🌡 TradingLab’s Headline Roundup

What a week. The most event-dense stretch of the entire year just delivered - and the market came out the other side at all-time highs.

The S&P 500 closed above 7,200 for the first time ever on Thursday, the Dow rallied 790 points, and the Nasdaq hit new records - all on the back of a Mag-7 earnings season that mostly delivered exactly what the bulls needed. Alphabet jumped 10%, reporting Q1 revenue of $109.9 billion against a $107 billion estimate. Amazon beat with $181.5 billion in revenue and AWS growth of $37.6 billion above expectations. Microsoft beat on EPS at $4.27 versus the $4.06 estimate. Meta beat on revenue at $56.31 billion but raised its full-year capex guidance to $125-145 billion - and got punished for it, falling 6.6% after hours. The AI revenue story is real. The AI spending story is getting more expensive by the quarter.

The Fed meeting was the other blockbuster of the week - and it came with a surprise. The FOMC voted 8-4 to hold rates at 3.5-3.75% - a dramatic split, with three of the four dissenters pushing to remove the easing bias from the statement entirely, signalling they have no interest in cutting rates. And then Powell closed his final press conference as Fed chair by congratulating Kevin Warsh and defending the Fed's independence with remarkable directness. An era is ending. The Warsh era begins May 15 - and that 8-4 split is a preview of exactly how messy things could get.

Oil remains the wildcard sitting underneath all of it. Brent briefly hit $126.41 a barrel on Thursday before settling at $114 - a four-year high - after Trump confirmed the Strait of Hormuz blockade will continue until Iran agrees to a nuclear deal. The market rallied anyway. For now, Big Tech earnings are doing the heavy lifting. But $105 oil doesn't stay quiet forever.

🏛️ Stock Markets

S&P 500 closes above 7,200 for the first time - April ends at all-time highs - The S&P 500 and Nasdaq posted their strongest monthly performances since 2020, with both indexes notching new record closing highs on Thursday. From war-correction lows to all-time highs in five weeks. Whatever your view on the macro, you have to respect that price action.
Alphabet surges 10% - the AI revenue story just got confirmed - Alphabet reported Q1 revenue of $109.9 billion against a $107 billion consensus, with EPS of $2.81 against the $2.63 estimate. Google Cloud's AI monetisation numbers directly neutralised the OpenAI revenue scare from Tuesday. One earnings call undid an entire market narrative.
Meta beats on revenue - then raises capex guidance and gets dumped - Meta reported Q1 revenue of $56.31 billion, beating the $55.5 billion consensus with EPS of $10.44, but raised its full-year capex outlook to $125-145 billion - and fell 6.6% in after-hours trading. Beat the number. Scared the market with the spend. Classic Meta.
Powell's final press conference - and he went out swinging - The FOMC voted 8-4 to hold rates, with three of the four dissenters pushing to remove the easing bias entirely. Powell used his final press conference to defend Fed independence, saying Trump's legal attacks had "left me no choice" but to resort to the courts. The most dramatic Fed exit in modern history. Kevin Warsh takes over May 15.
Apple beats after hours - iPhone strong, China back - Apple shares jumped roughly 3% in after-hours trading after delivering better-than-expected fiscal second-quarter results, with strong iPhone sales and growth in China. The new CEO transition clearly hasn't spooked investors. Tim Cook going out on a beat.
Caterpillar pops 10% - the global economy isn't broken - Caterpillar shares jumped nearly 10% on Thursday after reporting better-than-expected quarterly results and raising its annual revenue outlook. CAT is the closest thing markets have to a real-world economic health check. When it beats and raises, you pay attention.
Qualcomm surges 16% on a surprise hyperscaler deal - Qualcomm shares surged 16% after reporting a Q2 earnings beat and revealing a new custom silicon program with a major hyperscaler - sending the stock from red to green after hours despite analysts knowing few details about the deal. A mystery hyperscaler deal that nobody can explain yet. The market doesn't care - it's buying first and asking questions later.
Brent hits $126 intraday - Trump confirms blockade continues until nuclear deal - The Brent crude contract for June hit $126.41 a barrel - a four-year high - before settling at $114, after Trump confirmed the Strait of Hormuz blockade will continue until Iran agrees to a nuclear deal. The market rallied despite this. That can't last indefinitely.
Robinhood and SoFi both crater on earnings misses - Robinhood fell more than 14% after top- and bottom-line misses, while SoFi Technologies dropped nearly 14% after its Q1 results. When retail-facing fintech misses, it tells you something about the health of the everyday trader. Worth watching.

