These companies could follow Nvidia's lead with AI driving rapid sales growth

By Philip van Doorn

Also: The scorching IPO market, an IRA problem you wish you had, and your residential real-estate questions answered

This week, companies announced contract signings that signaled sustained large and sustained increases in revenue from services to companies developing generative-artificial-intelligence technology. Investors love to look ahead, and the announcements caused share prices to rocket.

Nebius Group NV (NBIS) said it would be paid at least $17.4 billion through 2031 under a new contract to provide services that would enable Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) to meet increasing demand for its Azure cloud services. The announcement sent Nebius's stock up 49% on Tuesday.

One fascinating element of the deal was that Nebius's own financing would enable Microsoft to avoid making another large capital expenditure. Here's how this type of arrangement can help companies like Nebius and CoreWeave to boost the flow of contract signings by AI hyperscalers.

Oracle Corp. (ORCL) had big news for investors on Tuesday, when Chief Executive Safra Catz estimated that its sales for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure would increase 77% during the current fiscal year to $18 billion, and balloon over the following four years to an annual figure of $144 billion.

Read: Oracle's stock just did something never before seen on Wall Street. Inside that historic move.

Analysts reacted to Oracle's announcement by raising their sales estimates for the company. Looking far ahead, here's a list of companies in the S&P 500 whose consensus sales estimates for calendar 2028 have increased the most since June 30.

The IPO market is still hot - and risky

Let's begin with a price chart for CoreWeave Inc. (CRWV), whose shares began trading on March 28, at an initial public offering price of $40:

CoreWeave's stock began trading on March 28, after its initial public offering was priced at $40 a share.

The stock hit an intraday high of $187 on June 20, after which it fell as low as $84.40 on Sept. 5. That made for a peak-to-trough decline of 55%. But on the coattails of this week's announcements from Nebius and Oracle, CoreWeave's stock closed at $112.69 on Thursday, for a 182% gain from its initial-public-offering price.

Read: CoreWeave's stock has surged 38% in four days. Why investors might be getting ahead of themselves.

Investors waited all week for Friday's IPO of Gemini Space Station Inc. (GEMI), a digital-currency exchange founded by Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss. High demand caused the stock to soar 25% past its $28 IPO price in afternoon trading. The Winklevoss Twins will make at least $2 billion off the IPO, and maybe much more based on early trading action for the stock.

This week brought more IPO action with mixed results:

-- Figure Technology's stock sizzles after IPO, as investors stay hungry for crypto deals

-- Klarna's stock loses some steam in post-IPO debut, as traders gain access to fresh play on fintech

-- Klarna goes public as more people say buy-now-pay-later is the only way they can afford to buy things

An IRA problem that may not be so bad

Beth Pinsker writes the Fix My Portfolio column. A frequent topic has been the difference between traditional IRA and Roth IRA accounts. A traditional IRA, or an employer-sponsored retirement account such as a 401(k) or 403(b), is funded with pretax money - which means you avoid paying taxes on money you contribute that year, but your eventual withdrawals will be fully taxable. With a Roth account, you contribute after-tax money and never pay income taxes on money you withdraw from the account.

One strategy for people with traditional IRAs who are worried about how much income taxes they will pay when they retire is to convert some or all of an IRA balance to a Roth account, to take the tax hit sooner rather than later. Conversions can be done all at once or a bit at a time.

This week, Beth helped an 80-year-old retiree whose annual required minimum distribution on his $6 million IRA (to which lifetime contributions had totaled $600,000) comes to $300,000. That is a lot of money to pay taxes on. What can this retiree do now to limit the tax bill?

More from the Fix My Portfolio column:

-- I'm a teacher, and fees are eating up my retirement savings so much that I don't want to contribute anymore

-- Emma Heming Willis on moving husband Bruce Willis into a second home for dementia care: 'I know it raises eyebrows [but] you have to do what's right'

When should you sign up for Medicare?

This week in the Help Me Retire column, Alessandra Malito helped a 67-year-old reader who is still employed but was told by a friend that there could be a penalty for not signing up for Social Security on time. But what really matters when someone is planning to retire is to apply for Medicare in advance - here's how it works.

The Moneyist tackles estate-planning, inheritance and notions of fairness

Quentin Fottrell is The Moneyist.

