Rebels Edge · Mon, Aug 10, 2026
Will the S&P 500 Hit 8,000 This Year?
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Jon reviews subdued trading ahead of inflation data, lower volatility readings, and prediction-market odds favoring the S&P 500 exceeding 8,000 before year-end. He also discusses aviation, pharmaceutical, and AI-infrastructure stocks, outlines options as an alternative to stock ownership, and closes with sports commentary and a RebelCon 2026 promotion.
- Investors are described as waiting for Wednesday’s CPI release, with benign inflation readings potentially supporting fourth-quarter rate cuts.
- The VIX is quoted near 15.20 and the Nasdaq’s VXN near 23, indicating lower expected volatility.
- Kalshi odds of the S&P 500 exceeding 8,000 this year are quoted at roughly 65–67%, up from about 10% in April.
- Archer Aviation reportedly rose more than 22% intraday on announced plans involving Boeing’s Wisk Aero, SkyGrid, and Insitu businesses.
- Vertex Pharmaceuticals is highlighted for post-earnings momentum, confidence in full-year revenue guidance, and its cystic fibrosis franchise.
- NetApp and Super Micro Computer are discussed as beneficiaries of AI and cloud demand, while hyperscaler spending and investment payback remain concerns.
- Jon presents calls and option spreads as lower-capital alternatives to buying shares, emphasizing the need to understand options.
Full transcript
Welcome back my friends. Another week of The Rebel's Edge, but only one of the rebels is here today because Pete is either with the NFL network or KFAN. I'm not sure.
But I know he's covering the Vikings and that's one of his favorite things to do.
So he will not be here today, but we will still give you a breakdown of the volatility metrics for the S&P and Nasdaq as well as stocks and sports on today's Rebel's Edge.
>> [music] [music] >> Well, great to have you back folks and an interesting
trading day so far. It's not so much like a heartbeat like we talked about with a big up and then the next day a big down and a big up and a big down.
Today it's kind of flatlining.
>> [laughter] >> That doesn't mean the markets are dead.
It just means that the movement in the markets is just not really there today and perhaps for a pretty good reason because we've got consumer price index CPI coming our way on Wednesday and perhaps absent any other really big news,
investors are waiting rather than willing to go in on the bullish side or take profits or get short on the bearish side. So that's kind of my breakdown of what the macro is today.
The yield on the 10-year benchmark benchmark did fall after last week's weaker than expected jobs number. The labor department put that out. That provided some hope that maybe we could see rather than a hike a
cut, but I'm not predicting that yet.
I'm just saying that's one of the hopes out there. And as Brad Pitt said in F1, hope is not a strategy.
Uh but nonetheless, we are watching closely to see that CPI print.
Um and if producer price and CPI do give us a benign reading, maybe we could be back off the uh idea that we're going to hike rates, which I think would be disastrous. And instead,
back onto the potential for a fourth quarter cut or two. We will have to see.
All right, let's take a look at the VIX, folks. Because the volatility metric for the S&P 500, again, not the fear gauge, but instead the volatility metric which tells us expected movement um for the S&P 500, as you can see there, it's
about 1520. It's pretty damn near flat on the session, coming down from last week's high, which was 17 and 1/2 18, all the way back down to 1520. And I'll point out that the VXN, which is the volatility metric for the
Nasdaq, the VXN is, um lowest level since June 4th. So, we're talking basically a little over 2 months ago the last time we had a 23 reading for the VXN. And all those ups and downs you see out of that VXN, that's because we were
seeing chip stocks hammered, chip chip stocks rally, data centers hammered, data centers rally, and so forth. And a lot of that, folks, I know you know this because we've covered it, was because 500,000 accounts were being liquidated
in South Korea.
Um and the KOSPI index that they traded on, well, that index happened to be very heavy in tech. So, whether you're Leopold Aschenbrenner or one of those unfortunate uh souls who was part of that 500,000 accounts that Goldman Sachs
cited that were liquidated between July 13th till the end of July, that is that heartbeat market. And without that kind of movement and instead waiting for patience, uh that's where we are right now. All right, so that's the story with volatility.
let's talk about prediction markets because Kalshi shows that 65% uh odds that the S&P will go over 8,000 this year. Now, where is the S&P right now? 7760, folks. So, they're seeing uh
the potential for a pretty nice rally uh either into year-end or before year-end, uh and that's rather bullish, I would say. As you can see, the uh odds had moved up pretty dramatically from April
when it was about a 10% chance of us seeing 8,000, now 67% chance. Again, this is according to Kalshi. I'm not saying that this is the same as the trillions of dollars that are invested in the stock market, but
nonetheless, this is very defined to a single point like this one, 8,000 sometime between now and the end of the year. That's how that that would pay off. All right, let's talk about Archer.
