
Is the fever breaking in the AI & metals trade? The chip & tech stocks seeing outsized drops, and how Silver reversed course in a major way after hitting records. Plus the next move for the tech trade after a standout year, and the stocks one top analyst is betting on in 2026, but Nvidia isn’t one of them. Fast Money Disclaimer
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Steve Grasso
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Brian Sullivan
Live from the NASDAQ market site. Right here in the heart of New York City's Times Square, this is fast money. Here's what's on tap tonight. Call it a metal meltdown. Silver and gold pulling back from records in a big way today. It may have something to do with the city of Chicago, which play plus AI of course, the buzz trade of the year. But who made Dan Ives list of hot stocks for next year and which big name was left off the list? Dan is here. Plus, what is behind the backslide in Alibaba? General Motors on pace for its best year in years and big bucks in the dollar stores. How to trade Dollar General even as it hits new highs almost every day. Hi, everybody. I am Brian in for Melissa Lee tonight. Coming to you live from Studio B at the NASDAQ on your desk tonight, final week of the year, Mr. Steve Grasso, Bono and Ison. Dan Nathan. Welcome everybody. All right. We start tonight with signs that the fever and a couple of red hot trades may have started to break. Silver coming back down to earth after its record run. It hit nearly $83 an ounce overnight but fell nearly 9% today. Gold also pulling back. Gold losing just under 4.5percent, settling its lowest level in nearly two weeks. But it wasn't just metals on the move. Some big stocks also seeing outsized drops recently. Names that you know, maybe you own or trade, Palantir, Oracle, Nvidia and Broadcom today. Short week, low volume, no Fed speakers, but still down today. We're going to get more in technology a bit later on this hour, but let's start Guy Dami with these metals. What I referenced was A raising of margin requirements on silver by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Some people pointing to that and saying that's the reason. What do you think happened today?
Steve Grasso
Welcome.
Brian Sullivan
Thank you.
Guy Adami
Be here all week.
Brian Sullivan
All week, not Thursday. Happy New Year. Happy New Year.
Guy Adami
That's one of the reasons, definitely. I mean people should have seen that coming because historically when you see prices move of that magnitude to the upside, you will see margin requirements be lift be raised by these exchanges. By the way, it wasn't just silver that was part of it. Another part of it was there were a lot of $75 calls in silver that were exercised on Friday. People that were short those calls needed to cover. That took the price to 82. And that creates something called in our world negative whip or bad Greek. I think that was part of it as well. And this was just in terms of. Technically you had a. Basically in one of these reversal days where you had a higher high than the previous day, a lower low than the prior days and you closed lower. So technically you have this engulfing pattern. It all lined up on Friday into the weekend. Now the next question is, is it over in terms of the selling? I don't think so. But the real question is is the move higher over And I don't think by any stretch of the imagination is. I think this is just a pause to a larger move higher.
Brian Sullivan
That's it. Steve Grasser, you know the bulls that are out there in gold and silver, they looked at today and said, you know what? Now I can get it for 9% cheaper than I could get it yesterday if it keeps going higher. What do you think if you look.
Steve Grasso
At these, the biggest updates, the 10 to 25 biggest updates historically are followed with a 20% drawdown. So you're going to have some time, you're going to be able to get it cheaper. These things have run so far so fast. I still believe upside is still there.
Bonnie Glick
Yeah, I mean I tend to agree, although I'm with you closer to the 20% drawdown rather than looking to get in right away. If you're going to play, you likely want to do it in a risk defined way. But I do have some concerns when I start to see silver and gold have moves like a complex names. I mean that, that is somewhat concerning. I think any time you start to see an increase in margin, whether it be on the downside or the upside, it is somewhat indicative of things getting away from there. We argued about fundamentals or whether or not there is. There is a fundamental case to be made a bit on Friday. But when you start to see these outsized moves and you.
Steve Grasso
And what happens, what happens if the silver move is based on what you just said, the AI move? Because obviously it has a use case in industrial. I'm sorry to take you off your train but continue on that path. When it's what silver has, the industrial use.
Bonnie Glick
I do think that it is somewhat a tertiary way of playing the AI market. Like we've seen AI, we've seen data centers, we've seen the chips, we've now seen utilities and now we've seen that follow through into silver. I do think it does have something to do with that. But all of that said, you are starting to see, even though you have seen somewhat of a bleed off in some of these names, the day to day volatility that we're seeing in silver is somewhat. Reminds me somewhat of what we've seen previously in some of the snowflakes or the cloud flares etc. In that space. And I think that type of price action is concerning and I would wait for that volatility to die down before I would be looking to reassemble.
Brian Sullivan
Because Bono and I were here on Friday. I know you guys are home watching or listening. So thank you for that on the radio as you listened you would have noticed that we had this polite discussion. Silver, yes, it has a use case as an industrial metal. Gold really does not. And gold also moved up. Did it feel on like on Friday or the weekend Dan, at all to you that there was almost. I think your point is panic buying in a weird way.
