NEW YORK, May 30, 2026, 16:02 EDT
- Applied Materials finished Friday at $450.06, climbing about 4.1% from last Friday’s close during the holiday-shortened week.
- Wall Street’s major indexes finished at record highs Friday. Tech and chip stocks kept leading the gains.
- Broadcom reports this week and the May jobs numbers are coming too, both set to gauge demand for AI-tied shares.
Applied Materials finished the holiday-shortened week just under record highs, keeping nearly all of Tuesday’s big move as traders left for the weekend with U.S. markets shut. The chip equipment maker ended Friday at $450.06, up 0.08% for the session and 4.1% higher than its May 22 close. Shares hit $462.40 on Wednesday, the top print in the latest month’s price data.
Timing is in focus. Nasdaq trades Monday to Friday, but U.S. equity markets took a break Monday for Memorial Day, so investors had less time to react to the recent rally in chip-equipment stocks.
Applied made its move with Wall Street holding its ground. All three indexes—the S&P 500, Nasdaq Composite and Dow Jones Industrial Average—finished at fresh highs on Friday. The Nasdaq gained 2.39% for the week and the S&P 500 stretched to a ninth weekly win. Wells Fargo’s Ohsung Kwon described “euphoric sentiment” around AI, saying the rally was driven by earnings. Reuters
Analyst calls kept shares in play late in the week. Cantor Fitzgerald’s C.J. Muse kept an Overweight rating and a $575 price target on the stock Thursday, as reported by StreetInsider. Benzinga put the consensus target from 29 analysts at $463.83, just above where shares closed on Friday. Highest call on the Street matches Muse, at $575.
Applied’s shares surged 5.26% on Tuesday, but then gave up 1.46% on Wednesday before recording modest gains Thursday and Friday, Investing.com data show. The week was strong overall, though trading was choppy.
Applied Materials shares keep drawing buyers as chipmakers spend to keep up with AI. The company makes the equipment used to produce chips. Earlier this month, Applied posted fiscal Q2 revenue of $7.91 billion, a record, and adjusted earnings of $2.86 a share. Its forecast for the current quarter calls for about $8.95 billion in revenue, give or take $500 million.
Applied Materials CEO Gary Dickerson called it “record quarterly performance.” CFO Brice Hill said AI growth is “in full force.” The company now expects its semiconductor equipment business to rise more than 30% in calendar 2026. Applied Materials
Analysts link the outlook to wafer-fabrication equipment, or WFE, the machines that make chips from silicon wafers. William Kerwin, senior equity analyst for technology at Morningstar, told Reuters the results pointed to a “strengthening” AI upcycle for this type of spending. Reuters
Applied Materials traded in step with other chip-equipment stocks Friday. Lam Research ticked up 0.14%. KLA was down 0.31%. ASML’s U.S. shares rose 0.45%. The group moved in a tight range, with no clear outlier.
Broadcom is set to report fiscal Q2 results after the close on Wednesday, giving investors a look at one of the top AI chipmakers. On Friday, the May U.S. jobs report is out. That could move expectations for rates, bond yields and the direction of stocks.
The setup has some issues. Hot jobs data could drive yields higher and that could hit expensive tech shares. If AI spending slows or fabs get delayed, Applied’s order book gets murkier. Applied points to export rules, tariffs, geopolitics and customer demand as risks that could shift results away from its outlook.
Applied Materials is still seen as a straightforward AI play, more about providing the tools to make chips than selling chips themselves. Next week, the stock faces a test: will new money show up, or is $450 already baking in all the positives?
