Michael Nagle / Bloomberg via Getty Images
Economists and consumers are all antsy. Wall Street analysts have a bullish outlook.
Of the 12,320 analyst ratings on S&P 500 stocks, 55.7% of them are Buy ratings, according to a recent report from FactSet Research. If this holds through the month’s end, it will be the highest percentage of Buy ratings at the month-end since August 2022.
Another read: According to FactSet the share of buy ratings is currently higher than its 5-year median (55%), whereas the shares of hold and sell ratings are lower than their 5-year medians (39.1% et 5.9%, respective).
The S&P 500 fell into a correction last week amid growing concerns about the Trump administration’s tariff policies and the potential they’ll raise prices and slow economic growth. President Trump and his aides have fueled market anxiety by repeatedly acknowledging tariffs could cause economic pain but will still implement them.
Big tech stocks have been hit particularly hard this year: The Magnificent Seven, for example, fell into a correction weeks before the S&P 500. They remain among the stocks that analysts are most bullish about.
Microsoft (MSFT), Amazon (AMZN), and Nvidia (NVDA) are the S&P 500’s fourth, fifth, and sixth highest-rated stocks, respectively. 95 percent of analyst reviews on Microsoft and Amazon stock are Buys. That’s just a bit more than Nvidia (93%) shares. FactSet’s calculations show that not a single Wall Street analysts recommends selling the stocks.
The tech sector is the second-highest rated sector—63% of ratings are Buys—bested only by energy, with 65%. The consumer staples sector, which has historically been a defensive one that tends outperforms when investors expect a downturn, has the lowest proportion of Buy ratings (41%)
This discrepancy is in line with a recent Bank of America report that suggested investors bought cyclical stocks during the sell-off last week and sold defensives.
