Market Review: May 18, 2026

Closing Recap

Monday, May 18, 2026

U.S. stocks finish mixed, opening “green” after futures were lower overnight. Stocks pulled back this morning following some headlines that the US was ready to unfreeze Iranian assets and give them sanctions relief. But as the market opened, the headline turned to the US is rejecting Iran’s latest proposal and preparing for more decisive military action soon. So back down we went where we spent most of the day after sliding Friday from recent all-time highs for the S&P 500, Nasdaq Comp and Russell 2000. Another leg lower came around 12:30 after CNBC reported on X, “a U.S. official tells me the Iranian state media report that the U.S. has agreed to lift oil sanctions while talks are ongoing is false.” The comments were only to be followed by a late afternoon post by President Trump on social media platform Truth Social, saying “I have been asked by the Emir of Qatar, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, and the President of the United Arab Emirates, Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, to hold off on our planned Military attack of the Islamic Republic of Iran, which was scheduled for tomorrow, in that serious negotiations are now taking place, and that, in their opinion, as Great Leaders and Allies, a Deal will be made, which will be very acceptable to the United States of America, as well as all Countries in the Middle East, and beyond. This Deal will include, importantly, NO Nuclear WEAPONS FOR Iran!” Back and forth we went all day with not much else to move markets – very choppy trading day as the S&P finished little changed, bouncing more than 50 points off its afternoon lows.

Risk assets ended lower as Technology (XLK) saw a notable pullback after leading Wall Street all of 2026, along with Industrials (XLI), while Energy (XLE), Financials (XLF) and other defensive sectors saw money rotate in following the bounce in oil and profit taking in some tech sectors. A recent spike in Treasury yields, the dollar and energy prices have renewed inflation fears (alongside a jump in CPI, PPI inflation readings last week). Bitcoin prices resumed its downward momentum failing to bounce after last week’s early gains, hitting new May lows. Treasury yields ended higher along with oil keeping the S&P and Nasdaq in negative territory. The Nasdaq slipped behind weakness in chip stocks (SOX) while software names (IGV) rebounded. @KobeissiLetter said on “X”, Shocking stat of the day: Semiconductor stocks have accounted for more than half of the S&P 500’s +8% year-to-date gain, or +563 index points. NVIDIA, $NVDA, alone has contributed +110 index points to the S&P 500. This is followed by Micron, $MU, at +58 points, Broadcom, $AVGO, at +44 points, AMD, $AMD, at +40 points, and Intel, $INTC, at +39 points. As a result, the remaining 495 stocks in the index have collectively contributed +272 points. This comes as the Semiconductor index, $SOX, has rallied +64%, 8x the performance of the S&P 500. Chip stocks now also account for 18% of the S&P 500’s market cap, near an all-time high.”

• Chinese economic data released overnight was weaker than expected in April. Retail sales rose 0.2% vs. a year earlier, the weakest since the end of 2022 and below forecasts for 2%. Industrial production grew 4.1%, missing forecasts for 6%. Year-to-date fixed-asset investment fell 1.6% vs. targets for a 1.7% gain

• June gold slipped -$3.90/oz, or -0.09%, to settle at $4,558.00 as support from a weaker U.S. dollar offset pressure from higher Treasury yields and inflation concerns stemming from rising oil prices, while July silver prices dipped -$0.10/oz, or -0.13%, to settle at $77.44 an ounce.
• The price of bitcoin fell -2.5% to around $76,250 late day, falling to its lowest price since May 1. Cryptocurrency liquidations topped $699 million over the past 24 hours as the price of bitcoin fell, according to CoinMarketCap data. More than $283 million in ethereum positions have been liquidated over the past day. Meanwhile, spot bitcoin ETFs recorded $1 billion in net outflows last week, ending a six-week streak of inflows, data showed.

• TSLA has increased the prices of its Model Y cars in the U.S. for the first time in two years, has raised the price of its Model Y Premium rear-wheel drive and all-wheel drive by $1,000 each to $45,990 and $49,990, respectively and there will be no impact on entry-level options.
• XPEV said it had ‌begun mass production of its first ​robotaxi at its Guangzhou headquarters, targeting fully driverless operations by early 2027. The Chinese EV maker is accelerating ‌its shift ⁠toward driverless vehicles and humanoid robotics as competition ⁠intensifies in the world’s largest auto market.