Um A C H R Archer Aviation, their shares were up over 22% for a while today. Uh basically, the company announcing that they were going to acquire Boeing's Wisk Aero as well as Sky SkyGrid. And with them doing that
and the Insitu, I think is how Insitu Insitu uh subsidiary, They were going to basically have autonomy for electric vertical takeoff, which is one of the things that they specialize in, of course, but autonomous and unmanned
systems, not so much, not yet. But, now with these, that could indeed be part of their future, and that's why ACHR was seeing a pretty nice jump. Boeing is going to retain access to their core autonomous flight technology. But,
nonetheless, when you're a company like Archer, and you have one of the biggest aerospace giants basically partnering up with you, that's a very bullish thing.
That's why we're seeing that stock move up so sharply today. All right, let's talk about Vertex Pharmaceutical. Symbol here is VRTX, and they were up basically residual momentum from second quarter earnings.
Um, and they also basically are looking at full-year revenue guidance that looks like it's within their grasp to make it to that full-year guidance, not just one quarter, but the full-year guidance. And analysts are pretty bullish on the possibility that they could indeed do that, because
we have several analysts here that were moving up the potential for them hitting these higher marks. And basically a cystic fibrosis franchise that they've got to treat that horrible disease, that's one of the big things that people
are focused on in the analyst community.
And obviously, anytime you have something that can treat horrible diseases and or maladies like that, you're going to see some positive news around it, and the analysts are just supporting it. All right, let's talk about NetApp, NTAP.
So, basically storage and data management play, basically they're tied into AI and enterprise cloud demand. And just like Intel said, except Intel of course is raising a lot of money and that's why that stock is being hit. But
nonetheless, the demand is still very strong. If somebody out there is telling you or your financial advisor, "I don't know, you know, this data center demand doesn't seem like it's real." Yes, it does. Yes, it does. Are they spending too much to deliver on the promise of
AI? Perhaps some of these hyperscalers are doing that. But, when you're looking at something like this which has very liquid options and so forth, N T A P does, you have ways that you can play without just putting your money on the stock.
And as Pete and I always say, if you want to be in the market but with less risk, one of the ways to do it, once you understand how options work, is through options. You could buy an option spread, you could buy a straight-out call option, spend a lot less money
than owning the stock. And some of these stocks are pretty pricey, so you have more potential for diversification, not just putting less money on down. You actually have potentially, I could go into three or four stocks in this space rather than just one. Like I say, a little more
diversification. And I'm going to wind up today with Super Micro Computer because it was up 5, 6% early on.
Optimism around what?
AI servers.
AI server demand and so forth. Again, somebody tells you that the demand isn't there, they are lying to you. The demand is there. and as I said about hyperscalers, question is how long does the payback take for these hyperscalers because they are spending as if all that money is going to be
coming at them right away. It may, and with the demand being as high as it is, that does give them the opportunity to sign people up for longer-term contracts, as you might imagine. These are not just rookie business people that have never been in business of this
scale before. I mean, not when you look at Amazon Web Services, Meta, any of these big companies that are providing basically what the data centers need and or the hyperscalers need.
Those hyperscalers are spending because they know the demand is there, even if somebody like Meta, for instance, is selling off some of their compute. Only makes sense because you'd rather, once you're once you've spent and you've got that sunk cost into the data centers and
so forth, your hyperscaler like Meta, you want to be able to get as much money as possible. If you only have 80% of the compute being used, should you pump out the other 20% to any active bidder? Of course, you should. That's what they're doing, folks. That's how you know that the uh uh
hyperscalers are not stupid.
All right.
Pete Redstone Sports, but without Pete.