₿ Crypto

Bitcoin holds above $77K - S&P at all-time highs is a tailwind - S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures climbed 0.2% on Friday after both indexes closed at all-time highs Thursday, with Apple advancing in extended trading. When equities are at records, crypto tends to follow. BTC at $77K with this backdrop is the floor holding - not a ceiling.
Strategy Q1 earnings land May 5 - 713,502 BTC on the books - Strategy reports Q1 2026 earnings on May 5. The company ended 2025 holding approximately 713,502 BTC under fair-value accounting, meaning quarterly Bitcoin price movements flow directly through to reported earnings and book value. The most watched corporate Bitcoin treasury update of the year. Accumulation commentary is the only number that matters on that call.
ISM Manufacturing PMI prints today - first post-FOMC activity signal - ISM Manufacturing PMI for April prints today at 10am Eastern, providing the first activity survey data post-FOMC and post-GDP - and crypto traders will be watching for any signal on growth momentum that could shift the Fed's posture heading into June. Boring name. Potentially market-moving number. Keep an eye on it.
The Warsh era begins May 15 - crypto's unknown variable just became very real - Powell's final press conference is done. Kevin Warsh, consensus-dovish on rates but hawkish on the $7 trillion balance sheet, takes the chair on May 15. A steeper yield curve, tighter liquidity, and a Fed chair with no track record in this role. For crypto, that's the macro uncertainty that doesn't go away just because Alphabet beat.

A gov't lab in Tennessee may be building AI a trillion times stronger than ChatGPT. Louis Navellier is sharing the one stock to watch. Get the Name Free.

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PLTR Is Down 20% YTD - But the Pentagon Just Changed the Game (And Earnings Hit Monday)

Let's not sugarcoat it: Palantir (PLTR) has been a pain trade in 2026.

Down ~20% YTD. Forward P/E sitting at 104. P/S of 45. Every bear on FinTwit has been waiting to dance on this stock's grave, and honestly? The valuation argument hasn't been wrong.

But while retail was busy revenge-shorting the bounces, the setup quietly shifted. And with PLTR's investor update dropping Monday, May 4, this name just became one of the most important tickers on every serious trader's watchlist.

Here's what changed.

The $1.5 Trillion Catalyst Nobody's Pricing In

The Trump administration just proposed a $1.5 trillion defense budget for 2027 - a 50% jump from 2026's ~$1T spend.

Inside that budget: $2.3B earmarked for Palantir's Maven Smart System over five years. And the bigger story buried in the Pentagon memo - Maven is being elevated to an "official program of record."

In plain English: long-term, locked-in government revenue. The kind of recurring contract base that built Lockheed and RTX into trillion-dollar defense empires.

That's stacked on top of PLTR's existing $10B Army contract, which already consolidated 75 separate deals into one flexible package.

This isn't story-stock fluff. This is structural revenue.

The Numbers (Because Hopium Doesn't Pay Bills)

Forget the narrative. Look at what's actually happening on the income statement:

Revenue: $608M (Q4 '23) → $1.41B (Q4 '25) = +130% in two years
Net income: $79M → $608.7M YoY = +670%
US commercial revenue: $214M → $507M YoY = +137%
180 deals closed in Q4 alone, each worth $1M+
Gross margin: 82%

This isn't a meme stock with a story anymore. This is a vendor with growing pricing power, fat margins, and one of the stickiest customer bases in tech.

The Bear Case (We're Not Here to Shill)

We're not telling you to YOLO into Monday's print. The setup has real risk:

Valuation is still nosebleed by every traditional metric
May 4 is a binary catalyst - could go either way
One soft commercial guide and we're back testing $105
"Proposed budget" ≠ "approved budget" - Congress still has to bless it
A 52-week range of $105–$207 tells you exactly how violent this name can move

If you're trading this without a defined risk plan, you're not trading. You're gambling.

How We're Trading It Inside TradingLab Premium

PLTR has been on our members' radar since the recent flush. We've mapped the key levels, the invalidation, and the asymmetric risk/reward setup heading into Monday's catalyst.

Members get:

The exact entry, stop, and target levels - not vibes
Live commentary through the May 4 event
Position sizing frameworks so one bad print doesn't end your year
A community of traders actually putting size on, not just chart-posting from the sidelines

👉 See This Week's PLTR Setup Inside TradingLab Premium

Real Talk

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The market doesn't care about your feelings. Your strategy needs to.

- The TradingLab Team