CrowdStrike is up 104% this year, which makes it the 12th best stock in the Nasdaq 100 and the 15th best in the S&P 500. On CNBC's Investment Committee that was offered as the settled answer to a question the rest of the market is still arguing about.
The argument is whether the artificial intelligence winners are still easy to pick. Wells Fargo cut technology to equal weight that morning, and Mike Santoli's market memo said the phase when the winners outnumbered the losers is over. The panel's answer was to stop guessing at models and buy what every model requires.
"What I can promise you is there is no AI without the appropriate amount of cybersecurity."
This is the programme whose panelists trade against their own published positions on air, broadcasting live from the Future Proof conference in Huntington Beach — and Stephanie Link spent the Trade Tracker segment defending three moves she made this week.
The full segment is covered here so you can skip it.
Here are the 7 insights that matter.
👤 Panel: Stephanie Link, Chief Investment Strategist at Hightower Advisors, who trades her own published positions on air
🎙️ Host: Scott Wapner, host of CNBC's Halftime Report, broadcasting from the Future Proof conference in Huntington Beach, California
👥 Also on: Kate Rooney, who covers financial technology and artificial intelligence for CNBC, reporting from San Francisco
🧩 Other segments: Rick Rieder, Chief Investment Officer of Global Fixed Income at BlackRock
📰 Published: 15 September 2026 on CNBC's Halftime Report
🟣 Apple Podcasts | 🔗 Episode page | ⏱️ length not available
Key Takeaways
The trade that does not depend on picking a model is cybersecurity, because no amount of AI spending happens without it
CrowdStrike is up 104% year to date, and Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks have doubled as well
Wall Street started marking down the AI trade on the same morning: Wells Fargo cut technology to equal weight
The camps on slowing AI down now run through the labs, the chip makers and the White House
The labs are arguing for guardrails while Nvidia's chief executive says the extinction talk is irresponsible and costs the US its lead
Wells Fargo is back in a portfolio that had exited it, on margins rather than on the asset cap
It has lagged the big five banks by 14% this year and trades at 1.4 times book and 11 times earnings
Bank of America's worst day since April 2025 was an overreaction to a guidance change that is really a yield-curve problem
Netflix is 38% below its all-time high, which the panel treats as a valuation opportunity rather than a warning
1. The AI Safety Divide
Wapner opened on what investors are supposed to do with AI-related stocks now that the safety argument has become a daily news story, and said the headlines will keep coming multiple times a day for the foreseeable future.
His inventory of the week: a Google DeepMind staffer whose exit post said AI may "kill us all", a Time magazine cover asking how dangerous the technology is under the title "the AI tipping point", and a president who has been calling the safety fears a hoax on social media.
"It seems like every significant voice within the techno sphere, if you will, is weighing in." He named David Sacks, Gavin Baker and Nikesh Arora, and Jensen Huang's appearance at the All-In Summit the day before, which the president called into.
Kate Rooney, reporting from San Francisco, said camps are forming around the single question of whether to slow AI down.
The labs are on one side. "Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei kicked all of this off over the weekend with an essay on Saturday calling for an AI slowdown." Sam Altman tweeted his support.
Her news line was fresh: OpenAI had told CNBC within the hour that it is working with other AI companies — Anthropic and Google in particular — on how to police and oversee the technology.
Elon Musk agreed with Amodei publicly and expanded on it at the same summit. Rooney's summary of his position: "He said when people from Anthropic and OpenAI are telling you that their models are very dangerous, he said we should believe them." He called for a peer review of the most powerful models.
The other side is the chip maker. Rooney reported Huang saying companies should take safety seriously but should draw a line between concrete risks and predictions of human extinction, and calling some of the rhetoric irresponsible. His competitive argument is that slowing down could cost the United States its lead over China.
The president agrees with that, and called the fear that AI could take over or destroy humanity a hoax — with Huang on speakerphone on stage.
The regulatory position Rooney gave last is that no new law is needed: Pentagon technology chief Emil Michael argued the existing statutes already provide the tools to police the industry.
2. Wells Fargo Downgrades Tech
Wapner brought the story back to positioning with two pieces of sell-side and in-house work published that morning.
Wells Fargo downgraded technology to equal weight.
Wapner read from Mike Santoli's market memo that "the youthful phase of AI when promise was unlimited and winner were easy to spot and vastly outnumbered losers is over."
The question he put to the panel followed from it: is it going to be harder now to tell the winners from the losers?
3. Cybersecurity Has No Losers
The answer came back that the question is already settled, and the panelist who made the case asked for the charts in rapid succession.
"I think it couldn't be easier. The market has spoken. We have the verdict already."
CrowdStrike is the evidence. "Stock's up 104% year to date. It is the 12th best stock in the Nasdaq 100 is the 15th best stock in the S&P 500."
The argument is that the trade does not require a view on which model or which cloud wins. "I don't care what model you're rooting for. I don't care what LM what hyperscaler I don't care. What I can promise you is there is no AI without the appropriate amount of cybersecurity."
The direction of that spending is treated as one-way: "Tell me one government or one board of directors at a public company that's having a meeting, even considering lowering the amount that they're spending on cybersecurity in the age of AI."
Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks were put up alongside it, and the claim made for the group was that all three have doubled this year.