Dan Nathan
I don't know. I mean I talk to a lot of investors as all you guys do. I just don't hear much about silver or a whole heck of a lot about gold. When you think about gold it's, you know, people tell you yeah, have 2, 3% of your portfolio in that. So I think that extrapolate the price action I think is kind of interesting. It says something about investor behavior or psychology a little bit. I tend to look more at what's going on with bitcoin right here. And we've been talking about gold for a long time. Guy has been pounding the table since it was 2000 maybe probably earlier. And so you have this sort of move, you know, gold did have this sort of stair step. It never really felt like it got really squeezy the way silver has of late. But the flip side of this with the US dollar or the index, the Dixie trading the way it does, I mean it really feels like it wants to make a new low over this period that it's been in over the last couple of years or so. And I look at like, let's say bitcoin, which is nearly a $2 trillion risk asset. And there was a time that this was very correlated to the nasdaq. That correlation has broken. We've also seen, you know, what's supposed to happen with gold and the dollar weakness. Well, bitcoin hasn't been doing that either. And so to me, when you talk about the fever breaking of some of these trades, it feels like to some degree people have taken their, you know, the foot off the, the metal or the pedal or whatever you want to do with that thing and really started to look around for some other things that are moving. And so maybe that is this metals complex. But again, I can't sit here and tell you that there's a fundamental reason for it. To me, it more feels like you're seeing the money that's chasing this sort of trade just kind of move from one thing to the next.
Brian Sullivan
Maybe we back it up. Guy Adami, great call on gold by you. Continues to be even with today because you're still way, way up. Who do you think were the buyers of gold and silver lately? Are they the gold bugs?
Guy Adami
Silver's its own end.
Brian Sullivan
Are they the people Botoin is referring to that were trading Palantir and now maybe decided to shift to silver?
Guy Adami
Some of that. I mean, I think there's some of the bitcoin crew probably found its way into silver. I do think to Steve's point, there's an industrial use. We've talked about that for a while. In terms of gold, it's not about people going to Costco and buying their 10th of an ounce or an ounce or whatever it is. I mean, that's not what's driving this. It's been for the last five years, central banks buying gold in record amounts. And that didn't change this year and it's probably not going to change in 26. And to me, listen, gold's a commodity in name only. There's really no end use other than jewelry. It's a commodity in name only. However, central banks have been hoarding in ways that we have never seen before. They are playing with. Dan was just talking about this de dollarization and they're finding their way into gold that will not abate. And today's price action did nothing to change my think about it.
Steve Grasso
Russian assets were frozen years ago when they invaded Ukraine. So how do they circumvent that with gold? And they circumvented that with buying up gold and giving it to countries that didn't have banks that were sanctioned, so they had an en route to buy weaponry. So that's where it started. And other central banks are just doing the same thing right now.
Brian Sullivan
I should have asked for this chart prior to the show, everybody. So I apologize.
Guy Adami
Can break it down for you.
Brian Sullivan
We should have a chart of they can. They do a great job. Bitcoin versus gold. Because what, what else has happened, Bono, in the last couple of weeks is bitcoin has gone down while gold and silver have gone up. And I also do wonder, is it that buyer again who said, I'm done with bitcoin for now, but I'm going to buy what some people would call the digital gold or real gold, whatever.
Bonnie Glick
It might be, or no, it's tough for me to pair. Aside from them being supposedly just a digital and physical flight to safety, that perception, drawing the parallels between gold and bitcoin to me, I think is a bit of a stretch. Beyond that, for one, there's endless supplies of gold and by design there is a constraint around bitcoin. So I just, I think it's hard. Just that fundamental difference makes it hard for me to kind of compare the two. I just think that when it comes to bitcoin, you are going to, you have seen and you will continue to see these massive swings, changes in sentiment, drawdowns, and then rush into this particular asset class. So, you know, seeing the gold move from 1 20, 125 K to 87, yes, that seems like a pretty precipitous fall. But it wouldn't be the first time that we've seen this thing go from 100k back down to 40 or $50,000 only a couple of years ago. So I think if you're going to be invested in this type of digital asset, you're kind of geared up and comfortable with that type of risk. I'm more surprised to see the type of moves that we're seeing in silver and gold because I don't think they should be trading like a bitcoin.
Brian Sullivan
It's also platinum and palladium too. It's not just.
Steve Grasso
Even so, there's supply deficits in all of those markets, except with the exception of gold. So 200 million ounces of supply demand deficit within silver because of the industrial use and because of basically 70% of all silver that's used is mined through copper and other precious metals as a, as a derivative. So there's real supply demand issues going on there.
Brian Sullivan
And I agree with you. We're going to get to Carter in just one second. Steve, the only thing I would push back on a little bit is that then why would gold keep going up when to your own point, gold does not have an investment.
Steve Grasso
Geopolitical, emotional, everything that guy's been mentioning for years. So there's a whole different sense of worth. And when you have central banks, the United States outnumbers their supply of gold by more than two and a half to one basically of every other country. China stockpiling it, Russia stockpiling it. So you've had this mad rush in into gold for a host of reasons. None of them are industrial, but all of them still could push the price.
Brian Sullivan
Higher, still higher than a price of a barrel of oil. And I said it in Friday, if you're looking for a last minute gift barrel of oil as opposed to silver, it's too expensive. All right, let's get more now on the metal pullback. Strip out, strip out the emotion. Look at the charts. And for that, who better than Carter Worth he put out a note this weekend we with a pairs trade saying maybe you short silver and go long gold. The chartmaster joining us now with what appears to be some gold on the wall behind him. What are you looking at Carter?