Without Pete today. So, I thought you guys uh would perhaps just like all those men and women in the sports book out at Circa, one of our partners here. I thought you guys might get a kick out of this because um a lot of people, including a Supreme
Court Justice, could not describe what a woman is. Um they either elect to act stupid or they are stupid because I could describe for you what a woman is, but again, I don't run the WNBA, but this woman does a great job breaking
down exactly what's breaking down with the WNBA. So, give it a look and a listen, folks.
>> Y'all, this is going to be the funniest thing I've seen all week. Two former NBA players just declared for the WNBA draft. And the WNBA players union immediately came out pissed off saying, "We will not be used as political pawns." Sweet Jesus, that's all you've been used as for years. All we have been told is inclusion, self-identification,
trans women are women, biology doesn't matter. And if a woman dared actually said, "Mhm, I think biology matters quite a bit when we're talking about women's sports." She was the problem then. These two dudes just simply looked at the rules that they have been defending about all of this DEI stuff and said, "All right, bet. I identify as a woman.
Let us play." Now, all of a sudden, IT'S WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, you can't do that. Well, why not, sugar tits? I thought if you said you were a woman, then >> [laughter] >> you were a woman, and if anybody asked you to prove otherwise, then they're a bigot, how dare they? Well, see, they didn't really change your argument. They just followed it to its logical conclusion and dropped it directly on
your doorstep. Ball's in your court, WNBA.
Which way you going to choose? This is fun.
Have a good day.
>> Yep. This is fun.
Um now, some of you might say, "Well, but is is Jon being um very hyperbolic with this?" No, I'm not. I I'm saying I'd rather have uh biological women compete against biological women. I'm not alone in saying that. I'm smart enough. If you
want to do um an academic test, by all means, women and men equal. As far as physical, no, not equal. Um so, you look at Enes Kanter.
Um I met him, nice man, um from Turkey, uh played for the Celtics when I was uh uh introduced to him at CNBC. Really smart guy and not a big fan of the Turkish government either in the way they treat women over there because of
the Muslim background, I suppose. But, um, he's a former NBA center, folks. I mean, he played for the Knicks. He played for the Celtics. He played for the Trail Blazers. This guy is an All-Star. And he said basically, "You know what? Uh, I'm going to declare for their draft."
And he said, "And if they don't draft me, um, we're probably going to have to take this to a higher court." Uh, same thing with Royce White. Um, he's a former first-round pick by the Houston Rockets in 2012. Well, we're 14
years on from 2012, so his NBA career has wound down and he's thinking, "You know what?
Suddenly, I feel myself identifying as a woman.
And I'm going to go in there and play with them. And I think I'm going to hoop it up with those queens. My queens. And I'm probably going to score 100 points a game." Pushed at the highest levels by the idiots like, uh, Mr. Silver in the NBA.
So, they basically set the ground rules out and said, "We can't tell you what a woman is." Okay, we've got two men that say now they identify as women and they are more than willing to, uh, take this to the highest court in the land if
necessary to be able to say, "Hey, that W in your name, WNBA, means women. If you can't tell me what a woman is, I'm a woman." I'm down for it. All right. Then, uh, on a sad note, even though he's a wonderful
guy, um, Don Nelson, uh, passed away. He was a legendary NBA coach. He was 86 years old. The second winningest coach in NBA history.
Five-time champion as a player with the Celtics. Now, granted, he had a lot of great players around him, too, but that's pretty special, folks. And he passed away, his family said, um at 86. Don Nelson, great job.
Um I'm happy for the wonderful life and career that you had in basketball. So, let's uh celebrate people who succeed as Don Nelson did, both as a player and a coach. Well, with that said, folks, I'm going to thank all of you for tuning in today.
Remind you that that sports book you see behind me, the largest sports book in the world, Circa, c i r c a, we've got some great information and news coming your way this week about a fabulous lineup of speakers that we've got that
are going to be out there at Circa with me, with Pete, with Mark LaPresti, with Ryan Mast Astro, with our whole team, and the lineup will shock you because it's the biggest lineup we've ever put together. It's RebelCon 2026. Can't wait
for it, folks. You'll see about it tomorrow on The Rebels Edge, 1:00 p.m.
Eastern time. 1:00 p.m.
Thank you.
Transcript from the show's YouTube captions; automatic captions may contain errors. Educational content, not investment advice.