Caterpillar traded from $800 in March up to $1,050 and back to $800 again, and Carter Worth says no earnings model, multiple or sum-of-the-parts calculation accounts for any of it.
Most sell-side research explains a stock by its business. Worth's morning note to institutional clients screened for the opposite: winners from every sector whose charts have turned, regardless of what the companies do.
"PE, price of sales, enterprise value, EBITDA, sum of the parts, dividend discount model has nothing to do with it."
Worth ran technical analysis at Cornerstone Macro from 2016 to 2021 and now sells chart research under his own name; the reversal list this episode walks through went out to his clients that morning, and Guy Adami says he and Dan Nathan put their own money into the ETF Worth runs.
I listened to the full episode so you can skip it. 25 minutes of audio, 17 minutes of reading.
Here are the 11 takeaways that matter.
👤 Guest: Carter Worth, founder of Worth Charting and head of technical analysis at Cornerstone Macro from 2016 to 2021, who publishes the Money in Motion research note and manages the WRTH options-income ETF
🎙️ Host: Guy Adami, a CNBC Fast Money contributor who co-hosts MRKT Call for RiskReversal Media
📰 Published: 1 September 2026 on YouTube (RiskReversal Media)
🔴 YouTube | ⏱️ 25 min | ✅ Time saved: 8 min
Key Takeaways
The same chart pattern is breaking winners in unrelated industries at once Worth put a hotel operator, an industrial machinery maker, a chip-equipment firm and a handbag company through the identical screen
Valuation explains none of the moves he is pointing at Caterpillar went from $800 in March to $1,050 and back to $800 with no change in the arithmetic
The bond market is not the threat people have decided it is The 10-year yield never once closed above 5%, even in October 2023
The semiconductor unwind is already underway, not waiting to start SanDisk and Western Digital are down 50%, and Worth says the burden of proof has shifted to the bulls
Nvidia doubled its top line and its bottom line and the stock is lower than before it reported A 17.5x forward multiple is below the market's own
Sell-side analysts stopped being able to forecast earnings and nobody replaced the function The average price target on three of the five names sits far above where each trades
Energy is the one place he wants to own more The sector is at its former high with crude $18 to $25 below where it was in March
Selling options into a volatility spike is a way to be paid by it rather than hurt by it The Abercrombie & Fitch position collected $2.64 against a $152.60 share price
1. Yields Creep, Nobody Panics
Adami opened on the two subjects he said everybody has suddenly become an expert in — the bond market and Japan — and on his own rule that a crowded subject is usually the one to fade. Worth's answer was that the level of yields matters less than the speed of the change.
Worth said the equity market reacts to the rate of change in yields, not the yield itself. "It's typically been about rate of change, meaning shocking moves down or up, unsettle or emboldened the equity market."
The move he is looking at is slow, and that is why it has not hurt stocks. "This has been a slow, steady move into the high fours, as we know, 4.7." He put the 10-year's high at an intraday print three years ago: "It was the third week in October of 2023. It touched 5.02." It never once closed above 5%, which he said is not a particularly high yield in the first place
His read on the chart is that a rising 10-year yield would be a buy if it were a stock. "It's not particularly exciting, but there's nothing wrong with it. It's trending higher."
He does not think the market is about to be unsettled by rates. "This is a benign thing, and it's one of the reasons in principle that equities I should think have been able to maintain this ongoing ascent along with obviously corporate earnings results having come through."
Adami cast himself as the alarmist who watches the rate of change, and Worth as the other camp: "Realists like yourself would point out the fact that we've been here before."
2. Gold Miners Fill the Gaps
Adami asked the show's producer to pull up a chart of the VanEck Gold Miners ETF, drew the downtrend from February 2026, and pointed out that the fund broke that downtrend on gaps and is now sliding back toward them.
Adami's worry was speed in both directions — how fast the miners rose and how quickly they are now approaching the 150-day moving average, the average closing price of the past 150 trading days
He invoked Worth's own maxim back at him, that "all gaps are meant to be filled"
Worth was unbothered, because the individual miners confirmed the move rather than diverging from it. Newmont made a new high alongside the ETF, and the bigger names have come straight back to their former highs and stalled
He rated the setup as neither a buy nor a sell, calling it "a pair of twos" — a hand not worth playing He would buy Newmont only on a further fall toward 115, and said the run from 90 to 135 was overdone: "here comes the giveback. Perfectly normal"
Adami said the pullback is a pause, not the end of the gold move. "I don't think the gold move is over in any way." The moment he is waiting for is gold rising "in the face of rising yields", which he said would be the worrisome one for equities
3. GE Vernova Rolls Over
Worth explained what the morning's note actually was: a broad list of bullish-to-bearish reversals for institutional clients, following the previous day's narrower list of hotel stocks. GE Vernova was his first illustration.