Carter Worth
So yeah, over the weekend obviously and over the past several weeks and then of course several months, the spike in silver is getting more and more extreme. And if you look at silver not only on its own but in relation to gold, the extreme reading is one of the most excessive seen past 50 years since gold and futures trading began in 74. Let's look at a few charts and a few tables and try to figure out the way forward together. The first thing we know is that it is simply a ratio of these two highly correlated assets. And in April, 1 ounce of gold bought 107 ounces of silver. Now as of today's low, 1 ounce of gold bought 55 ounces of silver and closed at 59. Interestingly, the long term average going back to the 70s is about 60. And so we have returned to the average. But when you get this extreme oversold and we'll look at it in the charts next, you play for a bounce in the gold silver ratio. So let's look at three charts. They're all identical. And this is again depicting not gold and silver but gold's relative performance to silver. And of course you see the plunge of late. In fact again having gone from 107 to as low as 55 today and then this key reversal, which is very important next of three identical charts, you'll see where the ratio is in relation to its moving average. And on this iteration you'll see that we are quite far below. And then the third and final chart, you'll see arrows which annotate the 13 other times that we have been this oversold or this extreme in terms of where we are in relation to the 150 day moving average. And each and every time this has occurred since 74 past 50 years, silver has underperformed gold. And in fact, silver is down an absolute basis 3, 6, 9, 12 months later every single time except once. And so we the bet here, at least that was the thought over the weekend. Sell silver outright or if one wants to be a bit more cautious, put on a pair being short silver and long gold.
Brian Sullivan
Interesting trade too. And I go back to the margin stuff. 2011, I believe it was raised silver fell. 1990, the Hunt brothers tried to take over silver. It soared margin requirements went up. Silver fell would seem to fall in line with the charts guy. Dom, you have a take on that ratio.
Guy Adami
I like the parachute. I think he's spot on. I think there's probably another 7 to $10 lower in silver before it get back, get back on its horse. But gold, for the reasons that we stated earlier, I mean, nothing has changed other than the price going down a couple hundred dollars today. But the fundamental story of gold is still intact. The speculative nature around silver is washing out a little bit, but silver will get back on its source. But gold over silver right now is absolutely correct.
Brian Sullivan
Gold over silver. All right, fundamental case and the chart case. Carter Moore, thank you very much. All right, stepping out of the metals. Alibaba shares dropped today about two and a half percent. There are some growing concerns over China's economy. Data over the weekend showing industrial profits in China fell more than 13% in November, faster than the prior month's date. The government also announcing plans to boost spending to support consumer demand. You had Tencent, Timu's parent company, Pin Duo, Duo, pdd, Gaidami and a few others also winning in the red. And of course I have to note that China's planning these sort of naval war games around Taiwan, which I don't blame people for being at least today a little bit nervous about China.
Guy Adami
Well, that should be an existential risk not only for China but for the global markets as well. I mean, if you go back, it was Jensen Huang, I think a year and a half or two years ago said the one thing that kept him up, or I'm paraphrasing, is the China Taiwan situation, which each and every day seems to sort of escalate a little bit. That's been a concern for a while, but if you've only been concerned about that, you've missed a huge move in the markets. With all that said, I mean, all these China stocks seemingly topped out in the fall, you started to get some rhetoric around China. You had, I think people talking about Alibaba here in the United States is basically being some subversive group. And obviously that didn't help. And now it's manifesting itself in some of these news. I think Alibaba is cheap. I thought that $10 ago, I'll say it now. And I think when people wake up to all this, they'll realize valuation alone, some of these Chinese stocks are very attractive.
Brian Sullivan
Fair enough, Dan. My only, my only beef with anything in China is that we just day to day, it's hard to know what's going to happen with the economy because we could have some kind of Taiwan issue. We could have leadership change. You just don't. It's not transparent.
Guy Adami
Yeah.
Dan Nathan
I mean, we know the economy's weak over there and they've been telling us, the data has been telling us that for years. I mean, pre Covid in a way. And so they have this deflationary problem, we have an inflationary problem. I think that we wanted to slap a bunch of reciprocal tariffs on them because of fentanyl. And I think the Chinese are acting like they won the trade war. They got rid of the reciprocal trade, you know, tariffs. They know that we need to sell them soybeans, we need their magnets, we need the rare earth. So we have this little detent. We also would like them to buy our chips. At least that's what's going on with the GPUs and the Nvidia. And they basically put on some import bans. So for all intents and purposes, so. So where we are with the China US Thing, it's not so clear. I mean, where we are with China, Taiwan, I don't think that anyone thinks the likelihood of that happening anytime soon is particularly good. But I bring up the point about who won over this last year. If the Chinese are doing exercises in and around Taiwan a few months before Xi and Trump are supposed to meet, I think that's showing a little bit about how they or how confident they feel about this little situation that we're in as it relates to trade, but also from a military standpoint, yeah, flexing a little bit.
Brian Sullivan
And I don't want to, I don't want to pile on China. Steve Grasso, we could throw up the. We're looking at the EW, which is a Hong Kong iShares ETF. You can look at the site. They're up 26 and 28% this year. You made more money if you own big China technology stocks this year than if you owned the S&P 500. It's not if, it's.
