Market Review: May 28, 2026

Closing Recap

Thursday, May 28, 2026

U.S. stocks remain in cruise control higher, getting a boost around 10:00 am this morning after Axios reported that the US and Iran have reached a deal which is pending President Trump’s approval. After those headlines, markets spiked  followed by a slow, steady climb all day for new record highs in the S&P 500, Nasdaq, Russell 2000 and more. Barring a market collapse tomorrow, a nine week winning streak appears in the cards for the S&P 500 following today’s rally, as the CBOE Volatility index (VIX) hits lowest levels since January, dropping below the 16 level amid no market fear. Meanwhile both the Nasdaq Composite and S&P 500 both extended their winning streaks to 6 days and the Russell 2000 Index went up 5 of last 6 days (only slipping yesterday by less than 1 point). It has been nothing short of extraordinary for stock markets since the end of March; a massive rally that has been led by technology and semis throughout. In fact, with one day left in the month of May, Technology (XLK) is up 17% MTD (second month up more than 10%), with the next best sector being Healthcare (XLV) +3.3% and Consumer Discretionary (XLY) +3% on the month. Energy (XLE) is down -4.4% on month, and Utilities (XLU) -4.75% and rest of sectors almost all flat or little changed. @MikeZaccardi noted on X, “Nasdaq Composite $COMPQ +25% April-May. Best 2-month rally since 2002.” Europe lower as the FTSE 100 snapped its seven-day win streak as renewed US-Iran conflict weighs initially. Britain’s FTSE 100 down 0.69%, Germany’s DAX down 0.3%, France’s CAC 40 down 0.19%, Spain’s Ibex down 0.44%, and the Euro Stoxx index down 0.21%.

Interesting stats: US consumers almost out of savings: in the last 2 months, personal savings rate collapsed by 1% to 2.6%, just shy of all time low. @FluentInFinance noted on X, “The personal savings rate dropped to 2.6% (down from 5.5% a year ago). In 60 years, it’s only been this low twice: 1. COVID pandemic spending in 2021, 2. Right before the 2008 Great Recession. After savings hit their 2007 low: Unemployment doubled, home prices collapsed, and the stock market lost roughly 50% over 18 months. Right now: Prices remain elevated. Wages are flat. Layoffs are quietly increasing. Credit card debt just hit a new all-time high.”

Sentiment data: 1) This week’s NAAIM Exposure Index jumped to 98.39 from 82.02 last week and up over 20 points from 77.34 on 5/13 and taking out the recent hi of 96.67 from 5/6 – the 10-29-25 Reading of 100.83 is the 52 week hi – 2025 trough from 4-16-25 of 35.16 – Last Quarter Average (Q1) was 82.00 (down from 92.26 in Q4); 2) the bull-bear spread in the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) weekly survey was -6.3 % vs -11.9% last week. Bulls rose to 35.6% from 31.7%, Neutrals fall to 22.6% from 24.7% and Bears fall to 41.9% from 43.6%.

• Q1 U.S. GDP (second estimate) came in at a +1.6%, annual rate, below the +2.0% in the first estimate and +0.5% in the prior quarter, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Personal consumption expenditures: +1.4%, annual rate, vs. +1.6% in initial estimate and +1.9% prior. Corporate profits fell at a rate of 0.4%, compared to the 5.7% growth seen in Q4 2025. Personal Saving Rate drops to 2.6%, the lowest since June 2022.
• Weekly Jobless Claims climbed to 215,000 from 210,000 and vs consensus 211,000 as the 4-week moving average climbed to 209,000 from 202,750 prior week (previous 202,500); continued claims climbed to 1.786M from 1.771M prior week and vs. consensus 1.780M.
• Durable Goods orders increased $25.5B or 7.9% to $346.0B, well above consensus of 2.8%, while March numbers were revised to 1.3% from 0.8%. Excluding transportation, new orders increased 1.1% vs +0.4% consensus and prior month’s revised figure of 1.1%. New orders, excluding defense, increased 8.1% M/M following a -0.3% dip.
• April single-family home sales 622K, below consensus 665K; April single-family home sales -6.2%; April home sales Northeast -12.9%, Midwest -25.0%, south -9.8%, West +18.7%; April new home supply 9.4 months’ worth at current pace vs March 8.7 months; median sale price $422,500, +2.2% from April 2025 ($413,600).