The screen is relative performance, not fundamentals. "Poor relative strength, typically bearish price volume correlation."
The characteristic shape is a winner that stops leading while the index keeps going. "A great winner that now we know is underperforming its sector, its market." The S&P 500, he noted, is at or near a high
He gave a downside target. "I mean, 200 or 300, if you will, to 1,200 is a big move. And here comes the giveback. And so, where is it likely headed? I would think 800."
Adami said the company does not report until towards the end of October, so there is no earnings event to break the pattern
The analysts covering it are nowhere near the chart. Adami, reading FactSet data on air: "I also want to point out that there 40 analysts that cover the stock, according to FactSet. Average price target, for reference, not that it matters, is $1,236. And here we are at 888."
He put the level that matters below the market: "I look at sort of the lows from June, which I think it's about 865 or so. That's your line in the sand."
4. Marriott Breaks Its Trend
The hotel operator was the previous night's work on Fast Money and the second chart of this episode.
Worth listed the specific features he is screening for, none of which are financial: "the flattening of the 150-day", the price "dropping and gapping", a heavy-volume gap down about a month ago, and a very poor session the day before
He said the combination is what makes it a signal rather than a wobble. "This has all the elements." Whether the shape is called a head and shoulders is beside the point: "It's something that's reversing."
The name of the pattern is literal. "And so, hence the nomenclature, bullish, it's been very bullish, 200 to 400, to bearish reversals."
Adami located the level where the fall should stop, from the last cycle. "I go back and look at the prior all-time high and you got to go back to February of 2025 when the stock traded I think 305 and then subsequently like a lot of things cascaded lower into the spring." Prior resistance becomes support, which is the level he would watch on the way down
The gap between the chart and the research is the same as GE Vernova's: "Average price target of the 30 analysts that covered is $385."
Adami also flagged a consumer read-through the market has not worked out yet, and that Marriott reports around Halloween
5. Caterpillar Kills Valuation
The third chart was the one Adami expected to surprise people, because Caterpillar has been a market favorite for a year on the argument that its machines dig the sites for AI data centers.
Worth's answer was that nothing in the valuation toolkit explains the last six months of the stock. "Over long periods of time for sure but this week, this month, no one intellectually can explain Caterpillar going from 800 in March to 1050 back to 800."
What he says does explain it is flow. "It has to do with money flow, it has to do with charts, it has to do with levels, relative strength, price time correlation" The market is at or near a high and the stock is struggling against it, which is the whole test
The stock bounced off the 150-day moving average and then fell through it, which is the sequence he treats as confirmation rather than noise, on a decline of roughly 1,050 to 800
Adami traced the round trip: the stock was near $300 in April of last year, before it became "everybody's all-American" on the strength of the AI trade and ran almost in a straight line to a thousand and change
The unanswerable question he put to Worth was whether Caterpillar leads or follows the AI semiconductor names, given the stock's reputation for "digging holes for the AI data centers"
6. The AI Semi Unwind Is On
Worth's reply was that the semiconductor question is not hypothetical, because that unwind has already started and has gone further than Caterpillar's.
The damage is visible in individual memory and storage names. "Think of SanDisk, Western Digital, these are down 50%."
He said the onus has changed sides. "The bears simply point to the fact that there's a major unwind underway, and there's no indication that it's over." He pointed at "the KOSPI index driven by SK Hynix" and by Samsung as the same move showing up in Korea
KLA was the next chart, a chip-equipment maker Adami said nobody discussed until last spring, when it caught the same bid as everything else AI-adjacent
Adami said the pattern repeats across the group: "Like many of these sort of semi-adjacent names that gap to the upside back in March, April." The move has round-tripped and left a gap in the chart
Worth's point is that the businesses have nothing to do with it. "That's because it's nothing to do with what business they're in." Put the charts side by side and page through them, he said, and you cannot tell which is which "Marriott has nothing to do with click or clack or cat" — his shorthand for KLA and Caterpillar by their ticker symbols The only difference is the speed: "Caterpillar can't spike the way clack spiked, but it's the exact same thing."
The sequence is identical in every case he showed. "A major run-up drawing in a lot of money, a major giveback, and a bounce off the 150-day, and now succumbing. Not good. Bunch of different industries, bunch of different sectors."
7. Tapestry and the Winners
The last of the five charts was Tapestry, the owner of Coach and Kate Spade, which Adami said gapped down alarmingly and is now following through.
