Philip Morris sinks on signs of cracks in Zyn biz, despite cheery earnings report

It’s bizarro world for the tech sector.

Software stocks, the market’s collective whipping boy in 2026 in light of the presumptive threat of AI disruption, are continuing to recover on Tuesday. Meanwhile, the biggest winners of the AI boom this year — memory stocks, benefiting from intense shortages — are taking their turn in the red.

The iShares Expanded Tech Software ETF’s gains are being led by Datadog, a rare case of a software stock rising after reporting earnings this season, with heavyweights Oracle and ServiceNow outperforming the industry. Figma, which isn’t in this product, is also up double digits.

On the other side of the spectrum, Micron, Sandisk, Seagate Technology Holdings, and Western Digital are selling off.

The seesaw of modern markets often requires that as one group’s fortunes inflect positively after a long drubbing, so too must a high-flyer have its wings clipped.

That is, if you’re a portfolio manager long memory and short software stocks, and enough investors are willing to catch a falling knife and buy the beaten-down group, staying market-neutral and reducing this position would require you to purchase software and dump some memory stocks.

Harley-Davidson posted a loss per share more than twice as bad as Wall Street had expected in its fourth quarter. The company, which reported Q4 and full-year results on Tuesday, posted an adjusted loss of $2.44 per share, compared to Wall Street estimates of a $1.06 loss per share.

The motorcycle maker is contending with declining sales of, well, motorcycles. Shipments fell 4% in the fourth quarter from the year prior, while analysts had anticipated a 22% increase. Harley’s full-year gross margin was about 4 percentage points lower year over year, a decline the company said was driven by tariffs.

Harley CEO Artie Starrs called 2025 a “challenging year” and said the company is “taking deliberate actions to stabilize the business, restore dealer confidence, and align wholesale activity with retail demand.” Near-term results reflect those actions, Starrs said.

The year ahead didn’t offer much optimism for investors. For its motorcycle division, the company forecast a full-year operating income of between a $40 million loss and a $10 million profit. Wall Street analysts polled by FactSet expected $128 million in profit. The company said its full-year guidance could be impacted by a new strategic plan, set to be announced in May.

Credo Technology Group is earning itself some new believers.

The seller of active electrical cables (AECs) and other electrical connectivity solutions for data centers announced stellar Q3 preliminary sales results after the close on Monday, with guidance that calls for rapid growth to continue.

Shares are up about 15% as of 8 a.m. ET.

Management said Q3 revenues would range between $404 million and $408 million, above the upper end of its guidance and the $341 million forecast from Wall Street. Going forward, the company projects that revenues will grow in the mid-single digits quarter on quarter, propelling revenue growth up more than 200% year on year through its current fiscal year.

“We reaffirm CRDO as our Top Pick for 2026 and view this announcement positively given management’s continued execution with its AEC product offering and our underlying belief in the longevity of AECs,” wrote Needham & Co. analyst Quinn Bolton, who has a $220 price target on the shares. “At the Needham Growth Conference, management stated that they believe the industry is still in the early innings of the AEC adoption curve, pointing to only one customer that has fully deployed AECs across potential use cases (front-end networks, scale-out networks and switch racks) and stated that visibility continues to be strong over the next twelve months and beyond.”

Bolton boosted his sales outlook for Credo’s next fiscal year and the one after that following this news.