The early results are in and Wall Street strategists issuing 2025 forecasts see the S&P 500 (^GSPC) rally chugging along over the next 12 months.
But missing from their baseline calls is one of the most popular themes of the past 18 months in markets: artificial intelligence.
AI driving the market higher has been a hallmark of market calls dating back to the spring of 2023 when Nvidia's first blowout earnings report of the cycle kickstarted a roaring bull market rally.
On Monday, BMO Capital Markets chief investment strategist Brian Belski initiated a 2025 year-end target of 6,700 for the S&P 500. Meanwhile, Morgan Stanley chief investment officer Mike Wilson issued a 12-month target of 6,500.
Neither leaned too far into the impact of AI driving stocks higher — perhaps a sign of a maturing bull market — and instead, both discussed further broadening of the rally away from the tech-concentrated stock market of the past two years.
"We expect this broadening in earnings growth to continue as the Fed cuts rates into next year and business cycle indicators continue to improve," Wilson wrote.
Belski's work shows the market has already broadened, with 276 stocks outperforming the S&P 500 in the second half of 2024 — better than the 10-year average of 238 and above the number seen since the start of 2023.
At the surface this can lead to weaker gains for the index, as smaller gains in small companies make for smaller overall gains. Dating back to 1990, Belski found that when the top 100 stocks in the S&P 500 outperform, the index delivers an average annual return of 11.8% compared to the average return of 8% when those stocks underperform the index.
In other words, the returns aren't bad; they're just not as great as the ones investors have enjoyed for two years now.
To be clear, the idea that an AI-related fever could keep driving stock prices higher hasn't been forgotten among Wall Street strategists. Just two weeks ago, Evercore ISI's Julian Emanuel wrote that he sees the S&P 500 reaching 6,600 by June 2025 as "exuberance lies ahead" amid a "public reengaged in speculation."
Wilson did offer a bull case in which wide AI adoption juices margins — and pushes the flagship index near 7,400.
For any investor in the S&P 500, that of course sounds like an appealing scenario. But perhaps even more appealing is that strategists no longer need to rely on AI to explain why the market will keep moving higher. Even if AI doesn't show up to the party, Wall Street expects a good time.
It's a stark contrast from where things stood in 2023, when AI mentions first started littering S&P 500 target changes across Wall Street and the macro backdrop was much more bleak. Recession fears were still common among economists. The other 493 S&P 500 stocks were still in an earnings recession. And speculation around the Fed centered on how much more they'd hike interest rates, not cut them.
While those debates could resurface at any moment, we've made it to the other side of all those rungs on the wall of worry. And for now, Wilson's base case is driven by a backdrop where the broadening of earnings rolls on as the Fed cuts rates and business cycle indicators continue to improve.
source: finance.yahoo.com
