The “New Economy” seems to have an age-old ball and chain bound to its leg – the “Old Economy.” The development of AI software and the hardware, semiconductors, needed to run that software were the initial beneficiaries of increased demand as investors thought of the possibilities of rapidly progressing technology. In the mania around AI, one important thing was seemingly forgotten, the infrastructure necessary to build out what was needed for AI’s scale. Companies have quickly realized the amount of spending necessary to make their AI dreams a reality. Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, and Meta are projected to combine for over $600 billion in artificial intelligence investments in 2026 (Yahoo Finance). The economic reality of the AI buildout is that it is going to be expensive and reduce the financial flexibility of many large tech companies. Large cash balances and strong free cash flows were a couple of the supporting arguments for mega-cap technology names’ lofty valuations, but that has taken a hit as these companies must now spend this cash and even take on extra debt to now meet their forward AI expectations at the expense of share buybacks and elasticity.

The building out of data centers, semiconductor plants, and energy infrastructure has led this money to flow from the “New Economy” sectors into the “Old Economy” sectors. The best-performing SPDR sector funds are energy (XLE), industrials (XLI), and basic materials (XLB). All three gained more than 10% year-to-date with XLE leading the pack up nearly 20%. On the other hand, financials (XLF), communication services (XLC), technology (XLK), and consumer cyclical (XLY) are the only four sectors down this year, albeit none are down more the 3% year-to-date. The dispersion in performance has led to sector rankings and signal counts in DALI making notable changes. Energy entered the year ranked ninth but has gained 58 signals and is now ranked fourth. Industrials and basic materials were doing well entering the year but now make up the top two ranked sectors, respectively. On the other side of the coin, technology fell from the top-ranked sector down to fifth, the starkest drop in any sector. While the tech behind AI will still be the spearhead, the buildout necessary to support such ventures will require the “Old Economy” in a way potentially not seen in decades.

A new car. A European getaway. A luxury watch. Lots of things come to mind when you talk about $50,000. For many clients, that sum is much more than pocket change and is a major psychological landmark along our financial journey. While not measured specifically in dollars, the Dow Jones Industrial Average notched its own respective landmark over the last week… crossing above 50,000 for the first time in its history on February 6th, 2026. While updates of our 1,000 point landmark piece are much less frequent than they were just a few years ago, notable landmarks like 50,000 give us an opportunity to look back at where we have come from in an effort to predict where we might be going as we move through 2026.

Before diving into the table, we will provide a brief technical comment on the Dow Jones as of 2/11. While other domestic benchmarks have struggled this year, the Dow has been able to put together a rather constructive opening to 2026. .DJIA has advanced roughly 4% as of the time of this writing, edging out the likes of NDX or SPX which have struggled as growth names have pulled back. This is partially due in part to the overall weighting methodology differences between the indices- the Dow is price weighted while others are market cap weighted. This means that the likes of AMZN, AAPL or NVDA have less of an overall impact on movement than higher priced names like CAT, GS or AMGN. This difference can help in some markets and hurt in others, but less overall reliance on big technology names have helped the index so far this year. This is quite evident on the default chart for .DJIA. After struggling to break through 49,600 a total of five times to open the year, it finally broke a quintuple top to crest 50,000 for the first time ever to start February. With support littered between 48,600 and 49,000, the technical picture is strong and improving.

With that said, we can journey into an analysis of other notable instances during which the Dow broke past important “landmarks.” Before going further, it is worth defining what we mean as “notable”. At this point, a 1,000 point move represents a mere 2% move off current levels… a metric that could seemingly come at any point in today’s fast moving environment. With this in mind, we adjusted our table from showcasing every 1,000 point move to those which represented a ~5%-10% move from the previous landmark, starting from 10,000. Said more plainly, the 3,000 point advance from 47,000 to 50,000 is the roughly same mathematical gain as moving from 16,000 to 17,000 back In 2013. The point of this is to observe moves on a more level playing field rather than hyperfocus on a move that could happen in the course of a trading week. Some interesting, high level statistics:

• It took just 105 days for .DJIA to move from 47,000 to 50,000 from October 24th 2025 to February 6th 2026. This marks the quickest move between “significant” breakpoints since the 69 day break from 31,000 to 33,000.
• This 105-day metric is also significantly quicker than the “average” timeline throughout longer timeframes. The typical duration between notable breakouts sits just under 650 days (do note this includes significantly longer stretches from the early 1970’s into 1990’s).
• The 105-day stretch is also much quicker than looking at other more comparable breakpoint rallies metrics. The average duration between landmarks between 10,000 & 50,000 sits at 462 days, accelerating to just 187 days when looking at the four instances ranging from 40,000-50,000. All this to say, market movement seems to continue to speed up in a post-Covid world.

Judging by these metrics alone, the next 3,000-point move (~6% gain from current levels) would come by August 11th, 2026. While there is certainly no guarantee that such an advance is coming down the pipeline, the overall technical posture remains strong for the Dow… and domestic equities in general despite some growing signs of changing leadership. As always, keep an eye on the charts in the event of further shifts worth monitoring.

Each week the analysts at NDW review and comment on all major asset classes in the global markets. Shown below is the summary or snapshot of the primary technical indicators we follow for multiple areas. Should there be changes mid-week we will certainly bring these to your attention via the report.

Remember, these are technical comments only. Just as you must be aware of fundamental data for the stocks we recommend based on technical criteria in the report, so too must you be aware of important data regarding delivery, market moving government releases, and other factors that may influence commodity pricing. We try to limit our technical comments to the most actively traded contracts in advance of delivery, but some contracts trade actively right up to delivery while others taper off well in advance. Be sure you check your dates before trading these contracts. For questions regarding this section or additional coverage of commodities email james.west@nasdaq.com.

Data represented in the table below is through 2.11.26:

Portfolio View - Commodity Indices

Cryptocurrency Update

Cryptocurrency Video (3:24)

Daily Option Ideas for February 11, 2026