The continuous rise in the U.S. stock market has sparked a craze of "tearing up research reports" on Wall Street! 7000 points have become the new anchor of the S&P 500 index.

With strong corporate profit growth data and a hot market outlook for artificial intelligence rekindling, the US stock market has been on a strong rise since April and has recently hit numerous historical highs. Top analysts from Wall Street are competing to raise their outlook for the S&P 500 index. Not only are the bullish analysts constantly revising their target, especially those analysts who have been bearish on the US stock market since the beginning of this year are also revising their targets multiple times in order to keep up with their bullish peers and the epic bull market pace of the US stock market. Overall, these top analysts on Wall Street generally expect the overall earnings of S&P 500 index constituents and the investment returns of this benchmark index to expand in 2025 and 2026. Some analysts predict that the index may rise significantly to around 7,000 points by the end of this year or early next year. Binky Chadha, a stock market analyst from Deutsche Bank, has raised his year-end target for the US stock market benchmark index, the S&P 500 index, to 7,000 points, meaning an increase of over 7% from the current level. Their peers at Barclays Bank have also raised their forecasts, and the analyst team from Wells Fargo Bank predicts that the US stock market will continue its bull market pace next year, forecasting an 11% increase in the S&P 500 index by the end of next year. Since the beginning of this year, the S&P 500 index has hit more than 20 historical highs and has rebounded by over 30% since its low in April. The unprecedented AI boom has undoubtedly shown strong bullish resilience among US stock investors. Undoubtedly, the just-announced cloud computing giant Oracle's contract backlog far exceeding market expectations of $45.5 billion, as well as Broadcom's strong performance and future outlook announced last week, have significantly strengthened the "long-term bull market narrative" for the AI computing power sector. The global surge in demand for AI computing power, coupled with the ever-expanding AI infrastructure investment projects led by the US government and the continuous substantial investment by global tech giants in building large data centers, largely implies that the "AI faith" sweeping across the globe is far from over for investors who have a long-standing passion for NVIDIA and the AI computing power industry chain. The strong belief in AI is expected to continue to act as a "super catalyst" for the stock prices of leading companies in the AI computing power industry chain, led by NVIDIA, TSMC, and Broadcom, driving the global stock market to continue the bull market trend. Thanks to the epic stock price rise of leading companies in the AI computing power industry chain such as NVIDIA, Google, TSMC, and Broadcom, as well as their consistently strong performance so far this year, an unprecedented AI investment boom has swept the US stock market and global stock markets, ultimately driving the global benchmark index, the MSCI Global Index, to surge significantly since April, and recently setting numerous historical highs following the S&P 500 index. Wall Street analysts are competing to raise their target points for the S&P 500 index "There is a bubble, but as long as AI capital spending by tech giants continues to expand, the bull market should continue," said Ohsung Kwon, an analyst who took over as chief stock analyst at Wells Fargo Bank after Christopher Harvey left in August. Driven by the AI boom and the optimistic sentiment regarding the Fed's upcoming rate cut cycle and the resilience of US economic growth, the US stock market has been rising steadily over the past few months. The S&P 500 index closed at a record high on Tuesday, pushing its year-to-date gains to 11%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 index surged by 13%. On a broader scale, these top Wall Street analysts have been struggling to keep up with the market's roller coaster-like volatility caused by the unpredictable policy measures by US President Donald Trump this year. After introducing comprehensive, globally targeted tariff policies in April, this group of Wall Streeters significantly downgraded their future expectations for the S&P 500 index. However, following the Trump administration's substantial weakening of its trade policy rhetoric, along with the fact that tariff rates directed towards major US trading partners ended up lower than those of the aggressive reciprocal tariff policy in early April, these analysts have once again returned to a bullish position. The US stock market rebounds significantly under the impetus of rate cut bets and optimistic profit data the S&P 500 index continues to climb to record highs Analyst Chadha from Deutsche Bank has raised his target by nearly 7% this time, stating that half of the expected impact of tariffs on US inflation has already been reflected. He also sees strong positioning by investors, better-than-expected US economic growth resilience, and the ongoing weakening of the "bearish market-like decline" of the US dollar as supporting factors for the US stock market. Julian Emanuel, a stock market analyst at Evercore ISI, has raised his year-end target for the S&P 500 index from 5600 points to 6250 points and expects the S&P 500 index to climb to 7750 points by the end of 2026 under the catalytic change of AI technology, which he calls a "once-in-a-generation" transformation. He predicts a potential increase of about 20%. Overall, Emanuel's long-term outlook is more optimistic, emphasizing that the popularity of AI will drive both corporate earnings and valuations. Emanuel states that during this process, a 10% or more correction in the S&P 500 index is possible, but in the backdrop of a structural bull market, such corrections are seen as buying opportunities. This analyst's forecast for the bull market scenario of the US stock market is more aggressive: Emanuel predicts that with an "AI-driven asset bubble," the S&P 500 index may even climb to 9000 points. One of the core logics that support the bull market pace of the US stock market: Wall Street continually raising corporate profit expectations The recent severe slowdown in the US labor market has reignited concerns about the stagnation of the US economy, but after the impact of tariffs turned out to be less severe than the market had feared, analysts are continuing to raise profit expectations for US companies. According to the latest data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence, Wall Street analysts expect a nearly 10% surge in overall earnings for S&P 500 constituent companies in 2025, and a further 13% growth in 2026 based on the strong foundation in 2025. From the discounted cash flow (DCF) valuation model of the stock market, performance expectations are crucial for expectations of stock prices. In the context of a Fed rate cut, if expectations for the next year are continually revised upward by Wall Street, this will also strongly and consistently support the bullish pace of the US stock market that continually sets new highs. Profit expectations for the US have significantly improved Wall Street analysts unanimously raised performance outlook expectations since May. At Barclays Bank, Venu Krishna, a stock market analyst from the institution, now predicts that the S&P 500 index will close at 6,450 points in 2025, higher than the institution's previous forecast of 6,050 points. The core reason for this is the improvement in profit expectations and stabilizing global economic growth. However, Barclays Bank's latest target implies a 1% decrease from Tuesday's closing but has significantly increased compared to the institution's previous points. Krishna also stated that the upward trend in US stocks will continue next year, potentially pushing the S&P 500 index to around 7,000 points. "Macro conditions may be under pressure, but we hold an optimistic view of 'the glass is half full'," he wrote in a report. "The glass is half full" is an English phrase used in everyday English-speaking countries to express a very optimistic attitude. Dubravko Lakos-Bujas, a stock market analyst at J.P. Morgan, warned that short-term inflation risks and unfavorable seasonal selling pressures are potential risks. However, this analyst stated that due to the relief from trade policy resistance, the upcoming lower rate regime, and record shareholder returns, the US benchmark index could rise to around 7,000 points by early next year. "While we remain cautious in the short-term investment outlook for the US stock market, if the outlook is longer-term, we believe the backdrop for the S&P 500 index is very constructive," Lakos-Bujas wrote in a recent report.