The stock market has been abuzz because the club’s monthly meeting in August, with the S&P 500 up 1.8% during that period, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq Composite gained 2.1% and 0.9%, respectively. But it hasn’t been a one-sided rally for the stock market. Investor concerns concerning the longevity of the generative artificial intelligence boom, coupled with market sensitivity to the Federal Reserve’s next monetary policy move, have led to ups and downs on Wall Street in recent weeks. Case in point: On Friday, the S&P 500 closed out its worst week since March 2023, dragged down by a weaker-than-expected August jobs report and Nvidia’s sharp decline (though the AI ​​chipmaker has surged this week, recouping much of those losses). September’s mixed performance up to now follows 4 consecutive months of success for the S&P 500. We’ve taken advantage of the market’s recent volatility. Since our last monthly meeting, the club has trimmed stakes in Eli Lilly and Procter & Gamble and completely exited our position in struggling Estée Lauder. We’ve used those funds to bolster our positions in AI beneficiary Dover and clean energy specialist Nextracker, despite the latter’s near-term challenges. We also purchased a stake in Home Depot on Sept. 4. Recent market jitters have pushed money into more defensive areas as investors search for well-capitalized corporations that may weather a possible recession. Just take a look at portfolio names like Abbott Laboratories and TJX Companies. These have been two of our top performers because the August monthly meeting. Meanwhile, other winners like Amazon have escaped last week’s sell-off within the megacap technology sector, while Best Buy got a lift after a robust quarterly earnings report. Advanced Micro Devices joined the list of winners late Wednesday on a rebound in chip stocks. Here’s a breakdown of what drove these five stocks’ gains because the club’s meeting ended on Aug. 14 through Wednesday’s close. 1. Best Buy: up 17.7% Shares got a lift on Aug. 23 after Fed Chair Jerome Powell made dovish comments on monetary policy on the central bank’s annual Jackson Hole Economic Symposium. Best Buy can profit from rate cuts because lower borrowing costs result in more activity within the housing sector, which might boost demand for the corporate’s products like TVs and appliances. We took advantage of the uptrend and sold a small share on Aug. 26 to guard ourselves from disappointment within the upcoming earnings report. The group didn’t disappoint. In fact, many of the stock’s whopping double-digit gain was because of the electronics retailer’s better-than-expected quarter on August 29. Shares rose over 14% through the session. Although the stock has fallen about 3% since that initial surge, it has managed to carry on to most of its gains on the back of a series of positive comments from Wall Street. Bank of America, Telsey Advisory Group and DA Davidson each raised their price targets following the quarterly results. We also updated our price goal to $105 per share from $95. 2. Amazon: Up 8.5% Shares of the e-commerce giant rose on the back of a series of positive Wall Street reports that fueled the continued recovery following the earnings sell-off earlier last month. JPMorgan named Amazon its top web stock on August 19. Days later, Goldman Sachs also named the stock its top web stock while reiterating its buy rating. In the Aug. 29 note, Goldman analysts said the corporate stays well positioned to learn from the shift in spending at the same time as consumers limit their purchasing decisions amid economic uncertainty. “We believe Amazon remains well positioned to benefit from the shift in spending. [Amazon] sees this as an opportunity to gain market share and meet consumers with lower prices, faster delivery speeds and more choice,” the analysts wrote, citing the expansion of Amazon’s on a regular basis essentials stores. The stock then eased a bit until Monday, when shares began to rise again following Amazon’s investor day, where investors celebrated CEO Andy Jassy’s positive remarks concerning the cloud business and a brand new partnership with Oracle. 3. TJX: Up 8% Similar to Best Buy, the retail stock lands on this list largely because of a stellar earnings report. On Aug. 21, TJX shot up 6.1% to a record close after the corporate raised its fiscal 2025 earnings forecast and beat expectations on revenue and profit. The stock has lost about 2% since then, but that is a lot better than the performance of a well-liked retail ETF over the identical period, which lost 6.7%. TJX’s relative outperformance versus other retailers got here as investors sought out recession-resistant names. A bargain retailer like TJX definitely meets that criteria. 4. Advanced Micro Devices: up 6.5% AMD has rallied big, rising 11.5% prior to now three sessions alone to land in the highest five. The stock has taken heavy losses in recent months, including late August and into September. Now, buyers have shown up in full force after dips, together with some generally positive updates on AI demand. After jumping 2.8% on Monday, AMD continued its run on Tuesday after its cloud computing partner Oracle reported upbeat quarterly results. Strength in chip stocks on Wednesday, spurred by comments from Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, likely contributed to AMD’s gains this session. The stock closed nearly 5% higher on the eve of the September monthly meeting. 5. Abbott Laboratories: up 6.1% The medical device maker can thank the rotation of cash into defensive sectors like healthcare for its slow rise in recent weeks. The healthcare sector of the S&P 500 has risen 2.2% because the August monthly meeting, easily outperforming the broad index’s 1.8% gain over that period. But Abbott shares appear to have benefited from a company-specific driver. The stock really took off on Sept. 5 after the corporate launched its first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor, Lingo, within the U.S. (see a full list of stocks in Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust here). As a subscriber to CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock from his charitable trust’s portfolio. When Jim has discussed a stock on TV, he waits 72 hours after the trade alert is issued before executing the trade. 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Traders work on the ground of the New York Stock Exchange on September 4, 2024.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
Since the club’s monthly meeting in August, there was chaos on the stock market.
