S&P 500 Notches Nine Straight Weeks of Gains as AI Stocks Leave the Rest Behind

Benzinga reported Tuesday that the S&P 500 winning streak has reached nine consecutive weekly closes in positive territory. That milestone has occurred only ten times since the index’s modern formation in 1957.

A Rally With Very Few Peers in Market History

The run has been historically fast as well as historically long. Over an eight-week window ending in late May, the S&P 500 gained 17.3%. That ranks as the second-best eight-week advance the index has ever recorded. The momentum carried into early June, when the index posted its longest daily winning streak in more than a year. All three major benchmarks — the S&P 500, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, and the Nasdaq Composite — simultaneously hit fresh all-time highs for five sessions straight. According to Benzinga, that triple-record streak had not been seen since February 2017.

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One Engine Is Doing All the Work

The rally’s composition is stark. Jay Hatfield, chief executive and portfolio manager at Infrastructure Capital Advisors, told the Wall Street Journal that the market’s breadth is dangerously narrow. “It’s all about tech. It’s thankless to own the other sectors now,” Hatfield said. “Everything that’s working is AI-related.” Energy, industrials, financials, and consumer staples have broadly struggled to keep pace. Investors rotating away from AI-adjacent names have found little reward. The result is a market where diversification has, at least temporarily, become a drag on performance rather than a buffer.

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What History Says About What Comes Next

Historical precedent after such streaks is broadly encouraging. Benzinga noted that comparable winning-streak episodes have preceded average 12-month S&P 500 returns of between 10% and 16%. But the near-term picture carries real risks. The index is currently priced at 21.2 times forward earnings, a premium valuation that leaves little room for error. Geopolitical disruptions to global energy supply are already putting upward pressure on inflation. If price pressures force the Federal Reserve into an unexpected rate-hike pivot later this year, analysts warn a sharp pullback could follow quickly.

Year-to-date, the S&P 500 has advanced 10.95%, the Nasdaq is up 16.60%, and the Dow has gained 6.05%. The gap between tech-heavy and diversified exposure has rarely been more visible.

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