• Retailers: Department store Macy’s (M) shares bounced after s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. disclosed a 5.4% stake in the department store operator, according to a regulatory filing. Williams Trading double upgraded VFC from Sell to Buy and raise tgt to $19 from $14 as a result of subtle increase in momentum within Vans, led by the LX Old Skool Pearlized Pack, as any improvement or likely improvement in Vans’ trends will be received well by investors. The firm also upgraded GOOS from Sell to Hold after Q426 revenue exceeded estimates, but earnings fell short as a result of increased wholesale revenue penetration. DECK upgraded from Underweight to Neutral at Piper with $100 tgt given its more cautious stance on the sneaker category Performance Running still has momentum and HOKA’s still lack diversification in silhouettes outside of Max cushioning. LULU is urging its shareholders to vote against the slate of directors nominated by founder Chip Wilson, saying he has outdated perspectives about how to position the athletic-apparel retailer for the future.

• Space related stocks moved higher after Elon Musk said he is back in Texas working on plans for a SpaceX (SPCX) initial public offering. "We’ve got to get the SpaceX IPO stuff going here pretty soon," he said, explaining why he appeared virtually rather than in person at the Samson International Smart Mobility Summit in Tel Aviv. Shares of SATS, RKLB, ASTS, LUNR, VOYG, YSS among early leaders.
• In Defense: Citigroup said the recent selloff in aerospace and defense stocks, driven by geopolitical uncertainty and fears of weaker defense spending looks overdone and has opened up buying opportunities. The firm added positive near-term calls on LMT, RTX, LOAR and VOYG citing attractive valuations and sector tailwinds, though pretty much cut its price targets across several aerospace and defense stocks to reflect sector-wide valuation compression, not weaker fundamentals.
• Drone sector: ONDS signed a definitive agreement to acquire Israeli defense software company Omnisys and its AI-driven Battle Resource Optimization platform. The BRO platform enables real-time battlefield orchestration across sensors, autonomous platforms and command systems with 25 years of operational deployment.

• In Banks: Commerzbank (CRZBY) formally rejected an offer by Italy’s UniCredit to buy the German lender. Commerzbank AG said UniCredit’s plan is vague and entails considerable risks; and significantly underestimates revenue losses, overestimates synergies, and assumes an unrealistic implementation timeline.
• SFR REITS: INVH and AMH both upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform at Raymond James saying they see signs that single-family rental leasing demand is accelerating. In addition, the House of Representatives last week released a more industry-friendly version of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, as the new bill eliminates a contentious provision from the Senate’s version that would have forced single-family rental dispositions after seven years for any newly acquired built-for-rent homes.

• BMRN said its experimental treatment for a rare genetic condition met one of the two main goals in a late-stage study. BMRN was testing its enzyme replacement therapy called BMN 401 in children aged 1 to 12 years with ENPP1 deficiency, a rare, lifelong genetic condition.
• DSGN announced positive biomarker and clinical data from the ongoing Phase 1/2 RESTORE-FA trial evaluating DT-216P2 in patients with Friedreich ataxia. Per the company, this is the first time increases in endogenous FXN have been observed alongside clinical improvements of this magnitude in patients with FA, overcoming the presence of the underlying GAA repeat expansion.
• MRK said TroFuse-005, the first global Phase 3 trial to demonstrate statistically significant improvement in both OS and PFS compared to chemotherapy for these patients and the first and only ADC to do so for patients with endometrial cancer in this setting.
• REGN shares tumble after announced a failure in a late-stage trial designed to evaluate a combination therapy involving its anti-PD-1 immunotherapy Libtayo against pembrolizumab, MRK cancer therapy Keytruda.

• Healthcare Services: HIMS announces proposed convertible Senior notes offering to support international expansion and accelerate Ai-driven platform investment; announces $300M convertible Senior notes offering due 2032 with $45M upsize option.
• Medical Devices: BSX enters into $2 billion accelerated share repurchase agreement. Separately, BSX announced it has invested $1.5 billion in return for an approximately 34% equity stake in MiRus LLC. As part of the investment agreement, Boston Scientific also received an exclusive option to acquire the MiRus TAVR system, subject to additional payments and the completion of certain milestones.
• Managed care: UNH shares fell after a handful of firms dump shares in last quarter 13F filings; Berkshire and Oakmark Funds both exited their positions, while Appaloosa and Tiger both reduced their stakes. Jefferies said they were out with the latest reading from Medicaid enrollment tracker, which shows April disenrollment tracking ~0.1% worse than the YTD monthly avg. of 0.4%. Notably, both CNC and MOH started the year with flat to moderately positive membership growth, but attrition has accelerated with Apr tracking to 0.9% and 0.8% disenrollment, respectively.