Steve Grasso
It's when they're going to have change of leadership in Taiwan. The 2027 is the 100 year anniversary of the People's Liberation Army. People have stuck out on that and I think Guy and I have used that surprise of the next year. I've picked it, he's picked it as a surprise. I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet. It's going to happen. That's the risk that you have with buying these names now. But I do believe there's some value in them.
Bonnie Glick
We're starting to get close to this 50% retracement from high to low on the year. So, you know, you may.
Brian Sullivan
On what, what are you on?
Bonnie Glick
Sorry. On Baba.
Brian Sullivan
On Baba.
Bonnie Glick
So clearly from a technical standpoint, for strategic entry standpoint, that starts to look interesting. I think the situation really though is that it's somewhat of the perfect storm. We've all talked about the geopolitical risk. You've seen some of the same come out of the AI trade and there was a lot of positive news, positive sentiment around cloud AI features, around Alibaba. And so I think that that confluence of events has kind of made it a bit tough as of late. I think once you kind of get through that transitory period, you'll look back and start to pick your spots in terms of where you want to reenter the stock. But the truth of the matter is the fiscal stimulus narrative has been there for quite some time. And until you start to see some follow through from the investor side, I think it's kind of a show me rather than tell me type of situation. And so until I think that kind of follows through, that's when you're going to probably get your trigger to, to get back into.
Brian Sullivan
It was a good discussion. And by the way, analysts wildly bullish on Alibaba stocks at 148 and change the median price target 203. So now analysts reserve the right to change their mind, do they not? And they do, Guy.
Guy Adami
Adam, they do. Often. They do. You know, as we've talked about, we play this game here. What's that then? The anagrams? Yeah. By the way, we have to all come up with a new one shortly. Fun game. It's a fun game.
Brian Sullivan
And what we come up with, Alibaba and Abba, that's, that's the genius of this show.
Guy Adami
That's what we could be. But Abbott doesn't really work because it's not really a word I use. Tube.
Brian Sullivan
This year, as you know, never, never say that in Stockholm. All right, on deck. We're going to hit the general dollar. General. It drove higher. We're going to find, find out why and what to do with it now. Plus, GM stock. Have you seen that one lately? General Motors pacing for its best year since 2009 when it came out of bankruptcy. We'll find out why. Fast Money returns right after this.
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Julia Boorstin
What made you confident that you could do something that hadn't been done before? I have no fear of failure. Trailblazing women, changing the game.
Brian Sullivan
One of my favorite pieces of advice. Think about what your boss's boss needs.
Julia Boorstin
Leadership can look in many, many different forms. It really does come down to just trusting yourself. Life is short and you just gotta think big to accomplish big things. Julia Boorstin hosts CNBC changemakers and power players. New episodes every Tuesday, wherever you get your podcasts.
Brian Sullivan
All right, welcome back to Fast Money. Dollar General hitting more than 52 week highs today. Dead end of the day, a little bit down. But the stock has been rocking. It's up more than 80% this year. $ General guidance on track for its best yearly performance since it went public back in 2009. You yourself flagging strength in the stock. Why? What are you looking at?
Guy Adami
Well, technically, I mean, go back to 20, 15, 16, 17. We traded down to the 68 level recently. Those were the same lows we made a decade or so ago. And we held. That was really important. We actually flagged that earlier this year. Then it started to get on its horse. Then you got an earnings beat. Then you have analysts starting to come around. Hey, wait a second. Maybe the stock is Too cheap. And maybe they shouldn't be in the penalty box along with Target. And now you're seeing what's happening. The average price target, according to facts that, believe it or not, is exactly where it closed today. So what I think you start seeing over the next couple of weeks is analysts start to chase on the upside. So I don't think the move is over. I think there's significant upside left in these names.
Steve Grasso
And plus their product mix. They sell, 80% of their products are staples. So you have essentials, and they're cheap essentials. And in this day and age where tariffs made everything else more expensive, they really usher a lot more consumers in. When you look at these stocks, you look at Dollar General and Dollar Tree.
Guy Adami
Mm.
Brian Sullivan
Dollar Tree had that rocking, by the way. Don't want to leave out Dollar Tree. It's up 31% in three months. Yeah, but.
Steve Grasso
But when you look at it on a year, this one has grossly outperformed Dollar General Jones up 81%. The other one's up 65.
Brian Sullivan
One's a general, one's a truck day.
Steve Grasso
But they've both killed it. But when you look at what the past is for Dollar Tree, they took over or bought family $10 12 years ago. That seems like a mishap for them. They've had store closure closures. They don't have the same product mix as Dollar General. I would pick Dollar General.
Bonnie Glick
Well, I think this has been a beneficiary of the K shaped kind of recovery. Right. And we were worried about economic growth. We got a GDP number that knocked the COVID off the ball a la Sammy Sosa 10 years ago.
Steve Grasso
Good reference.
Bonnie Glick
You know, but I'm really wondering if we do indeed thread the needle and have this soft landing Goldilocks scenario, will the momentum behind this name continue? That would be the one thing that concerns me here.
Steve Grasso
Yeah.
Brian Sullivan
So I think basically in the short term, they've both done well. But to your point, for the year, one's Barry Bonds, one Sammy. So ultimately, only one can win.
Steve Grasso
Right.
Brian Sullivan
And that one is going to broaden.
