The Stock Market’s Magnificent Seven Is Now the Fab Four
It is a bullish signal that the market is rallying without the likes of Apple and Tesla, some investors say
4 min
The Magnificent Seven trade is beginning to fizzle—and yet, the stock market is still heading higher.
The S&P 500 climbed 10% in the first quarter, its best start to a year since 2019 , even though two of its biggest constituents suffered double-digit declines. Apple shares fell 11% in the first three months of the year, while Tesla dropped almost 30%. Alphabet shares sputtered for much of the period before making a run in the past three weeks and ending up 8%.
The other four big tech stocks in the group known as the Magnificent Seven— Nvidia , Meta Platforms , Microsoft , Amazon.com —continued their meteoric run and outpaced the broader market. Some market strategists have dubbed them the new Fab Four.
Some investors say it is a bullish signal that the market is still rallying without the likes of Apple and Tesla because it means other groups are taking part . All of the S&P 500’s sectors, except real estate, logged gains in the first quarter. Small caps, industrial and financial-services stocks are among those that jumped, fueling bets that the broader market might have more room to run.
Much of the enthusiasm is tied to hopes that the economy has escaped a deep recession and that the Federal Reserve will soon pivot to cutting interest rates , even if not at the pace some investors had previously hoped. A frenzy over the future of artificial intelligence has added to the zeal.
“If you’d have told me eight weeks ago that Apple and Tesla would be down as much as they are, oh and by the way, you’re punting when you’re going to do the rate cuts and you’re getting less rate cuts, I would have assumed the market would be down,” said Ryan Detrick , chief market strategist at Carson Group.
To be sure, some investors worry the divergence in the big tech stocks is a sign of exhaustion in the rally and question whether future gains will be harder to achieve from here. The S&P 500’s market value has swelled more than $9 trillion since late October, and the index has set 22 record closes in 2024.
In the coming days, investors trying to gauge the trajectory of the market and economy will parse the release of U.S. manufacturing data Monday and the monthly jobs report Friday.
Nvidia continues to be a stock-market star. The graphics-chip maker has indicated demand for the computing power that underlies AI remains astronomical . Its shares have jumped more than 80% to start the year, after more than tripling in 2023.
By some metrics, Nvidia has displaced Tesla as the most popular stock among individual investors . It is currently the biggest average holding in individual investors’ portfolios, at about 9%, VandaTrack data show.
Meta shares, meanwhile, have soared partly thanks to Meta’s investments in artificial intelligence that have made targeted ads smarter. The social-media company recently said it would pay its first shareholder dividend. Microsoft stole the crown of biggest U.S. company from Apple earlier this year, with a valuation that topped $3 trillion, and Amazon has sharply improved its profitability.
Despite their recent gains, some of the stocks look less pricey than they did last year. Nvidia is trading at 35 times its projected earnings over the next 12 months, below its peak of 62 in May of last year. Amazon’s multiple is 40, down from 2023’s high of 62. The S&P 500 is trading at 21 times future earnings, slightly up from last year’s highs of 19.
The Fab Four are responsible for nearly half of the S&P 500’s first-quarter advance, according to Howard Silverblatt , senior index analyst at S&P Dow Jones Indices.
Joseph Ferrara , investment strategist at Gateway Investment Advisers, said he expects investors to rotate out of big tech stocks and funnel into other sectors as the year progresses. That is largely because the earnings of the other 493 companies in the index are expected to outperform those of the Magnificent Seven by the fourth quarter.
“The fact that the market is still holding these levels and trading up without that full force of the Magnificent Seven is actually a really positive thing,” he said.
Jonathan Golub , a strategist at UBS, said one reason Magnificent Seven’s earnings dominance could end is because it will be hard to top the explosive growth they posted at the end of last year. Those results looked like blockbuster beats when compared with 2022’s weaker numbers, he said in a recent research note.
Last year, any hint of weakness in the Magnificent Seven would have sent the broader market tumbling. In fact, for much of the year, those seven stocks were responsible for all of the S&P 500’s advance.
This year is a different story. Tesla is struggling on numerous fronts. The electric-vehicle maker is facing pressure from Chinese competitors, which have rapidly expanded their presence around the globe in recent years. It has also warned of notably slower growth in 2024, and its profit margins have taken a hit.
Apple’s woes have been mounting, too . The Justice Department recently sued the company, accusing it of monopolistic behaviour. European authorities are cracking down on its app store. Plus, it is facing another weak iPhone demand cycle, and investors are worried that Apple is behind in the current wave of excitement around AI.
Bespoke Investment Group data show Apple shares underperformed the S&P 500 over the 200 days through Tuesday by the widest margin since October 2013.
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The voices reshaping how Australians think about money — and why credibility matters more than reach.
6 min
The best financial advice many Australians are receiving right now is not coming from licensed advisers charging by the hour. It is coming through a phone screen, in the ten minutes between work and dinner, from creators who have built credibility the hard way: by being right, being transparent, and being specific in a space where vagueness has always been the easy default.
This is not a ranking by follower count. Follower count is a measure of distribution, not of quality. What follows is a ranking by substance — credentials, accuracy, community depth, and the quality of what an audience actually learns from following these accounts. The distinction matters, because the Australians acting on this content are making real financial decisions with real money.