• In Chemicals: WLK was upgraded from Underweight to Neutral at JP Morgan with $90 tgt saying, they believe that Westlake is now trading close to fair value, and it upgrades its rating for the company to Neutral. JPMC estimate Westlake’s mid-cycle earnings at about $2.2B in EBITDA.
• In Paper, Packaging and Containers: BALL was upgraded from Neutral to Overweight and CCK was upgraded to Overweight at $107 tgt at JP Morgan noting over a one-year period the S&P 500 is higher by 25%, Ball is up 3% and Crown is (4%) lower and notes the beverage can industry supply/demand balances have tightened because of rationalization steps by major producers. For BALL, the stock often trades short-term on Consolidated volume growth momentum, which JPMC thinks should accelerate sequentially in Q2:26 due to positive South American demand and production variability.

• Other software: NOW shares rallied behind positive ratings coverage by Bank America as they reinstated both with buy ratings saying ServiceNow stands to benefit from, rather than be replaced by, new AI solutions; the firm reinstated CRM at underperform. RAMP to be acquired by Publicis for a total enterprise value of about $2.2 billion in an all-cash deal as Publicis will pay $38.50 per share for LiveRamp, a 29.8% premium.
• Neoclouds: NBIS and CRWV were both assumed coverage at Davidson with Neutral ratings (down from Buys) as NBIS tgt stays $250 and CRWV cut to $100 from $175. For NBIS, believes shares deserve their current premium valuation, but also believe that may cap the upside in the short-term, so are taking a breather while for CRWV thinks this a good time to be balanced for shares.
• Data Centers: HIVE through its wholly owned subsidiary BUZZ High Performance Computing, announced that BUZZ is advancing a major infrastructure investment in Ontario, anchored by a planned new industrial-scale AI infrastructure facility, also known as an AI gigafactory, in the Greater Toronto Area with approximately 320 megawatts, MW, of utility capacity. DELL and OpenAI are teaming up to bring Codex into hybrid and on-premise setups for enterprises that want to keep data local while still tapping advanced AI capabilities. MSFT also exploring deep integration between Codex and the Dell AI Factory with NVDADell already has over 5,000 customers deploying the AI Factory as it helps companies move from pilots to real production.
• Comm Equipment & Networking: FFIV upgraded to Outperform at Evercore with $475 tgt saying growth is driven by Ai opportunities, pricing strategy, operating leverage, sustained systems growth, and attractive relative valuation. The firm is gaining traction in Ai workloads, evidenced by $50M in Ai bookings for H1:26 (FY).
• In AI sector: a U.S. jury on Monday ruled against Elon Musk in his lawsuit against OpenAI, finding the artificial intelligence company not liable to Musk for having allegedly strayed from its original mission to benefit humanity, Reuters’ reported. In a unanimous verdict, the jury in Oakland, California federal court said Musk had brought his case too late.

• Semiconductor Equipment: LRCX was upgraded to Overweight from Equal Weight at Morgan Stanley (tgt to $331 from $293) while downgraded AMAT to EW from Overweight with $502 tgt saying the magnitude of Morgan Stanley’s DRAM wafer fab equipment revisions have narrowed, and the firm is now more positive on NAND wafer fab equipment revisions from here, citing cites its confidence on Lam’s 2027 share gains for the upgrade. ONTO said it plans to offer $1.1B of convertible senior notes due 2031, with an option for buyers to purchase an additional $165M.
• Chip makers: Citigroup raised their price tgts on AMD to $460 from $358 and INTC to $130 from $95 in semis as the firm introduces its server CPU TAM model that includes general purpose CPUs, Ai head nodes, and agentic CPU applications. Citi forecast general purpose CPUs to grow at a 20% CAGR to $50.9B in 2030, AI head nodes to grow at a 21% CAGR to $21.1B in 2030, and agentic CPUs to grow at a 185% CAGR to $59.4B in 2030.