👀 Tariffs, Nvidia, and a Market That Can't Make Up Its Mind

This was a week that had everything — a Monday tariff shock, a midweek AI relief rally, a blockbuster Nvidia earnings beat that somehow still sent the stock lower, and a Friday selloff to close it out on a sour note. The S&P 500 finished the week around 6,867, down about 0.6% on Friday alone, as markets spent five straight sessions fighting between optimism and anxiety without ever settling on either. Tariff policy remained a moving target, software stocks staged a comeback, and Nvidia proved once again that beating expectations means nothing if the market already priced in perfection. And somewhere in the middle of all that noise, the Senior Vice President of Pool Corporation quietly walked into the open market and dropped $1.2 million of his own money on company stock — 42% below its 52-week high.

Author

silas peters
March 01, 2026

Good afternoon and happy Sunday! Here is a quick market rundown and an ‘inside’ peek behind the curtains of what C-Level Execs, Wall St. Hedge Fund Gurus, and politicians are trading right now…!

📊 Market Recap — Week Ending February 27, 2026

Market Performance

Monday set the tone early — the S&P 500 lost 1.04% and the Nasdaq dropped 1.1%, with the VIX spiking 10.1% to 21.01 as tariff fears rattled risk assets. Markets bounced back Tuesday through Wednesday before the S&P 500 fell 0.54% and the Nasdaq declined 1.18% on Thursday after Nvidia's earnings, despite a record beat, failed to inspire buyers. Friday saw a second consecutive session of selling, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 each falling roughly 1% as the Dow dropped 1.5%.

🔑 Key Drivers & Dynamics

🚨 1. Tariff Chaos — Again President Trump announced over the weekend a new blanket 15% global levy on imports, before the rate that actually took effect on Tuesday came in at 10% under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 for a period of 150 days. The whiplash from the announcement versus the actual implementation rattled markets Monday before cooler heads prevailed mid-week.

🤖 2. The AI Relief Rally That Didn't Last Beaten-down software stocks bounced Tuesday, with the Nasdaq 100 gaining 1.1% as AMD jumped about 9% after Meta announced plans to spend billions on its chips. Salesforce and ServiceNow added more than 4% and 2% respectively, with cybersecurity names Zscaler and Cloudflare also rebounding sharply. The relief was real — but short-lived.

💚 3. Nvidia Beat Everything — And Still Got Sold Nvidia reported data center revenue up 75% year over year to $62.3 billion. Total revenue of $68.13 billion beat estimates of $66.21 billion — what Morgan Stanley called the largest and cleanest beat in semiconductor industry history. The market's response? Nvidia shares fell more than 5% on Thursday — its worst single day since April — as concerns mounted that hyperscalers are depleting cash flows on AI capital expenditure.

🏠 4. Home Depot Gave the Dow Its Only Win Home Depot reported EPS of $2.72, beating estimates of $2.54, on revenue of $38.2 billion. The company also raised its dividend to $2.33 per share and reported comparable U.S. sales growth of 0.3%. A bright spot in an otherwise choppy week for consumer-facing names.

📺 5. Media M&A Drama Stole the Headlines Paramount raised its bid for Warner Bros. Discovery to $31 per share in all cash, with WBD CEO David Zaslav signaling support for the deal. Meanwhile, Netflix jumped 7% after walking away from its own bid for WBD's studio following Paramount's raised offer.

📌 Key Takeaways

😤 "Prove it" mode is fully activated. As Facet's chief investment officer Tom Graff put it, the market is in "prove it" mode — and Nvidia's record beat simply didn't clear the bar given concerns around its OpenAI deal and the sustainability of hyperscaler AI spending.

🤖 Jensen Huang pushed back on the AI fear trade. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told CNBC the markets got it wrong on AI disruption fears, arguing that enterprise software companies like ServiceNow would develop AI agents fine-tuned for their specific use cases — not be replaced by them.

📉 Software still under pressure. The iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF (IGV) is down more than 10% in February alone — a brutal month for a sector that entered the year with high expectations.

🖥️ Dell was the week's quiet winner. Dell surged 11% after forecasting that revenue from its AI-optimized server business would double in fiscal 2027, and announcing a 20% dividend hike alongside another $10 billion in stock buybacks.

🕵️ Insiders are buying while Wall Street cuts targets. Analysts are slashing price targets across the board. Insiders are opening their wallets. That divergence is worth paying close attention to.

👀 What We’re Watching Next Week

🎙️ Fed Commentary — With tariff volatility and sticky inflation keeping the rate-cut narrative on ice, any Fed speak will be parsed closely. The next move in rates may hinge on how tariff policy shakes out over the next 150 days.

🤖 AI Capex Narrative — The Nvidia sell-off was a direct vote of no-confidence in the sustainability of big tech AI spending. Watch for any commentary from Microsoft, Meta, or Alphabet that either confirms or refutes that concern. One reassuring capex update could reverse weeks of software pain.

📦 Tariff Clarity — Trump has signaled plans to reimpose broader tariffs within legal bounds after the Supreme Court's IEEPA ruling, meaning this story has more chapters. Any new trade policy development moves markets immediately.

💻 Software Sector Stabilization — IGV down 10%+ in a single month creates either a value opportunity or a value trap. Watch for whether buyers step in at these levels or the selling continues into March.

🏊 Pool Corporation (POOL) — POOL shares are down 37.5% over the past 52 weeks , and Q4 earnings missed on both EPS and revenue with a $0.15 per share shortfall against estimates. Analysts keep trimming targets. But Senior Vice President Kenneth G. St. Romain purchased 5,560 shares on February 23rd — a $1.2 million open-market buy that increased his stake by 7.19%. When insiders buy this aggressively into a 37% drawdown, it doesn't mean the bottom is in — but it does mean someone with real information thinks the market has it wrong.

Insider spotlight of the week…#POOL

Here is a snapshot of last week’s recent insider activity…

Politicians

C-Level Execs

Hedge Funds

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