Dan Nathan
This going out from these two companies. Right. And so we've been talking about Wal Mart in the trade down that we've seen, you know, over the last few years or so. And obviously that's a period where inflation, you know, while it is becoming more muted, is on a cumulative basis is still very high. Right. And so if you look over the last month or so, we saw Kohl's have that huge beat and raise stock gapped up in one day. I think for 40% or something like that, that was Thanksgiving week. And you've seen this across some other names like this that you might associate with a mid to lower end consumer. Now the flip side of that is Costco can't get out of its own way and Costco has been making 52 week lows as Wal Mart has been making 52 week highs. If you just look at it over the last month or so, at some point I suspect you're going to see a little bit of convergence in that. But to Bahnwan's point about this GDP number and the unemployment number, they're kind of seem to be at odds with each other. The higher unemployment goes though, I suspect the more that you see demand for these sorts of, you know, the, I guess the items that are sold at these stores and that should obviously buoy the stocks.
Brian Sullivan
We're not going to do it now and Karen's not here. But Target Tarje has been another hot stock the last couple of months. Is up 10%. All right, that's a sound of a rapidly moving. Sorry. That's a big deal. I mean, yeah, good for targeting on the Adami household.
Steve Grasso
They're down 27% year to date. Sorry. There's a lot more fast money left.
Brian Sullivan
There is a lot more fast money to come. Here's what's coming up next.
Steve Grasso
The wheels keep on spinning for gm. The stock outpacing competitors this year, even lapping Tesla. But can the drive higher continue? Plus, a big year for big tech. But who will carry the group in the news?
Dan Nathan
A top tech analyst lays out the.
Steve Grasso
Names he's standing behind. And the one time darling that didn't make the cut. You're watching Fast Money live from the NASDAQ market site in Times Square. We're back right after this.
Julia Boorstin
What made you confident that you could do something that hadn't been done before? I have no fear of failure. Trailblazing women, changing the game.
Brian Sullivan
One of my favorite pieces of advice, think about what your boss's boss needs.
Julia Boorstin
Leadership can look in many, many different forms. It really does come down to just trusting yourself. Life is short and you just gotta think big to accomplish big things. Julia Boorstin hosts CNBC Changemakers and Power Players. New episodes every Tuesday. Wherever you get your podcasts.
Brian Sullivan
I'm gonna love this segment because we get to talk about cars and trucks. General Motors. That stock put on a tear this year. It's up 56%. GM is on track for its best year since coming out of bankruptcy in 2009. Cash for clunkers, anybody? GM is now trading at all time highs. It is handily outperforming its rivals like Ford, Toyota and even Tesla. Question now though is if you own it, Steve Grasso, what do you do?
Steve Grasso
I mean they sell an awful lot of cars, they sell an awful lot of trucks, they sell awful lot of SUVs.
Bonnie Glick
They.
Brian Sullivan
The Trump Tahoe is for everybody.
Steve Grasso
Exactly. They are expensive. But the Trump administration relaxed fuel standards, relaxed emission standards. Stop the EV mandates. So I think the market is just truly balancing out the headwind that they had for the last couple of years and turning it into a tailwind. They chose ice over EVs. I think the trade probably should maybe stall, if you will, a little bit, but I think ultimately it goes higher. Sorry, go ahead, stall. Yeah, you saw that, right? You caught it.
Guy Adami
But Brian, Mercedes, he's locked in.
Brian Sullivan
We mentioned, I'm not going to acknowledge that we mentioned him a few weeks.
Guy Adami
Ago, that you're probably familiar with that be Borg Warner bwa.
Brian Sullivan
Yes, it's an auto parts company. It's also the namesake of the Indianapolis 500 winners trophy, which as I just.
Guy Adami
Said, you're familiar with it. Throw up an eight or nine year chart of this sucker and you'll see this 48 level was huge resistance in 2017. We traded up there again. I think in 2022 here we are sort of knocking on the door And I think BWA is a name downstream that if we break through 48, it's got a lot of Runway to the upside.
Brian Sullivan
You know, Borg Warner does.
Guy Adami
That's the same.
Brian Sullivan
Are you, are you bullish on, are you bullish on all the automakers or bwa?
Guy Adami
I said, we mentioned the last few weeks ago and you said it's not only that, it's the recipient trophy in an Indianapolis 500.
Brian Sullivan
But I'm asking a new question which is are you bullish on auto, the.
Guy Adami
Auto parts companies, specifically bwa.
Brian Sullivan
Why?
Guy Adami
I just. Because this one I happen to look at genuine parts is one I think people talk at. Look at BWA is the one I've been focused on recently.
Brian Sullivan
The one thing I would add is that gm, not that I care what analysts have to say, but I do care and GM is at its analyst price target. So either Wall street has to move or this or not Wall street will.
Dan Nathan
Move because they always chase a little bit here. One of the things I think is interesting that we got rid of these EV credits, right? These tax credits credits at the end of Q3. And if you look at how Tesla has traded since Then if you look at how Rivian has traded since then, they've traded very well. And on the Rivian front, you know, they introduced this AI trip. They've underpriced, you know, Tesla as it relates to self driving, or at least they're kind of flat on supersized self driving. Whatever you want, they price it at 20$500 versus Tesla at 10,000. So it seems to be that, you know, the auto business maybe is something that for at least these companies where you see a transition to autonomy, you know, this is something that maybe these stocks are trading on. I think Rivian is a clear example of that.