Many of the questions MarketWatch readers submit to Quentin Fottrell - The Moneyist - center on estate-planning, trust and inheritance scenarios. Here are recent examples:

-- My parents promised to split their estate 50/50, but my mother gave my brother real estate. Is that fair?

-- 'He is increasingly angry': My troubled son lives with me. How do I ensure he is financially secure after I die?

-- 'It's keeping me up at night': My brother sold his share of the family farm and lost the rest in a divorce. He says I owe him.

-- I'm 67. My wife, 48, is financially illiterate. How do I teach her to manage our money? After all, I won't be around forever.

The state of the stock and bond markets - and what they indicate for the economy

What is good for one market may not be good for the other.

Joy Wiltermuth and Joseph Adinolfi explained why equity investors have remained exuberant despite the slowing economic indicators and declining long-duration bond yields, which also point to a lower pace of economic growth.

More: Investors are exuberant about stocks, bonds and gold. And that's not necessarily good.

Investors have been inspired by Warren Buffett's contrarian take on UnitedHealth

Shares of UnitedHealth Group Inc. (UNH) have fallen more than 28% this year, with dividends reinvested. But the stock has actually returned nearly 32% since Aug. 14, when Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.B) (BRK.A) disclosed that under the leadership of outgoing CEO Warren Buffett, it had purchased 5 million shares of UnitedHealth during the second quarter.

For background on this year's souring of investors on UNH before the Berkshire announcement, if you go to page 10 of the company's July 29 press release in which it announced its results for the second quarter, you can see that the company's second-quarter revenue increased 13% from the year-earlier quarter, but its operating expenses increased at a faster pace of 17%. And if you go to the figures for the first half of the year, revenue was up 11% from a year earlier, while operating expenses were up 13%.

Second-quarter earnings from operations were $5.15 billion, down 35% from $7.875 billion in the year-earlier quarter. For the first half of 2025, earnings from operations totaled $14.269 billion, down 10% from $15.806 billion during the first half of 2024.

On Tuesday, UnitedHealth's shares soared nearly 9%. Tomi Kilgore dug into the good news behind investors' renewed enthusiasm for the stock.

A seasonal strategy for stock traders

Mark Hulbert explained why large-cap stocks tend to outperform during the fourth quarter each year - and the reason for this tendency might surprise you.

For market timers: It's hard to predict a stock-market top, but two red flags have this analyst eyeing the eject button

Stock picks and a stock screen

Small-cap stocks have led the U.S. equity-market rally during the third quarter.

Every weekday morning, the Need to Know column features investing and trading ideas from professional money managers. You can sign up to have this information sent to your inbox early each day.

This week, Barbara Kollmeyer interviewed Josh Wein, who co-manages the Hennessy Cornerstone Growth Fund HICGX. The fund holds 50 stocks and leans toward small-cap companies - which, as you can see in the chart above, have taken the lead in the third quarter as U.S. stocks have continued to rally.

The managers of the Hennessy Cornerstone Growth Fund have a unique methodology that includes quality, momentum and value factors to set the portfolio up once a year. It has a five-star rating (the highest) from Morningstar and an excellent five-year performance record - with a total return of 162%, compared with returns of 112.5% for the S&P 500 SPX, 93% for the S&P MidCap 400 MID and 84% for the S&P Small Cap 600 SML, all with dividends reinvested.

Wein discussed three stocks held by the fund that he believes are good plays on current economic trends.

A screen: 20 stocks to consider if you want alternatives to the expensive S&P 500

Read this if you are interested in investing in autonomous cars

Long-term investors might expand beyond the current focus on Tesla Inc.'s (TSLA) robotaxis to think about how freight transportation will eventually be automated as well. Actually, this has already started with the testing of automated 18-wheelers in Texas.

Michael Brush dug into this trend and listed stocks for long-term investors to consider if they want to be early participants in autonomous trucks and tractors.

Related: Tesla is losing U.S. market share. And that's in the middle of an EV boom

Answers to MarketWatch readers' housing-market questions

Aarthi Swaminathan covers residential real estate. During a live Q&A event Friday, she answered MarketWatch readers' questions about the state of the housing market, which has been cooling off in many parts of the U.S.

More from Aarthi Swaminathan:

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