To beat the market in recent years, many investors implemented a simple strategy: Load up on the biggest U.S. technology stocks. It paid off well in the long run. But this did not happen last year. For the first time since 2022, when the Federal Reserve began raising interest rates, most of the Magnificent 7 tech giants—Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Meta Platform, Alphabet, Amazon, and Tesla—underperformed the S&P index. While the Bloomberg Magnificent 7 Index rose 25% in 2025, compared with 16% for the S&P, this was only due to huge gains by Alphabet Inc and Nvidia Corp. Many Wall Street professionals expect this dynamic to continue into 2026, as profit growth slows and questions grow about the payoff from huge AI spending. So far they have been right, with the Magnificent 7 index up just 0.5% at the start of the year and the S&S up 1.8%. It is important to suddenly pick stocks within the group. “This is not a one-size-fits-all market,” said Jack Jansiewicz, chief portfolio strategist at Natixis Investment Managers Solutions, which has $1.4 trillion in assets. bloomberg