Worth's framing was the size of the win that preceded it. "Think 40 to 160."
He treats the first break as the start rather than the end. "All about the run-up and that then the initial stumble is usually the beginning."
The same thing is happening in retailers nobody would group with a handbag maker. "We've seen it Walmart, we've seen it in TJX." His example of the extreme case was a convenience-store chain: "Look at Casey, c a s y. Maybe do a three or four or five year. This has been one of the greatest performers. And it's starting to roll."
The list runs both ways, and the other side of it is where the money is going. "Look at Roper. Look at NOW. Look at CRM. There's always rotation. There's always money flow."
That rotation is the reason the research note carries the name it does: "That's why we titled the research report of last 30 years money in motion."
Adami said the names that did not get a chart on air would go in the show notes
8. Analysts Get Offsides
The gap between the price targets Adami kept reading out and where the shares actually trade turned into a discussion of what sell-side research is now for.
Adami's complaint is that the analyst community moves as one. "But you know, the analyst community, it's one of those things where they all get on one side of the boat." Tapestry is his example: "And in this case, the average price target of the 24 analysts that cover Tapestry is north of $172." The question he posed is whether that ends in a mass exodus of ratings or in analysts doubling down
He said single-stock volatility over the past three or four months has been staggering, and not only in small companies. "And the fact that it hasn't made it into the broader market continues to sort of puzzle me a little bit."
Worth's explanation is regulatory. Before the rules changed there was the whisper number: "And companies would give sell-side analysts sort of the answer. All that has gone away."
Since then the forecasting has got worse and the pay has come down with it. "Interestingly, sell-side analysts have been paid less and less. They can't tie it to banking, and they can't particularly predict earnings. And so, it's just become journalism in many ways." "It's just maintenance. They cover it up. Stocks up, stocks down." He said there is "no real predictive ability" left in it
9. The Abercrombie Trade
Adami set up the weekly segment on WRTH, the options-income ETF Worth launched about five months ago, as the instrument that turns single-stock volatility into income rather than damage. The example was Abercrombie & Fitch, which Adami said had moved in a way that was, in a word, historic.
The move: "I mean, this is a stock that basically went from $108 in a straight line to about $150 back in, well, I guess a week or so ago."
The position sells options on both sides of the price and keeps the premium if the stock stays between them. "We sold the 175 calls, and we sold the 125 puts, taking in $2.64." Entered Wednesday, August 26th, with the shares at $152.60 "$2.64 divided by the price of the stock gives you a 1.73% yield for 24 days. 26% annualized."
What the fund is being paid for is the fall in volatility after a shock, not the direction of the stock. Worth said he is looking for "vol crush" — options premiums deflating once the news that inflated them has passed — with both sides expiring worthless
Adami asked whether there is a set of circumstances in which the fund would hedge the rise in single-stock volatility with a level in the VIX, the index of expected S&P 500 volatility. Worth said there are plenty of volatility funds and option-selling strategies that do it, and that it is not what he does
The levels come from the charts, not from options mathematics. He said other funds run on the Greeks, the sensitivities options traders measure, while his are strikes he judges unlikely to be reached in the 15 to 20 days before expiration
Low volatility and low correlation between stocks is the current backdrop. "It's a stock picker's market as people say", which he said will not last forever but has no real bearing on the strategy
Adami disclosed a position: "Full disclosure, Dan and I invest on a monthly basis in WRTH." He said he and Nathan are investors rather than traders in it
10. Energy at All-Time Highs
The last two subjects were the ones Adami said are pulling on each other — energy and yields. The Energy Select Sector SPDR is at an all-time high with oil well below where it was the last time the fund was there.
The oil price no longer has to rise for the energy stocks to. "Crude is probably anywhere from $18 to $25 lower depending on what you're looking at." "Yet, here's the XLE making all-time highs."
Adami stated his own position: "By the way, I'm bullish in crude stocks, but I'm not saying I'm right."
Worth called the sector chart excellent and expects it to break out. "It's returned to its former high and there's every indication that it's going to move up and out above the former high breakout."
Inside the sector he is selective. "We think the refiners are a little overdone that would be Valero, PSX, MPC, but this is they're only 15% weight." The weight is in Exxon, Chevron and Conoco
The case is defensiveness plus profitability. Energy is a defensive part of the market at a moment when the exciting parts — semis — are under pressure, and with "crude is at 80 dollars a barrel" the companies earn money quarter after quarter
His conclusion was a position, not an observation. "we like energy as an overweight"
11. Nvidia's 17.5x Multiple
Adami closed on semiconductors, working through Nvidia's chart after earnings and then the broader chip index.