1- Queenie Tan – Corporate Authorised Representative; Co-Founder & Director, Invest With Queenie & Billroo
There are finance influencers who talk about building wealth, and there are those who document it in real time with receipts. Queenie Tan belongs firmly in the second category. Starting from a $400-per-week income, Tan built her net worth past $1 million while publishing the actual numbers — income, savings rate, investment decisions — for an audience of more than 400,000 across platforms.
She is a Corporate Authorised Representative, co-founder of the personal finance app Billroo, and the author of a book that has become a practical reference for young Australians navigating ETFs, superannuation and property. What separates her from the crowded field of money educators is precision: she does not talk in principles when she can talk in percentages.
2- Alan Kohler – Editor-in-Chief, Eureka Report; Editor-in-Chief, InvestSMART Group; ABC News finance presenter, host of Inside Business.
If Queenie Tan represents the new wave of personal finance creators, Alan Kohler represents something the new wave will spend decades trying to build: institutional credibility that has survived multiple economic cycles. As Editor-in-Chief of the Eureka Report and InvestSMART Group, and a decades-long presence on ABC News, Kohler has spent more than thirty years making financial analysis accessible without dumbing it down.
His coverage of RBA decisions, market movements and economic policy is cited by podcasters, journalists and fund managers alike. He is not chasing virality. He does not need to.
3- Aleks Nikolic – Corporate lawyer; host, Big Swinging Stocks podcast
Most finance creators address the mechanics of money. Aleks Nikolic addresses the psychology — and that distinction explains why her following is as loyal as it is. Operating as Broke Girl Wealth across Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, Nikolic covers ETFs, crypto and investment strategy, but her real differentiator is a willingness to discuss the emotional architecture of financial decision-making.
Shame around debt. Fear around market volatility. The limiting beliefs that stop people acting on what they already know. In a space where confidence is routinely performed, her candour is a genuine competitive advantage.
4- Bryce Leske & Alec Renehan – Equity Mates Media
Equity Mates did not build a following. They built a media company. What began as a podcast by two friends learning to invest has grown into Australia’s most established investing media brand, covering ASX stocks, ETFs, global markets and fund manager interviews across podcast, social and YouTube.
The longevity is the credential. Equity Mates has operated through multiple market cycles, a global pandemic, and a generational shift in how Australians engage with investing — and its audience has grown through all of it. When the hosts speak, their listeners know they have been paying attention for years.
5- The Lazy CEO – CEO & Founder, Showpo; Shark Tank Australia investor
The metric that matters most on social media is not followers — it is engagement, because engagement signals trust. Jane Lu, known as The Lazy CEO, maintains an engagement rate of approximately 1.15 per cent on Instagram, which is exceptional for a finance account of his size. Her 242,000-plus followers are not passive consumers: they ask questions, share experiences and apply what they read.
Her content focuses on business finance and wealth building, and the active comment sections are the clearest possible evidence that her audience does not merely scroll past.
6- Tash Invests – Founder, Tash Lends; Forbes Australia 30 Under 30
Tash Invests built her following on a premise that sounds simple but is rarer in practice than it should be: she publishes the actual numbers. Not approximations or ranges or anonymised case studies — her salary, her savings rate, her portfolio value, her net worth, updated and on the record.
Having bought her first property at twenty-two and grown her documented net worth past $1 million, she has become the primary reference point for young Australians trying to understand what building wealth on a moderate income genuinely looks like. The specificity is the product.
7- David Scutt – APAC Market Analyst at StoneX Group
The authority of most finance social media content rests on research and reading. David Scutt‘s authority rests on having done the job. A former Treasury Dealer at Arab Bank and the Commonwealth Bank, former ASX Business Supervisor, and former Global Markets Editor at Business Insider Australia and anchor at ausbiz TV, Scutt now brings that direct market experience to his role as APAC Market Analyst at StoneX Group, rather than relying on secondary commentary.
When he discusses foreign exchange movements or ASX dynamics, it is not because he has read about them. It is because he has traded them.
8- Meddy Demars – Investing & crypto content creator
The gap Meddy Demars fills is specific and underserviced: connecting global macroeconomic events to the practical reality of Australian investors. When the US Federal Reserve adjusts interest rates, when inflation data moves, when commodity prices shift — most Australian finance content either ignores the local implications or translates them poorly.
Demars, operating across TikTok and Instagram from Sydney, does the translation well: explaining what global conditions mean for Australian stocks, savings rates and investment portfolios in terms that are accessible without being condescending.
9- Simran Kaur – Founder, Friends That Invest
Friends That Invest is arguably the most successful community-building exercise in Australian personal finance, and Simran Kaur is the reason why. The New Zealand-based creator — whose audience is predominantly Australian — built a podcast, a book and a social media presence around a single insight: that the personal finance world was not speaking to young women, and that the consequences of that gap were significant.
The measurable cultural shift that followed — women engaging with investing concepts in communities that had not previously existed — is the kind of impact that most financial literacy programmes aim for and rarely achieve.
10- Effie Zahos – Money Editor at 9News
Effie Zahos is one of Australia’s most recognised financial commentators, appearing regularly across 9News, A Current Affair, Today and Today Extra as 9News Money Editor. Her role puts everyday money questions, from mortgage rates to cost-of-living pressures, in front of a national broadcast audience.
Before television, she spent years as editor of Money magazine, building the editorial foundation for her current commentary. She is also Director and Money Commentator at InvestSMART, an ambassador for Canstar, and a published author, with her financial advice available in print as well as on screen.
That combination, decades of editorial experience, an active broadcast presence, and a body of published work, is what makes her commentary carry weight beyond any single platform or post.
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