• WTI crude oil rose $0.22 or -0.25% to settle at $88.90 per barrel while Brent crude fell -$0.58 or 0.62% to settle at $93.71 pr barrel in mixed action. Iran/U.S. news made energy complex volatile early. U.S. distillate fuel oil inventories fell to a 23-year low last week, Energy Information Administration said on Thursday. Distillate fuel oil stocks fell to 100.8 million barrels in the week ended May 22, the lowest since May 2003.
• U.S. natural gas futures jumped about 6% to an 11-week high on a smaller-than-usual weekly storage build, which followed forecasts for more demand over the next two weeks than previously expected. Nat gas prices rose over 16 cents, or 8.14%, to $3.285 per million British thermal units (mmBtu). The U.S. EIA said energy firms added 92 billion cubic feet (bcf) of gas to storage during the week ended May 22, slightly smaller than the 95-bcf build analysts forecast in a Reuters poll. It compares with an increase of 104 bcf during the same week last year.

• Off-Price Retail: BURL shares declined despite beat and raise quarter after shares rallied into the print; reported Q1 sales +14% y/y to $2.85B topping ests $2.8B and raised its FY sales forecast to grow 9%-11%, up from a previous view of up 8%-10%, and comp sales are expected to grow 2%-4%, up from a prior 1%-3% view.
• Apparel & Accessory Retail: CTRN provided upbeat guide as sees Q1 revs $230.9M, vs. consensus $217.4M and prelim Q1 adjusted EBITDA $13.5M-$14M; raises FY26 outlook with comparable store sales growth now expected to be in the range of 8% to 10%, above previous outlook of 5% to 7%, and implying balance-of-year comparable store sales growth of high single-digits and boosts year Ebitda to $35M-$40M from prior $34M-$38M.
• Department Stores: KSS maintained its annual targets after posting quarterly sales in line with estimates, as cost cut efforts start to pay off; said it continues to expect annual net sales to remain flat or decline up to 2%. It also sees annual earnings per share in the range of $1.00 to $1.60.
• Electronic Retail: BBY Q1 adj EPS $1.28 tops consensus $1.23 along with comp sales beat of +2% vs. est. +1% and forecasts Q2 sales above Wall Street expectations; maintains annual forecast of comparable sales in the range of a 1% decline to a 1% rise, with adjusted profit per share between $6.30 and $6.60.

• Electric vehicle sector: Chinese EV maker XPEV said Q1 revs fell -17.6% y/y to RMB13.03B on lower vehicle deliveries while posted wider net loss as expenses rose; said Q1 gross margin improved to 20.6% from 15.6% y/y; sees Q2 deliveries between 100,000 and 106,000 vehicles and revs between RMB19.60 bln and RMB20.80 bln; LI shares active following its mixed quarterly results.

• Industrials: MMM sued by Australia for $1.4B over PFAS contamination. Australia has launched a record $1.43B+ lawsuit against 3M over PFAS-contaminated firefighting foam, citing extensive environmental, economic, and cultural damage tied to the forever chemicals – Reuters.
• E&C Sector: PWR was upgraded to Outperform at Oppenheimer with an $800 price target following a transfer of coverage saying the company is positioned in markets with superior growth prospects and notes Quanta’s exposure to power generation, complex facilities development, underground delivery network modernization, and pipeline are necessary to support electrification demands, AI development and other secular drivers.
• In Chemicals: LYB was upgraded to Overweight from Equal Weight at Wells Fargo and raised tgt to $98 from $80 saying the Iran war has persisted long enough to position the commodities for near-peak margins in 2026 and structurally higher earnings longer term.
• In Materials: uranium producer CCJ said its Key Lake mill and McArthur River mine have returned to full production activities following a disruption.

• In Banks: NTB entered into a definitive agreement to acquire CIBC’s 91.7% interest in CIBC Caribbean Bank. The total consideration to be paid for CIBC Caribbean will be comprised of $1.09B in cash and $703M in Butterfield shares. RY announces 45M share repurchase program; raises quarterly dividend 7% to C$1.76 per share; Q2 adjusted EPS C$3.90 vs. C$3.12 last year and Q2 revenue C$17.45B vs. C$15.67B last year. GS President today said he expects merger and acquisition volumes for the industry this year are on course to approach a 2021 record, with corporate activity driving dealmaking.
• In Crypto: BMNR, MSTR, IBIT, COIN and other crypto related names as Bitcoin falls over -3% to 6-week lows below $73,000, and Ethereum fell over -4% to below $2,000 before rebounding off lows.

• GSK released results from two phase 3 trials for the drug, bepirovirsen, which showed 19% of hepatitis B patients achieved a functional cure response rate in the overall study population after a six-month treatment. The drug delivered a functional cure rate of 26% in a smaller group of patients with lower viral activity, the company said.
• LLY shares surged near record highs after CVS announced they will add Eli Lilly’s Zepbound (tirzepatide) back to its commercial formularies as an additional preferred option Oct. 1st. CVS previously dropped LLY as a preferred drug on May 1st, 2025. CVS will also remove the new-to-market block on LLY’s Foundayo on June 1.