Brian Sullivan
And that's a fascinating point. I mean, really don't talk a lot about. It's over 20 bucks a share. It was sitting around 12 to 14. Forever. Really broken out. Are you surprised by that, given the change?
Dan Nathan
They miss their deliveries, you know, you know, year on year and they lose a lot of money. They have a lot of cash. They have some big shareholders not going to let it go down. They have good cars. And I think that, you know, we've been talking about full self driving for a while. Elon has shifted the conversation more towards autonomous rideshare. But maybe, you know, Rivian's got something. They're operating off of a very small base as far as cars that they're making and delivering, but they make good cars.
Brian Sullivan
All right, coming up, technology in the red today. Some of the biggest names seeing some losses. But listen, light week, low volume, guess what's happening. Dan Ives going to be here. No, I can see him. Just, he's here in person, in a, I think it's a peach colored jacket. Mango, McLaren, Papaya, whatever you want. He's going to give you his top tech picks for next year. Guy Domi can't control himself now. We're back right after this. All right, welcome back to Fast Money, everybody. Stocks closing a little lower to start the shortened holiday week. The Dow fell 250 points. The S&P 500 down about 3.10of a percent. The NASDAQ down about half a percent. But keep in mind, low volume, no Fed speakers. New Year's on Thursday. Go figure. All right. Oil, though a little higher today settled up more than 2%. But oil still down nearly 20% this year, on pace for its worst years in years. In fact, worst since 2018. So worst in about seven years. Lululemon also on the tape responding to founder Chip Wilson's proxy fight and plans to nominate three independent directors to Lululemon's board saying it will evaluate the nominations as by the way, it's legally obligated to do. Meantime, a batch of technology stocks under pressure as we wind down the year. Oracle amongst all the bigger decliners setting about 30% over the past two months. Metta, Broadcom, Nvidia even kind of stuck in a little bit of a holding pattern the last couple of days though. And Dan, you flagged some of this weakness for us.
Dan Nathan
What I mean, there's a way to look at this and you broaden it out that it's maybe bullish for the market. You know, if you look at Apple, Amazon, Metta, Microsoft, Tesla, they're all underperforming the S&P 500 year to date, right? And then if you look at some of these other names, Mac was talking about this on the prior program. You know, you've seen storage, you see memory, some of these things have kind of joined the party. But maybe that's kind of late stage if you think about the enthusiasm in and around the trade. Maybe we've gotten to a point where there is some skill, skepticism, skepticism about the ability to continue this capex at the pace despite all of these companies that just guided that capex higher. So again, you know, to me I think it could be viewed as a bullish thing that you're seeing a broadening out away from some of these names that have been huge, huge contributors to the growth of The S&P 500, not just on earnings but also performance.
Brian Sullivan
All in the meantime, Wedbush securities today out with its top tech names to own into next year. Among them Microsoft, Apple, Tesla, Palantir, CrowdStrike. One name that you're not seeing on that list in video. Dan Ives, behind the call. He is the global head of technology research. And I have to issue the biggest correction in the history of my career, which is now that you're in the light that that jacket is not McLaren Papaya. It is, I would dare say, Peach.
Dan Ives
I look, I mean, I'll take both sides again, you never.
Brian Sullivan
That vital correction now aside, why is Nvidia not on your tech names to own next year?
Dan Ives
Well, it's still, I mean still in our Ives a 30, a top tech name. But ultimately to me, in terms of the five that stick out, it's really about how do you play the revolution on the hyperscaler, how do you play it on the consumer in terms of Apple, how do you play it on, on enterprise names like Palantir, CrowdStrike, Cybersecurity? Brian, I view it as like Nvidia. There's only one godfather of AI Jensen. We'll see him next week at ces. But the derivatives, the second, third, fourth just starting, which is why we're so bullish in tech.
Guy Adami
You're in the hall of fame regardless of color. Although Oscar Piastri just emailed me and mentioned that he actually thinks the color is a McLaren Papaya.
Carter Worth
There you go.
Guy Adami
From with that said Palantir, what are their revenues need to be? They're going to do six and a half billion dollars revenue next year to justify a half a trillion dollar valuation. In your opinion?
Dan Ives
Yeah, look, I mean to me and we've talked about it a bunch, it's ultimately, it's the commercial business that I believe could ultimately be 2, 3 billion. When I see it playing out, I think when you actually do the trajectory here, I think numbers where you see for Palantir in 2026, I think they ultimately double over the next three to four years. And it speaks to the point, super expensive stock today. But I just view it, I think it's a trillion dollar valuation in the next two or three years as the AI revolution plays out.
Steve Grasso
So everyone knows you for these marquee names. And when you go into ces, what I always look at are a portfolio of names that are going to shock people, something that shows up. If you, if you, if you search anything with ces, you'll see robotics come up. What are the names you see with you meet with everyone, both private and public companies. What companies are going to a be there and have impressed you already?
Dan Ives
Yeah, I think when it comes to robotics, I think maybe like off the radar name that we're bullish. So serve like survey. When you look what they're doing on robotics on the delivery side, what I view is actually true autonomous playing out. They'll be there front and center. And look, Steve, to me it's really like the top autonomous is going to be front and center here. It starts with Jensen's going to lay out. But this speaks to autonomous robotic robotics is going to be key to what I view as one of the. And that's one of the core names.
