U.S. stocks have been rather volatile in the past month, but in the past week they had a strong run on hopes of rate cuts. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had its fourth consecutive winning session on Monday, and the S & P 500 also climbed for the past four days. Tech stocks, which would be boosted by rate cuts, have been a big part of that rally — with Meta , Alphabet and Amazon in particular having a strong showing over the past couple of weeks. “Any shift in investor expectations around the Fed’s path to rate cuts and the fluid situation in the Middle East may inject further volatility,” UBS said in a May 6 note. “But ahead of the next catalysts, including Nvidia’s results and major industry conferences, we are encouraged by many positives in tech fundamentals during the first-quarter reporting season, which in our view continue to support the investment case for generative artificial intelligence,” it added. Elsewhere, analysts are getting more optimistic on China stocks, especially those in the tech sector. China has rebounded from a lengthy slump and Bernstein believes the rebound has further to go — largely through its growth stocks. “We are positive on chasing momentum stocks across the region including within the tech sector,” it said in a May 3 note. Kevin Liu, managing director and strategist at CICC Research, said his conviction call would be a structural barbell allocation with themes including tech names “with high-end upgrading opportunities,” among others. A barbell strategy involves investing in both ends of the spectrum — low-risk and high-risk securities. Stock screen Against this backdrop, CNBC Pro screened FactSet for stocks from four exchange-traded funds (KraneShares CSI China Internet ETF, Vanguard Information Technology ETF, Invesco China Technology ETF and the iShares MSCI China Multisector Tech ETF) to find stocks that: have beaten the S & P 500’s around 9% year-to-date performance. have been given more than 20% upside by analysts. are covered by six analysts or more. have received a buy rating from at least half of analysts. These stocks showed up in the screen:
