Amazon.com (AMZN) and Meta Platforms (META) lead this weekend’s watch list of five stocks near buy points, as a big start to the holiday shopping season and a bullish pick for Treasury secretary keep the S&P 500 postelection rally in gear. In addition to AMZN and Meta stock, the list includes Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRKB), insurance giant Travelers (TRV) and luxury homebuilder Toll Brothers (TOL).
Meta is part of the IBD Leaderboard portfolio of elite stocks. Berkshire is a current holding of the SwingTrader portfolio.
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Will This Software Leader’s AI Agents Lift Stock To New Highs? Earnings May Tell.
The S&P 500 just finished its best month in a year, rising 5.7%, with the GOP election sweep and a Fed rate cut fueling the gains. Deregulation and another corporate tax cut are on the agenda for 2025, though trade wars and deportations could muddle the outlook.
Yet after President-elect Donald Trump nominated hedge fund manager Scott Bessent to serve as Treasury secretary, Wall Street is seeing the glass as more than half full. The expectation is that Bessent, a fiscal hawk, will help Trump navigate the risks to economic growth, including a potential bond-market backlash.
Be sure to read IBD’s The Big Picture column after each trading day to get the latest on the prevailing stock market trend and what it means for your trading decisions.
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Amazon Stock
E-commerce spending got off to a big start, as Thanksgiving Day online spending jumped 8.8% to $6.1 billion, according to Adobe Digital Insights. Wedbush Securities said Amazon should be primed for a huge holiday, especially since Thanksgiving didn’t come until the 28th of the month. That plays into consumers’ confidence in Amazon’s rapid fulfillment.
Meanwhile, Amazon’s artificial intelligence positioning has analysts pounding the table, with Redburn Atlantic raising its AMZN stock price target to 235 from 225 on Nov. 26, keeping a buy rating. The research firm highlighted Amazon Web Services’ full-stack vertical integration as a “defining advantage.” The firm also noted fast market-share gains for Anthropic, narrowing the gap with OpenAI in adoption by business customers. Amazon recently doubled-down on its investment in Anthropic.
AMZN reclaimed a buy point in the shortened holiday trading week. Monday’s 2.2% gain carried Amazon past a 201.20 buy point that it had first cleared on Nov. 6, the day after the election. Amazon edged up 1.05% to 207.89 on Friday. The buy zone runs through 211.26.
Meta Stock
Meta was featured as IBD Stock Of The Day on Friday, as the parent of Facebook and Instagram looks to retake its 50-day moving average, which could offer an early entry opportunity.
The stock has lagged the S&P 500 since the election of Trump, who not only has a history of being temporarily banned from Facebook, but also has his own social media property. Facebook’s Threads site for public conversations is getting millions of more users, as Elon Musk’s X site sees an outflow of some users upset by his efforts to elect Trump. Threads will reportedly launch ads early next year, turning the site into a potential profit source.
In a Nov. 20 note, Jefferies analysts touted Meta as a “top AI winner,” sticking by its 675 price target and buy rating, after the launch of its new Business AI group. Meta named Clara Shih, former CEO of AI at Salesforce (CRM), to direct efforts to provide generative AI tools and agents for 200 million businesses that use WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook.
Meta stock rose 0.9% to 574.32 on Friday, closing a hair below the 50-day line near 575. Look for Meta to clear Friday’s intraday high of 578.46, ideally on above-average volume, before buying into the rebound.
Meta has an official 602.95 flat-base buy point, according to a MarketSurge analysis.
Berkshire Stock
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has rallied strongly since Trump’s election, as its portfolio companies stand to benefit from tax cuts and deregulation, particularly in the financial sector.
Berkshire’s biggest equity holdings, according to its latest filings, include Apple (AAPL), American Express (AXP) and Bank of America (BAC). It also wholly owns the likes of Geico, Duracell, Dairy Queen, Fruit of the Loom and railroad operator BNSF.
BRKB stock rose 1.35% to 483.02 for the week, closing just below a 484.82 buy point from a flat base. Shares climbed as high as 491.67 on Thursday, before pulling back to close just out of buy range. Berkshire has formed a base-on-base pattern, which looks like a stair-step formation. It occurs when a breakout produces gains of less than 20% and the next consolidation forms fully above the prior consolidation, which is suggestive of a firm floor.
Travelers Stock
The insurance giant, part of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, was featured as IBD Stock Of The Day on Wednesday as its earnings resurgence puts another buy point in sight.
In posting Q3 results on Oct. 17, Travelers cited strength in all three segments, business insurance, personal insurance, and bond and specialty insurance. The combined ratio, or insurance losses and operating expenses as a percentage of premiums, improved to 93.2% from 101% in the year ago-quarter. Strong investment returns, up 16% from a year ago, also padded profit, which grew 169% to $5.24 a share.
In the earnings call, CEO Alan Schnitzer explained that its “leading data and analytics” have led Travelers to increase exposure in areas where returns are attractive. Over the last four years, he said, the premium base has grown nearly 50%, while underwriting income is up more than 80%.
TRV stock rose 1.4% for the week to 266.04. That’s just 1% below a 269.56 buy point from a flat base, which is part of a base-on-base formation.
Toll Brothers Stock
Toll Brothers and other homebuilder stocks surged on Monday amid news of Bessent’s appointment. His credentials as a fiscal hawk helped convince markets that Trump is going to take fiscal responsibility seriously in his second term, helping to take pressure off of long-term interest rates.
The 10-year Treasury yield tumbled 23 basis points for the week, falling to 4.18%. As a result, the 30-year fixed mortgage rate fell to 6.88% from 7.03%, according to Mortgage Daily News.
Lower mortgage rates help housing demand and affordability, which are both positive for prices. Still, Toll Brothers caters to move-up and luxury homebuyers, who tend to be less sensitive to mortgage rates and monthly payments than other builders’ customer base, Wedbush wrote in an Oct. 25 note. The research firm, which upgraded TOL to outperform and raised its price target to 175 from 148, said the lack of existing homes in most markets is pushing must-move buyers into new homes.
TOL stock surged 6.5% to 167.80 on Monday, breaking past a 160.12 buy point from a five-week flat base. TOL eased back to close the week at 165.17. The buy zone runs through 168.13.
A weekly MarketSurge chart shows TOL stock’s relative strength line at a new multiyear high. The RS line is the blue line in IBD charts that tracks a stock’s progress vs. the S&P 500.
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