Dan Nathan
All right, Dan, talk to us about RPOs. Not the run pass option. This is remaining purchase obligations here. Not something that I think a lot of folks were talking about too much until this summer when we saw, you know, that huge open air contract with Oracle and a lot of investors were really excited. And you know, as an analyst though, you see this big number, right? You see a $500 billion purchase obligation. How do you like Think about that. It's not in your numbers, right. But it helps kind of formulate how you're thinking about future revenue. Like to me the market called BS on this with Oracle and how do you think about it? Is this something we're going to see? Maybe some of these contracts not come.
Dan Ives
To fruition and I think we sit here a year from now. I think actually one of the names that's going to stick out is, is sort of the renaissance that's going to happen Oracle. Because to me when I look at what's happening, where they play from the stack play, where they play in terms of a revolution and I think investors are wrong to call out that this rpo, what I've ultimately reacceleration of growth that's going to go from 18% to 30% to 45%. I think 80 and 90% of that gets done. So to me, would I take out 5% debt if I had 100% chance to ultimately do what they could do?
Bonnie Glick
Yeah.
Dan Ives
And I think that's what they're doing. I think that's why Oracle, to me right here, it's a 78 hour upside, $15 downside risk reward.
Brian Sullivan
The risk reward certainly skewed to the upside. Dan Ives, always love seeing you.
Dan Ives
Great to be here.
Brian Sullivan
That's a beautiful peach colored jacket, Dan. Thank you Bonoin.
Dan Ives
Thank you.
Bonnie Glick
Well listen, I think Dan has always been on the front and center in terms of seeing what people can't see. The thesis that's not necessarily within the numbers as you see them to date. And I think when it comes to robotics and AI and now we're kind of seeing the transition to inference as kind of signaled by Nvidia's purchase of Grok or sorry licensing of Grok. And we make sure I don't use the wrong word here. I think he's kind of stayed on the forefront there. I think the case for Oracle is a little bit tougher for me to get my head around. But I can see a scenario in which you look up six months a year from now and you say my goodness, that really would have been an awesome opportunity for me to kind of pick up this stock after it had completely round trip and then it's trading to a discount to where it had established itself prior to the debt concern. So listen, I think he's been on top of it. I have long kind of pushed back, I think a lot of us have against the Tesla narrative, but that has proven to be right. And the fact that it's now being valued as A robotics company, a self driving company. And we talked about GM earlier, but Tesla is completely decoupled from what it is as a car company. So I think he's been on top of this.
Brian Sullivan
Good stuff. Yeah, I think the Oracle debate is probably going to be one of the big stories heading into the new year as well. Coming up, pending home sales made a big jump in November, but homebuilding stocks continue to go down. Why talk about coming up. Alright, got some new signs of a thaw in the housing market. Pending home sales jumping to their highest level in nearly three years in November. Let's get more now on the housing market with Diana Olek in Washington. Diana?
Julia Boorstin
Well, Brian, pending home sales in November, as you said, came in much better than expected. Up over 3% from October and over 2% from a year ago. The best showing in fact of this year. Now these pending sales are based on signed contracts. So it's an indicator of future sales. Homebuilder stocks though are getting nothing from today's better than expected report on those pending sales. But you can see the homebuilding ETF ITB is down on the day following the broader markets. Big names like Lennar Pulte and Dr. Horton all off around 1% on the day. The builders are much more sensitive to mortgage rate moves which we did not get today. And to the broader economy right now. Also a win for the existing homes market. While it does show more buyer demand does not necessarily translate to new homes which are more expensive, it also shows the existing market now getting more competitive again. The builders had actually been benefiting from slower resales because they didn't have that competition. Brian.
Brian Sullivan
Diana, look in D.C. and by the way, check out Diana's newsletter, Property Play. Diana, thank you very much. To Diana's point, Steve, some of these stocks have been just awful the last couple of months.
Steve Grasso
They had a bunch of buy downs, right? For the mortgage rates. You need mortgage rates to come substantially lower.
Dan Ives
You need.
Steve Grasso
Most people have a mortgage rate. I bet you your mortgage rate, if you have one, big guy. I think the mortgage rate is probably around three and a half. That would be my guess, right? Lower. All right, sorry. So you need mortgage rates to come, come below five and a half.
Brian Sullivan
That talked about it every day, but I'm the guy that forgot to do something. I was too busy talking about it. My mortgage rates like 14%.
Guy Adami
That's impossible.
Brian Sullivan
It was.
Steve Grasso
You bought your house during the Carter administration?
Guy Adami
No.
Steve Grasso
No. So, so you need, you need a mortgage rate. You need a mortgage rate below five and a half percent. We still have a ways to go there. We've seen existing home sales lag new home sales and now you're starting to see that level out. I would still be a buyer of the homebuilders here. I think rates are coming down. They will benefit.
Brian Sullivan
Well, we've cut rates three times in a year and yet mortgage rates have done what? Guy Domi Nothing. The same. Basically the same place the they were a year ago.
Guy Adami
That's the police coming to get you.
Brian Sullivan
For now, that's the mortgage rate police.
