Lockheed Martin, Alphabet, Valero Energy, and Others Featured in CNBC's 'Final Trades'
Market Dynamics: The technology and defense sectors are attracting investor interest, with key players making strategic moves that impact market dynamics and growth forecasts.
Alphabet Inc. Performance: Alphabet Inc. reached an all-time high, driven by advancements in artificial intelligence and cloud computing, alongside a favorable macroeconomic environment.
Stock Recommendations: Analysts recommend stocks such as Lockheed Martin, iShares Global Comm Services ETF, and Valero Energy, with Valero reporting strong second-quarter earnings that exceeded analyst expectations.
Price Movements: On Monday, shares of Alphabet rose 1.2% to $208.49, Lockheed Martin increased by 0.3% to $447.72, and Valero Energy also gained 1.2%, closing at $147.11.
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- Primary Loss: Congressman Dan Crenshaw lost his primary race against Texas State Rep. Steve Toth on Tuesday, which means he will exit Congress in January 2027; while this is bad news for him, his trading activity shows strong profitability.
- Trading Activity Review: Once a top trader in Congress in 2021 and 2022, Crenshaw has not actively bought or sold stocks in recent years, but his latest stock purchases, as of May 2025 filings, are all up, with several of the Magnificent Seven stocks rising over 180% since 2022.
- ETF Trading Halt: Crenshaw has not purchased any ETFs since 2023 or stocks since 2022, and while he was once recognized as one of Congress's best traders, investors will no longer be able to track his trading activity after he leaves the House, potentially impacting market interest in his investment strategies.
- Uncertain Future: Crenshaw has not announced his plans after leaving Congress, and given his past trading performance, he may turn to the financial sector, but this also means he will no longer be legally required to disclose trades.
- Money Flow Analysis: In early trading, positive money flows were observed in major stocks like Amazon, Meta, NVIDIA, and Tesla, indicating strong investor interest that could drive overall market gains.
- Bitcoin Market Dynamics: Bitcoin surged above $70K due to aggressive buying linked to Iran outreach, highlighting its nature as a speculative risk asset rather than a traditional hedge, which may attract more speculative investors.
- Crude Oil Inventory Changes: API reported a build of 5.6 million barrels in crude oil inventories, significantly exceeding the expected 2.2 million barrels, which may lead to price volatility and impact related energy stocks, necessitating investor vigilance.
- Investment Strategy Recommendations: Investors are advised to maintain long-term quality positions while tactically adding based on market signals to navigate current uncertainties and capitalize on emerging opportunities.
- Stable Market Share: Google Search maintained a market share of 90.01% as of February 2026, demonstrating its strong competitive position despite the emergence of new AI search engines like Perplexity, which failed to make a dent in its dominance.
- Waymo's Deployment Leadership: Google's subsidiary Waymo launched autonomous driving services in five major U.S. cities and plans to expand to more, significantly outpacing Tesla's Robotaxi service, highlighting Google's technological edge and first-mover advantage in the autonomous driving sector.
- Surging Capital Expenditures: Google plans to increase its capital expenditures to between $175 billion and $185 billion in 2025, a substantial rise from last year's $91 billion, primarily for data center expansion and future innovations, reflecting the company's strong commitment to long-term growth.
- Innovations in Drug Discovery: Google is leveraging AI to accelerate drug discovery, particularly in treating currently incurable diseases, indicating its potential transformative impact on global health and the company's strategic focus on healthcare advancements.
- Meta Chip Development Canceled: Meta has canceled the development of its most advanced custom AI chips due to design complexities, which will shift its focus to simpler versions, impacting its AI model training capabilities and highlighting challenges in AI hardware development.
- Amazon's AI Model Plans: Amazon is planning to develop AI models using its custom chips, which could significantly reduce costs if successful, indicating its strategic positioning in the AI space while also hedging its bets with investments in OpenAI and Anthropic.
- Alphabet's Technological Edge: Alphabet's Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) have reached their seventh generation and are widely used for internal workloads, showcasing its leading position in the AI chip market, attracting companies like Meta, Anthropic, and Apple to rent its TPUs.
- Capital Expenditure Plans: Alphabet plans to invest $175 billion to $185 billion in AI data centers, which is expected to further solidify its competitive advantage in the AI market, especially when compared to competitors relying on Nvidia GPUs, demonstrating a higher return on investment.
- Meta's Chip Development Failure: Meta has scrapped its most advanced custom AI chip development, highlighting the significant design challenges it faces, which diminishes its competitive edge in training AI models despite collaboration with Broadcom.
- Amazon's AI Strategy: Amazon plans to develop AI models using its custom chips, which could significantly reduce costs; however, its substantial investments of $50 billion in OpenAI and Anthropic indicate a diversified approach in the AI sector.
- Alphabet's Technological Edge: Alphabet's Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) have reached their seventh generation and have been battle-tested over a decade, making them the preferred choice for several AI companies, underscoring Alphabet's leading position in the AI chip market.
- Capital Expenditure Plans: Alphabet intends to allocate $175 billion to $185 billion for capital expenditures related to AI data centers, demonstrating its long-term commitment to AI investment while indicating a cost advantage over competitors relying on Nvidia's GPUs.
- Apple's New Laptop Launch: Apple has introduced its most affordable laptop model amidst rising memory costs.
- Market Context: The launch comes as competitors are increasing their prices, positioning Apple strategically in the market.