• Healthcare Technology: PHR reported a bottom-line beat driven by cost controls but also notable top-line contributions from Network Solutions and AccessOne; beat consensus revenue and adj-EBITDA estimates, but missed the firm’s revenue and adj-EBITDA forecast.
• CRO Sector: shares of ICLR decline on mixed Q4 results as EPS $2.52 misses consensus $3.12 but Q4 revenue $2.11B beat est. $1.99B which were delayed due to an accounting probe earlier this year; mixed guide in lower EPS/higher revs with FY26 EPS $10.00-$11.00 (est. $11.28) and sees FY26 revs $7.85B-$8.15B vs. est. $7.85B).

• Aerospace: HEI reported 2Q EPS of $1.66 beat expectations by over 20% (Street $1.33) while EBITDA of $408M was similarly strong, coming in well above the Street’s $339M. Driving the better results was volumes and margins as the company saw sales rise 25% (+18% org) which was 9-10% better while op margins of 25.5% were a record high by 150bps. BKSY received a seven-figure, multi-year contract renewal to develop automated non-Earth imagery services as the program expands work into space domain awareness.
• Defense: ATRO announced that the U.S. Army has issued a purchase order to Astronics Test Systems for the TS-4549/T Radio Test Sets Program. The order initiates the full rate production stage of the program and is for $44.7M; order is expected to cover deliveries over the next 20 months.

• AI/Data Center/AI Infrastructure: NBIS shares jumped after prominent AI investor Leopold Aschenbrenner has backed the company as the Aschenbrenner’s Situational Awareness fund disclosed it owns 12.41 million Class A shares of Nebius on Wednesday, worth around $2.86 billion at Wednesday’s closing price of $208.37. That represents a 5.6% stake in the company. Anthropic launched Claude Opus 4.8, upgrading its top model for coding, agentic workflows, reasoning and knowledge work. The update adds Fast Mode which runs up to 2.5x faster at one-third the cost while giving users more control over speed versus deeper thinking. Anthropic has raised $65B in Series H funding led by Altimeter Capital, Dragoneer, GreenOak’s, and Sequoia Capital, valuing the company at $965B post-money, the company announced
• Computer Hardware/Components: DELL received a $9.69 billion contract from the Pentagon. The award is a firm-fixed-price blanket purchase agreement to streamline and consolidate software acquisition across the Pentagon, intelligence community and Coast Guard. HPQ shares slipped as beats revenue, profit estimates as AI PC and Windows 11 refresh boost demand; Q2 revenue rose 9% to $14.41B y/y, and above est $14.07B but narrowed FY26 EPS guidance to $2.90 to $3.10, compared with its prior estimates of $2.90 to $3.20. IBM said it has committed $5 billion to an initiative that will deploy engineers and AI tools ‌to help companies better secure open source software. The initiative, called ‌Project Lightwell, seeks to create a "clearinghouse" for open source security, establishing a model for managing ​risks across software supply chain.
• EDA Sector: SNPS reported better F2Q results, despite the Ansys accounting benefit, raises annual forecast on demand for AI chip design software; raises FY26 adj EPS view to $14.72-$14.80 from $14.38-$14.46 and revs to $9.625B-$9.705B from $9.56B-$9.66B, consensus $9.63B; also reached an agreement with activist investor Elliott Investment Management that will ‌give one board seat to the activist investor’s managing partner Jesse Cohn.
• Storage & Management: Everpure (P) grew revenue 35% in fiscal Q1, well above consensus at 29%, and management called out higher win rates and market share gains, while Q2 guidance for 28% growth was "well above the Street too and reiterated its initial hyperscale deploy, citing customer order commits, with expansion even further in FY28.
• More Software: BRZE shares fell as increased full-year guidance by more than the Q1 beat, which now implies ~22% growth in FY27 alongside expanding margins. Canaccord noted weakness in the stock appears more tied to elevated expectations and a strong run-up, rather than any deterioration in demand signals or commentary. Earnigns tonight in software plentiful with AMBA, ASAN, ADSK, ESTC, MDB, OKTA, PD, S and PATH to report.

• MRVL reported in-line FQ1 (Apr) results and guided FQ2 (Jul) higher with most of the upside is being driven by increased demand for Optical Interconnect with F27 rev growth being revised up to +70% vs +50% prior; MRVL raised its F27/F28 ests accordingly with DC revs expected to grow +50%/ 55% respectively vs +40%/+50% prior.
• PLAB shares tumble as posted a miss on the top and bottom line for Q2 as EPS $0.42 below the $0.54 est. and revs fell -0.5% y/y to $209.9M vs. the est. $216.6M saying certain design releases were delayed due to elevated fab utilization rates, extending new product launch timelines; guides Q3 revs $207M-$215M vs. est. $218.5M as design releases face delays from elevated fab utilization, memory supply constraints, OEM cost pressures, and geopolitical uncertainty.