Guy Adami
You know what a lot of people may not realize all the four names we talk about, Dhi, Pulte, Toll Brothers, Lennar, they all topped out in November of 2024 and they've been trading lower. Decided was ever since Paul Picharnell and nar, if you want to see one that's completely underperformed. And I think, listen, we can debate whether or not interest rates are going up or down, mortgage rates. I don't think it's about that. I think it's about the unemployment rate and that's the definitely.
Brian Sullivan
You don't think it's about that. You don't think if mortgage rates fell a percent, those stocks are going to take off?
Guy Adami
No, I think the unemployment rate's a bigger deal right now. I mean, people will say that. First of all, I don't think that's going to happen in terms of mortgage rates. Let me be crystal clear. I think if that were to happen, maybe get a knee jerk bounce until people realize, wait a second, maybe there's something else going on here. And if the unemployment rate continues to tick higher, homebuilders continue to tick lower.
Brian Sullivan
All right, good discussion there. We have another one coming up after the break. We're going to talk about Netflix. Why can't it catch a bid the last couple of months? We're gonna talk about it. You've seen stranger things. I have.
Guy Adami
A lot of people are hating on it. I'm not one of them.
Brian Sullivan
We're back right after this. Say counting crows for Netflix because they're having a long December.
Guy Adami
Nice.
Brian Sullivan
The streamer sliding more than 8% since announcing it wanted to buy pieces of Warner Brothers Discovery earlier this month. For the year, Netflix up only but by about 5%. Bottle. And you mentioned this round trip for the stock on our midday call.
Bonnie Glick
Why? Yeah, well, because I think a lot of the attention right now is being spent on the hyperscalers. I guess Netflix is within the max seven. But that trade and I think the rotation that we're seeing out of technology and out of high beta is more than just that. And so I think as long as you continue to see this momentum where you're kind of seeing money flowing into that industrial complex, Netflix is kind of somewhat emblematic of that rotation, I think. I listen, this is a very fundamentally sound company. I just think it's at this point where it's now a mature compounder. And until we see some type of reacceleration in either margin or free cash flow, there's going to be some rerating here. And I do think this is likely going to be an opportunity to get it. But that's what's going on with Netflix, in my opinion.
Dan Nathan
Yeah, you could make the argument long before this bid that, you know, Netflix had something fundamental going on, Spotify had been trading the exact same way. Maybe it had something to do with the union economics, maybe it had something to do with the saturation here in the US because both these charts, if you overlay them, they look almost identical. And Spotify didn't even make a $80 billion bid for another company. That might even highlight maybe some of those weaknesses we're talking about fundamentally. So to me, I think if Netflix does not get Warner, I think you buy it with two hands. And I think Spotify is getting pretty cheap here too.
Brian Sullivan
All right, look at them both go. All right, up next, it is your final trades. Exactly one minute for final trades. Kick it off. Steve Grasso.
Steve Grasso
There was a name that Dan Ives mentioned. It was Serve Robotics.
Brian Sullivan
It's been under pressure this year.
Steve Grasso
It's down 27% percent year to date.
Brian Sullivan
He mentioned it.
Steve Grasso
There they are presenting at CES Serve Robotics.
Brian Sullivan
Bonwick.
Bonnie Glick
I know sometimes this company has a tendency softbank to top tick the market, but I do think you can get some directional bias from them that is actually quite accurate. If you're looking at the the AI infrastructure play, look at Vertiv VRT virtu.
Dan Nathan
It's also worth noting SoftBank is down nearly 30% since it sold its entire Nvidia state a couple months ago.
Dan Ives
Interesting.
Brian Sullivan
That's not your final thing.
Dan Nathan
Spotify, Netflix start to look interesting here.
Guy Adami
Jason Coleman will be performing Wednesday evening, but he was also spinning some chaperone before the Pink Pony Club. ExxonMobil.
Brian Sullivan
Brian Exom going up even as oil goes down. Thanks for watching Fast Money. We'll see you tomorrow. Mad Money starts right now.
Julia Boorstin
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Podcast: CNBC's Fast Money
Episode: "AI & Metals Fever Breaking?... And Top Tech Picks For The New Year"
Date: December 29, 2025
Host: Brian Sullivan (in for Melissa Lee), with traders Steve Grasso, Bono(n) Ison, Guy Adami, Dan Nathan
Notable Guest: Dan Ives, Wedbush Securities
This episode dives into whether the explosive rallies in both AI-linked stocks and precious metals like gold and silver are starting to cool off. The traders debate what’s behind the sharp reversals in metals, implications for tech investing in 2026, the evolving risk profile of China tech names, dollar stores’ surges, and General Motors’ breakout year. Dan Ives joins to reveal his top tech picks for the new year—and notably, which prominent name he left off the list.
[01:02 - 15:29]
[15:29 - 20:13]
[22:16 - 25:49]
[27:12 - 30:49]
[31:50 - 38:55]
[38:55 - 42:22]
[42:34 - 44:17]
[44:34 - 45:23]
The episode is brisk, insightful, and laced with trademark Wall Street banter. The roundtable balances technical and fundamental analysis while weaving in wit (and a few sports jokes). Dan Ives brings bullish excitement on AI, while the rest of the desk offers a slightly more cautious, seasoned perspective on trades ranging from precious metals to China tech.
This summary captures all actionable discussion, memorable moments, and top soundbites—perfect for those who missed the show or need a refresher for investment decisions as 2026 kicks off.