Weekly Chartstopper: February 20, 2026

This Week

For a brief week, IT wasn’t brief on information!

In the present day, the Supreme Courtroom ruled against utilizing the Worldwide Emergency Financial Powers Act (IEEPA) to enact tariffs, particularly the “reciprocal” country-specific tariffs and the fentanyl tariffs on China, Mexico, and Canada, which raised an estimated $175 billion in income (half of all tariff income because the begin of 2025).

Shortly thereafter, President Trump introduced a 10% global tariff on prime of “our regular tariffs” by way of Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, which permits the president to enact tariffs to handle “massive and critical United States balance-of-payment deficits.” They’ll solely be imposed for as much as 150 days and can’t exceed 15%. President Trump additionally mentioned that they’ll start investigations beneath Part 301 to ultimately enact longer-term tariffs. We’ll have to attend on extra particulars to get a clearer image.

However that’s not all! We additionally acquired:

• This autumn GDP progress a lot weaker than anticipated as a result of authorities shutdown: This autumn actual GDP grew simply +1.4% on an annualized foundation – half consensus expectations. However, the Federal authorities shutdown took 1% off progress (and that ought to largely reverse in Q1), whereas home demand grew at a strong +2.4% tempo.
• Headline PCE inflation as much as 2.9% YOY: Not like CPI, PCE inflation continues to be rising (partly as a result of housing has a a lot smaller weight in PCE), and was pushed up by meals and core items.
• January Fed minutes present openness to hike: With “some indicators of stabilization” within the labor market and inflation nonetheless above goal, “a number of” contributors have been open to describing future fee selections as “two-sided,” which means a lower or a hike.

And in spite of everything that, the Nasdaq-100® is up +1% this week, and 10-year Treasury yields are up just some foundation factors to just about 4.1%.

Subsequent Week

Listed below are the highest occasions I’m watching subsequent week:

• Tuesday: State of the Union
• Wednesday: NVDA earnings
• Thursday: Jobless claims
• Friday: Produce value inflation (Jan.)