Nasdaq Nears a Record as Meta and AMD Surge
The Nasdaq Composite rose 2% on Monday, Sept. 21, 2026, to close near a record high. Meta (META) jumped 11% and AMD (AMD) gained 8%. Yahoo Finance
Many stocks took part, not just the leaders. The Nasdaq-100, which tracks the 100 largest non-financial companies listed on Nasdaq, rose 4.2% in August for its best August since 2021. Nasdaq By Sept. 18, the Bullish Percent for the Nasdaq-100 stood at 75%, the highest in over a year. Nasdaq Dorsey Wright Bullish Percent is the share of stocks showing a buy signal on point-and-figure charts, a method for tracking uptrends.
The September climb came after a spring reset in leadership and price structure. On April 15, 2026, the Nasdaq 100 rose 1.4% to set a record for the first time since October. Bloomberg At that time the index was in the middle of its longest winning streak since 2019. Bloomberg
Large tech names had already pulled ahead again by mid-2025. In coverage titled "How the Market Has Changed Since It Was Last Breaking Records" on June 30, 2025, the WSJ reported Microsoft was up 20% since the last high, Nvidia was up 13% since the last high, and Meta was up 4% since the last high. WSJ The WSJ also published a podcast episode titled "The Magnificent Seven Aren't This Market's Only Winners." WSJ
An earlier record showed how price and participation connect. Reuters reported in its 'Wall Street indexes notch record-high closes as Intel soars' coverage that the Nasdaq rose 0.94%, lifting the tech-heavy Nasdaq and the S&P 500 technology sector. Reuters In that session the Nasdaq Composite recorded 156 new highs and 42 new lows. Reuters New highs are stocks at yearly peaks. New lows are the reverse.
Not every session this year has pointed the same way. On July 28, 2026, the tech-focused Nasdaq Composite ended down 0.2%. Investopedia On that date Magnificent Seven mega-cap tech stocks ended mostly higher. Investopedia In a separate Tuesday session, the Nasdaq and S&P 500 finished lower under pressure from technology stocks while the Dow marked its second straight record high. Reuters
The broader context here is a market balancing narrow pushes from big stocks with wider support. A 75% Bullish Percent reading means three in four Nasdaq-100 members are in defined uptrends. That lines up with the August gain and the 156 to 42 new-high to new-low count from the September 2025 record session. For chart watchers, those are breadth confirmations. For fund managers, they soften the concentration story around Microsoft, Nvidia and Meta in mid-2025 and around the Magnificent Seven into July 2026.
In my view, the sequence matters more than any single close. The April record after a months-long gap, the climb through August, and the September jump in Meta and AMD trace a path from index repair to steady momentum to single-stock acceleration. The splits, a down Nasdaq with mostly higher mega-caps in July and a soft Nasdaq with a record Dow that Tuesday, fit late-cycle rotation. They do not break the trend, but they raise the bar for follow-through. What professionals will watch next is whether new highs keep beating new lows and whether participation stays above that one-year high if large tech pauses.