The comparison with the rest of the complex is the point rather than a dismissal of it. Money can be made in chips, in the hyperscalers and in power — but none of that spending can be banked on without the security spending that accompanies it.
4. Wells Fargo Bought Back
In the Trade Tracker segment Wapner turned to Stephanie Link, who had bought back a position she had exited — Wells Fargo, once her largest holding.
Her case is that the turnaround has become visible. The asset cap was lifted a year ago, and it has taken the bank this long to build momentum.
"They were at barclays this week at the conference talking about gaining market share in investment banking. In m&a. Fee growth is accelerating."
The number she cares about most is the margin. "Most importantly, NIM net interest margins have bottomed and net interest income is growing. And that is by definition positive operating leverage to be seen."
Net interest margin is the spread between what a bank earns on its loans and what it pays for deposits, so a bottom in that spread is what turns rising loan balances into rising profit.
The valuation case is relative and absolute at once. "So this stock has actually lagged the big five by 14% year to date. It's down 2% in the year, trading at 1.4 times. Book 11 times earnings."
Her verdict: "I think they're back."
5. Bank of America's Bad Day
Wapner raised Bank of America's worst session since April 2025, after the bank said it expects third-quarter investment banking fees to fall more than 10%, and Morgan Stanley's response that the reaction was overdone.
Link owns the stock and was surprised by the size of the move, because the same update carried a lot of positive material.
What changed was the size of a benefit rather than the direction of one: positive operating leverage this year of 2 to 300 basis points instead of 500.
Her point is where the shortfall comes from. "That's a yield curve thing. I don't think it's really in their control."
She set it against what the bank's chief executive had said on CNBC a week or two earlier about business momentum, loan growth, demand growth and deposit growth, and called the session a backtrack rather than a warning. At this valuation, she said, she is not concerned at all.
Another panelist made the broader case for the group: the opportunity in net interest income is real, and even with investment banking down there will be a lot of transaction volume, so trading remains a large driver for the financials.
6. Netflix 38% Off the High
Wapner ran through two more of Link's purchases.
She added to Netflix, which is 38% below its all-time high. "I think the stock is just too cheap."
She cited Mark Mahaney's note from the previous day, a $110 price target, and his argument that the market is missing all of the positives, and said she agrees.
She also added to Delta Air Lines on the dip, and her reasoning is that the selling is not about Delta: the airlines are being depressed together because crude oil is back above $100.
Her expectation is that the oil move reverses quickly, which is what makes the dip a buying opportunity rather than a repricing.
7. Target at 16x Earnings
The final trades ran through three names and one exchange-traded fund.
Target had been named on the show a couple of weeks earlier as one of the best stocks in the market, and has now gone into client portfolios in a concentrated momentum strategy — at about 16 times earnings with 33% growth expected over the next year.
Telsey Advisory Group reiterated its outperform rating with a $182 price target.
Link has owned Target for a long time, and said the wait was not fun: "This year it's up 61% year to date and they have a lot of momentum in."
The other final trades named were Truist Financial, where the panelist's interest is another new chief executive, and the iShares US Healthcare ETF.
Bonus Insights
The programme was broadcast live from the Future Proof conference in Huntington Beach, California, and Wapner trailed the Closing Bell panel he would host from the same venue at 3pm eastern: Tom Lee, Dan Ives, Sarah Malik and Cheryl Penny of Dynasty.
Wapner's framing of the AI safety story was about volume rather than substance — that the headlines will arrive several times a day, every day, for the foreseeable future, which is itself the condition investors have to trade in.
One panelist's method was on display more than his conclusion: he asked for the charts one after another and let the year-to-date performance make the argument, on the view that the market has already voted on which parts of the AI complex are winners.
The committee's bottom line is that the AI trade has stopped being a single trade: the panel would rather own the spending nobody can cut — cybersecurity — than pick a model, and the money freed up is going into financials and consumer names where the valuation case can be argued from margins and multiples rather than from a forecast.
Products, Companies & Tools Mentioned
CrowdStrike, Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks (The cybersecurity trade the panel called the settled AI winner — CrowdStrike up 104% year to date, and the claim that all three have doubled this year)
Wells Fargo (Bought back into Stephanie Link's portfolio on bottoming net interest margins, and the source of the morning's technology downgrade to equal weight)
Bank of America (Worst day since April 2025 after guiding third-quarter investment banking fees down more than 10%; Link owns it and called the reaction overdone)
Netflix (38% below its all-time high, which Link added to, citing Mark Mahaney's $110 price target)
Delta Air Lines (Added on the dip, on the view that airlines are being marked down together because crude oil is back above $100)
Target (Put into client portfolios in a concentrated momentum strategy at about 16 times earnings, with Telsey Advisory Group reiterating outperform and a $182 target)
Truist Financial (A final trade, on the arrival of another new chief executive)
OpenAI, Anthropic and Google (OpenAI told CNBC during the hour that it is working with the other two on how to police and oversee AI models)
Nvidia (Jensen Huang's argument that slowing AI down would cost the United States its lead over China)
Books & Resources Mentioned
Dario Amodei's essay calling for an AI slowdown (The weekend piece Kate Rooney said started the argument, supported publicly by Sam Altman)
Mike Santoli's market memo (The CNBC commentator's note that the phase when AI winners outnumbered losers is over)
Time magazine's AI tipping point cover (One of the headlines Wapner used to describe the doomer side of the argument)
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