The best performing S&P 500 stock of the year

+300%

That’s the percentage change in shares of merchant power provider Vistra over the last 12 months. Vistra, which joined the S&P 500 on May 8, replacing Pioneer Natural Resources, is the best-performing stock in the index this year, jumping more than 230% in 2024.

Merchant power providers are companies that generate electricity and sell it to the highest bidder in wholesale markets or to industrial buyers, rather than at the regulated prices that utilities collect.

Like Constellation Energy and NRG, Vistra’s stock price has benefitted from excitement over growing power demand for energy-hungry AI data centers, which is expected to raise demand for their clean-energy offerings, including nuclear power.

Up nearly 70% over the last three months alone, expectations seem to be high for Vistra’s next earnings report, which is due November 7.

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Luke Kawa3m

IonQ posts huge sales beat in Q3

IonQ posted a monster top-line beat in the third quarter, along with a smaller loss than analysts had feared.

The results:

Revenue: $39.9 million (estimate: $27 million, guidance for $27 million)
Adjusted earnings per share: -$0.17 (estimate: -$0.31)

Management boosted its full-year revenue outlook to a range of $106 million to $110 million (previously $82 million to $100 million).

The prospect of government support has been a major catalyst for the quantum space in recent months, including the US government deeming the technology an R&D priority, which was followed by a report that the Trump administration was in talks to accumulate equity stakes in IonQ and its peers. That report, however, was quickly contradicted by separate reports.

Over the course of Q3, IonQ signed an agreement with the Department of Energy to advance the development and deployment of quantum technology in space, and also announced plans to acquire quantum sensor company Vector Atomic. It carried some of this momentum through early in Q4, claiming a “quantum computing world record” for the accuracy of its two-qubit gate model.

Shares of the trapped ion pure-play quantum computing company peaked at nearly $85 in mid-October, but slumped into the mid-$50s ahead of this report as part of a broad pullback across many speculative pockets of the market.

Luke Kawa5m

Qualcomm beats on Q4 sales and earnings; Q1 revenue guidance well ahead of estimates

Qualcomm reported a beat on the top and bottom lines in its fiscal fourth quarter, along with a bright outlook for the start of its next fiscal year

Here are the Q4 results:

Revenues: $11.27 billion (estimate: 10.77 billion, guidance for about $10.7 billion)
Adjusted earnings per share: $3 (estimate: $2.88, guidance for about $2.85)

Its guidance for the current quarter (fiscal Q1 2026) was stellar:

Revenues: $12.2 billion (estimate: $11.59 billion)
Adjusted earnings per share: $3.40 (estimate: $3.26)

Shares soared today ahead of the release, outperforming peers in a broad-based rebound for semiconductor stocks. Qualcomm has declined in the session following each of its past five earnings reports.

Qualcomm is readying itself for a bigger push in the AI market, having recently announced new chips for data centers expected to be available in 2026 and 2027, with Saudi Arabia’s HUMAIN as the first big buyer.

The chips that go in smartphones are still Qualcomm’s biggest business, but gauging potential demand for these upcoming chips will also be in focus during the company’s earnings call with analysts.

Luke Kawa, Toby Bochan

Market Wrap

10m

Markets rally as SCOTUS looks likely to weigh against tariffs and hope rises for end to US government shutdown

Markets bounced back from a rough Tuesday to finish higher on Wednesday

Luke Kawa2h

Qualcomm surges ahead of earnings

Qualcomm has more than erased Tuesday’s losses with a gain of more than 5% through 2:11 p.m. ET, with the company slated to released quarterly results in just a couple hours.

The same can’t be said for the semi space at large: while theVanEck Semiconductor ETF is putting in a solid rally, the ETF is still in the red over the past two sessions.

Call demand is a touch elevated: 72,229 contracts have changed hands already today, versus a 20-day average of just short of 73,000 for a full session.

Analysts are expecting the chip designer to deliver adjusted earnings per share of $2.88 on adjusted revenues of $10.77 billion for its fiscal fourth quarter.

The last five times it’s reported quarterly results, Qualcomm has declined in the following session.

Luke Kawa2h

Tariff losers are today’s big winners as Supreme Court seen as likely to strike down Trump’s IEEPA tariffs

US companies in the crossfire of wide-ranging tariffs imposed by the Trump administration are surging as the Supreme Court hears oral arguments on the legality of levies imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and prediction markets conclude that the ruling is not likely to go the government’s way.

Event contracts offered by Polymarket ascribe roughly 30% odds of the Supreme Court ruling in favor of the existing tariff regime, a number that got as low as 18% around 11:30 a.m. ET. Earlier this morning, that likelihood was briefly above 50%.

A basket of stocks deemed to be the biggest losers from Trump’s tariffs compiled by UBS is having one of its best days of 2025, up 3.7% as of 1:48 p.m. ET.

Rivian’s standout post-earnings rally is giving that index a big boost, but other gainers include Gap,American Eagle, Yeti, Fluence Energy, Nike, Stanley Black & Decker, RH, Deckers Outdoor, Under Armour, Wayfair, Best Buy, Williams-Sonoma, Crocs,Five Below, and Dollar Tree.

WisdomTree macro strategist Sam Rines recently warned that the Supreme Court striking down IEEPA tariffs could turn into a “be careful what you wish for” or “pyrrhic victory”-type scenario, as the Trump administration would likely a) talk more about tariffs, an issue that the stock market is keen to move on from and b) pursue alternative mechanisms to get similar levies back on.

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