Positioning for Big Tech's Next Move 8/12/26

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**SPEAKER_2** (0:26)
The board recommends approving.

**Joe Terranova** (0:27)
Regarding that seat on the committee, we're promoting.

**SPEAKER_4** (0:29)
To boost quarterly earnings.

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**Scott Wapner** (0:56)
I'm Scott Wapner and you're listening to CNBC's Halftime Report, the podcast, the most profitable hour of the trading day. We record this live weekdays at 12 Eastern. Listen in.
Carl, thanks. Welcome to the Halftime Report. I'm Scott Wapner, front and center this hour. Food for the bulls. The CPI hits in line, yields down, core weaves surging after earnings. Trade the markets with the Investment Committee. Joining me for the hour today, Joe Terranova, Shannon Sikosha, Brian Belsky, Brent Tocquegton. Check the markets here. Green across the board today. So a little bit of relief, obviously, after the CPI print. Certainly the AI bulls getting a nice lift from Supermicro and CoreWeave, the beats, the raises, et cetera. And Ed Yardeni goes to 8,400 now on the S&P. 8,250 was the prior target, which at the time, he said, could be a little conservative. All right, so the words, then the action. So he raises it, says, quote, we've never seen consensus earnings expectations rise so quickly for the current and coming years as they have since mid 2025 The result has been an earnings led melt up in the stock market to record highs.
That's where we find ourselves. There's no reason to think that that's going to change as long as the earnings picture remains what it is.

**Joe Terranova** (2:12)
No, and congratulations to Ed on calling the 20s for exactly what it is. It is the roaring 20s, specifically attributable to the earnings growth. Now, Ed is the highest on the street. If you look at the S&P targets, the actual consensus price is $78.45. But we're looking now at taking profit margins towards 17%, which is absolutely staggering if you think about where they were just five, six years ago, kind of wallowing around 10%.
The earnings growth is the driving force for sure.
Ed right now is the highest on the street. And I think what we will benefit from is continued participation as we move higher from the systematic funds. We're kind of sitting in place right now off of this 3% gain that we've had in the month of August, really strong out of the gates. But I'll tell you what, we break out above that August 5th, 77.93 high. I expect systematic to engage further and move the market towards 8,000.

**Scott Wapner** (3:10)
Okay, so I mentioned, you know, obviously you get the news that you really needed, Bryn, today. Does the Yardeni target sound reasonable now to you? Because I said yesterday, I think 8,000 is the floor. It feels like it from the street, at least. Everybody's gotten now to at least 8,000, or certainly most people are getting there. And now he ups the ante at 8,400 because of this FIMO, right? Not FOMO, FIMO. It's the earnings-led momentum.

**Brian Belsky** (3:37)
So I typically ignore year-end price targets. That being said, Ed's been doing this for decades. He has a very good track record. And so I think directionally, what he's saying makes so much sense because you also have to think about how the construct of the S&P and the NASDAQ or for the S&P for earnings has changed so much. So yes, NVIDIA is still the number one holding in the S&P, but now Broadcom and Micron are also in the top 10
Obviously Broadcom has been there for a minute, but Micron's now broken to, I think it's like number seven or eight position. And those earnings from those three companies are going to continue just to be monster. And so I think if you are looking at earnings from these specific companies, especially the Micron and NVIDIA, you can math out very easily why his number at 8,400 like sounds plausible. And so I do think investors do need to understand that huge shift of the in the Constitution of the S&P and the NASDAQ has changed, which is going to continue to push those earnings growth numbers higher.