflate, as the S&amp;P 500 failed to advance in June or July.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Previously high-flying chip stocks hit <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/business\/media-telecom\/chip-selloff-erases-over-1-trillion-stock-market-value-2026-06-05\/\" target=\"_blank\">an air pocket<\/a> in early June. <\/li>\n<li>The slump then spread to hyperscalers, with the Mag 7 stocks becoming the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/06\/30\/mag-seven-tech-stocks\" target=\"_blank\">Lag 7<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The latest: <\/strong>In the last four sessions, however, stocks have jumped almost 6%, led by massive gains from some of those same tech giants after Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet each reported their quarterly results.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The S&amp;P 500 rose 1.8% Tuesday, notching a new all-time closing high of 7736.52.   <\/li>\n<li>Tech shares led the way on Tuesday, as retail favorite Palantir Technologies soared 29.5% after its second-quarter results showed strong sales of its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/08\/03\/palantir-ai-software-earnings\" target=\"_blank\">AI software platform<\/a> to corporate clients. <\/li>\n<li>Palantir&#8217;s ability to profitably sell AI services appeared to help reinvigorate the AI trade, with semiconductor stocks and makers of other IT hardware that data centers need jumping. <\/li>\n<li>American producers of components called transceivers \u2014 used to connect fiber optic cables that carry data \u2014 also rose after reports that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/trump-administration-drafting-ban-chinese-data-center-devices-sources-say-2026-08-04\/\" target=\"_blank\">the Trump administration was considering<\/a> banning similar products from Chinese competitors on security grounds.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Context: <\/strong>The revival of tech momentum adds to the strength of so-called &#8220;cyclical&#8221; sectors of the stock market \u2014 such as industrial companies, financial firms and energy stocks \u2014 that have largely kept the S&amp;P 500 from falling too much throughout the recent soft patch.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Energy shares \u2014 the benchmark index&#8217;s biggest riser so far this year, up more than 30% \u2014 have of course been lifted by the Iran-related surge in oil prices.<\/li>\n<li>But industrial stocks have also risen amid growing proof that cash from the AI boom \u2014 driven by an expectation of almost $800 billion of capital expenditures by hyperscalers this year, according to FactSet data \u2014 is working its way deep <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/31\/ai-industrials-paint-stocks\" target=\"_blank\">into the industrial tissue<\/a> of the U.S. economy.<\/li>\n<li>The S&amp;P 500 industrials are up 20% year-to-date. If there at year end, it would be the best performance for the industrial sector since 2019. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div>Data: FactSet ; Note: Expectations are for calendar year 2026, per FactSet. Hyperscalers include Amazon.com, Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft and Oracle. ; Chart: Matt Phillips\/Axios<\/div>\n<p><strong>The big picture:<\/strong> Indeed, the economy is looking hot by a number of measures, from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/business\/us-core-capital-goods-orders-increase-strongly-june-2026-07-27\/\" target=\"_blank\">surging capital goods orders<\/a>, to expanding <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2026\/08\/03\/manufacturing-survey-shows-inflation-worries-adding-to-pressure-on-fed.html\" target=\"_blank\">manufacturing activity<\/a>, to growing <a href=\"https:\/\/continuumeconomics.com\/a\/4286c5c8\/fed-sloos-on-bank-lending-shows-stronger-demand-for-ci-loans\" target=\"_blank\">demand for bank loans<\/a> from bigger companies. <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>And c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/08\/04\/earnings-ai-accounting-amazon-alphabet\" target=\"_blank\">orporate profits<\/a> look, technically speaking, nutso high. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Caveat:<\/strong> You often hear Wall Street analysts describe this phenomenon as a &#8220;broadening out&#8221; of the AI boom, which has a nice, soothing ring to it. <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Doesn&#8217;t &#8220;broadening out&#8221; sound sort of like the &#8220;broad diversification&#8221; investors are supposed to seek out for market safety?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Yes, but:<\/strong> With AI now driving results at companies well beyond the tech sector, a skeptic might say that the market is actually <em>more concentrated<\/em>, rather than diversified, in terms of risk.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>In other words, more and more of the U.S. economy seems to be reliant on this one gigantic gravy train to keep chugging. So far, it has.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Bottom line:<\/strong> The AI boom continues to roll, with more of the economy exposed to both the upside, and the risk, associated with one of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/06\/30\/ai-boom-bis-warning\" target=\"_blank\">largest investment boom<\/a>s in American history.<\/p>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Data: FactSet; Chart: Matt Phillips\/Axios Who cares about war, oil prices, interest rates or an AI bubble? Investors apparently do not \u2014 for now at least \u2014 sending stocks back to record highs. Why it matters: High stock prices are critical to keeping funds flowing to the AI buildout. A significant erosion of investors&#8217; confidence&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/graphics.axios.com\/hermesv2\/2026-08-04-1023-s-p-500-\/fallbacks\/2026-08-04-1023-s-p-500--fallback.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28807","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28807"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28807\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}