Nvidia "closed around 207 ish or something 208" on the day it reported and then traded up to about 227
Worth's read on the reaction is that the pop did not produce a new high. The stock "was unable to make a new all-time high" even after getting through the print
Adami put the 150-day moving average on the chip index at 510 and an uptrend from the April low, and said the chart looks "a tad vulnerable" to him, while allowing he may be "clutching at straws"
The call given on air was to be "underweight semis as a theme", both against the market and within technology, and to be short the group for anyone able to
The valuation is the part neither of them can reconcile. "We know 105% year-over-year revenue growth. We know the EPS growth. We know their margins." The market is rewarding that with a 17.5x forward multiple The thought experiment: "I want to tell you about a company that just doubled its revenues and doubled its quarterly results from the year prior." "And the stock didn't really go up. Nobody cares. And it's trading below a market multiple. This is not possible. That's why valuation is irrelevant."
The position that follows is a shrug rather than a sale. "It's a hold, but it's not exciting. It's lost its potential." The catalyst has come and gone and the stock is lower than it was before the results Broadcom's results are the next event he is waiting on
Adami's darker reading is that the discount is information. "There's a reason why the market is trade is trading this at a discount to the broader market." "And maybe it's sort of foretelling something a bit more ominous."
Bonus Insights
Adami said the bullish-to-bearish names that did not get a chart on air would be published in the show notes, and Worth's note itself runs to a full sell list with a chart for each name
Worth on why he distrusts his own industry's certainty about a number: "There's wisdom in price."
On the many ways to run a volatility strategy, none of which he uses: "there's as many ways to get to heaven"
Adami's own hit rate, offered before he criticized anyone else's: he is "wrong the majority of the time"
The episode opened on the calendar rather than the market, with Worth noting that "it doesn't feel like September" and that it is, he supposed, still summer
Adami ran the charts through a producer, Amanda, drawing trendlines live on request, and said Dan Nathan was off for the day
Worth's sign-off was his own business description: "Worth charting. Great hair. Old-fashioned technical analysis. Nothing slick other than my hair. Just charts."
Worth's bottom line is that one chart pattern is breaking winners across industries that have nothing to do with each other, and that no valuation argument — Nvidia's included — is going to stop it.
Products, Companies & Tools Mentioned
GE Vernova (The first bullish-to-bearish reversal on Worth's list; he sees the stock heading to 800 against an average analyst target Adami read as $1,236)
Marriott International (A hotel operator with what Worth called all the elements of a reversal — a flattening 150-day average, a heavy-volume gap down and a broken trend)
Caterpillar (The stock Worth uses to argue valuation is irrelevant: 800 in March to 1050 and back to 800 with no fundamental explanation)
KLA (Chip-equipment maker that spiked last spring and has round-tripped the whole move, leaving a gap in the chart)
Tapestry (Handbag and accessories group Worth charts from 40 to 160; the average target of 24 analysts is north of $172)
Nvidia and the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (Doubled revenue and profit yet trades on a 17.5x forward multiple; the chip index's 150-day average was put at 510)
Abercrombie & Fitch and the WRTH options-income ETF (The week's trade: calls sold at 175 and puts at 125 against a $152.60 share price, collecting $2.64)
Energy Select Sector SPDR (At an all-time high with crude $18 to $25 below its March level; Worth wants energy overweight)
Valero, Phillips 66 and Marathon Petroleum (The refiners Worth thinks are a little overdone, and only 15% of the sector's weight)
Exxon Mobil, Chevron and ConocoPhillips (Where the weight in the energy sector actually sits)
VanEck Gold Miners ETF and Newmont (Broke a downtrend on gaps and is now filling them; Worth would buy Newmont nearer 115)
SanDisk and Western Digital (Down 50%, Worth's evidence that the semiconductor unwind is already well underway)
SK Hynix and Samsung (The two names driving the KOSPI, where he says the same unwind is visible)
Walmart, TJX and Casey's General Stores (Retail winners showing the same first stumble; Casey's is his example of a long-running outperformer starting to roll)
Roper Technologies, ServiceNow and Salesforce (The bearish-to-bullish side of the same list — where Worth says the money is rotating to)
Broadcom (The next semiconductor result Worth is waiting on)
Books & Resources Mentioned
Money in Motion: "Bullish-to-Bearish" Reversal Sell List – Worth Charting (The 1 September research note this episode walks through, with a chart for each name and the full sell list; the show linked it in its episode notes)
The previous day's Money in Motion note (The narrower hotel-stock version Worth says this list broadens out; not published publicly)
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