22 best-performing stocks of August, as the software industry continues its recovery
I'm LongbridgeAI, I can summarize articles.Moderna surged 152% in August, leading S&P 500 gains alongside a continued software industry recovery. The index rose 2.28%, with 22 stocks gaining over 20%. Software stocks rebounded significantly after a H1 decline, while semiconducters also recovered from July losses. Nvidia gained 8.6% despite strong earnings. The market remains earnings-driven, with the S&P 500's forward P/E declining to 19.7.
By Philip van Doorn
Moderna shares soared on test results for the drugmaker's experimental mRNA therapeutic vaccine, while software stocks continued to recover
These are among August's top-performing S&P 500 stocks.
Although the rise in oil prices and blowout earnings from megacap technology companies have grabbed headlines in August, there's a lot more to the market's rally in the past month than strength in those two sectors.
The S&P 500 index SPX has gained 2.5% during August. Shares of biotechnology company Moderna (MRNA) have made the biggest splash with a 152% gain, but the software industry has had another excellent month, continuing its recovery that started in June.
Here's a summary of how the 11 sectors of the S&P 500 have performed during August, through early trading on Monday. The sectors are sorted by their performance for the month and are followed by the full S&P 500, the PHLX Semiconductor Index SOX and the S&P 500 Software & Services industry group.
Sector, index or industry group August price change Price change since June 30 2026 price change 2025 price change
Energy 6.9% 20.3% 41.9% 5.0%
Materials 6.5% 4.6% 16.2% 8.4%
Information Technology 5.9% 2.2% 22.1% 23.3%
Healthcare 4.1% 6.5% 9.2% 12.5%
Financial 1.4% 7.5% 5.3% 13.3%
Consumer Discretionary -0.1% 0.7% -0.4% 5.3%
Consumer Staples -0.9% 1.1% 7.8% 1.3%
Communication Services -0.9% -0.4% 0.0% 32.4%
Real Estate -2.2% 0.2% 9.9% -0.3%
Industrials -2.5% -5.5% 12.9% 17.7%
Utilities -5.6% -7.8% -2.1% 12.7%
S&P 500 index 2.5% 2.4% 12.2% 16.4%
PHLX Semiconductor Index 2.2% -18.8% 63.2% 42.2%
S&P 500 Software & Services 13.5% 28.4% 2.4% 9.7%
Source: LSEG
Price changes are also shown from the end of June. So far during the third quarter, the software industry group has performed very well, with a 28.4% gain. The group is up only slightly for all of 2026, but this marks a trend reversal after it sank 20% during the first half of the year.
Meanwhile, the PHLX Semiconductor Index of 30 chip makers and associated companies, which is tracked by the iShares Semiconductor exchange-traded fund SOXX, has gained 2.2% so far in August, following its decline of nearly 19% in July. Of course the semiconductor industry is still a market leader for 2026, with SOX up 63% so far this year. During August, that industry's leader, Nvidia (NVDA) - the largest company by market capitalization in the S&P 500 - has gained 8.6%, which is relatively modest considering the blowout results the company reported last week.
Best and worst performers of August
About half of the stocks in the S&P 500 were up for August through early Monday. There were 88 stocks showing gains of 10% or more.
Here are the 22 stocks in the S&P 500 showing gains of 20% or more for the month:
Company August price change Price change since June 30 2026 price change 2025 price change Intraday forward P/E Forward P/E as of Dec. 31
Moderna 151.7% 97.1% 368.0% -29.1% N/A N/A
Palantir Technologies 50.8% 59.0% 4.4% 135.0% 86.0 173.1
Salesforce 39.4% 63.7% -3.2% -20.8% 15.7 20.2
Paramount Skydance 37.8% 11.3% -18.1% 28.1% 14.8 13.4
Veeva Systems 36.4% 56.6% 24.5% 6.2% 28.2 26.1
Newmont 35.4% 35.8% 27.0% 168.3% 12.3 11.1
Gartner 31.8% 53.5% -21.1% -47.9% 12.5 18.7
ServiceNow 30.3% 46.0% -5.4% -27.7% 30.8 37.1
Super Micro Computer 29.4% 25.3% 25.6% -4.0% 8.3 11.6
Workday 26.9% 66.2% -5.3% -16.8% 16.4 20.3
Lumentum Holdings 25.1% 4.0% 142.2% 339.1% 38.2 50.2
Airbnb 24.4% 31.7% 38.9% 3.3% 31.9 28.3
Sandisk 24.2% -33.6% 535.9% N/A 6.8 13.6
Charles River Laboratories International 23.0% 26.1% 43.3% 8.1% 23.1 18.2
Coinbase Global 21.8% 21.9% -21.2% -8.9% 197.4 34.4
Estee Lauder 21.8% 29.4% -2.4% 39.7% 29.6 41.1
Freeport-McMoRan 21.7% 21.2% 50.1% 33.4% 20.1 19.3
Leidos Holdings 21.4% 36.3% -22.2% 25.2% 11.1 14.6
Zebra Technologies 21.0% 35.0% 46.4% -37.1% 16.2 13.7
CrowdStrike Holdings 20.6% 20.7% 96.5% 37.0% 158.2 99.1
DoorDash 20.3% 27.8% 4.2% 35.0% 61.1 70.7
Tyler Technologies 20.3% 27.3% -18.0% -21.3% 25.6 36.3
Source: LSET
The right-most columns include current forward price-to-earnings ratios and those at the end of 2025. The P/E ratios are based on rolling consensus 12-month earnings-per-share estimates among analysts polled by LSEG. For 12 of these 22 stocks, forward P/E ratios have declined this year, because the earnings estimates have risen more quickly than the share prices. This is in keeping with the theme of an earnings-driven bull market. The S&P 500's weighted forward P/E has declined to 19.7 from 22.2 at the end of 2025, according to FactSet.
An "N/A" for forward P/E means the consensus 12-month EPS estimate for that company is negative or that an earnings estimate is (or was) unavailable.
Here are the 10 worst performers of August among the S&P 500:
Company August price change Price change since June 30 2026 price change 2025 price change Intraday forward P/E Forward P/E as of Dec. 31
DaVita -25.1% -19.2% 58.2% -24.0% 11.0 8.9
Edison International -25.0% -26.1% -8.3% -24.8% 8.6 9.8
PG&E -24.4% -21.9% -18.2% -20.4% N/A 9.9
Honeywell Aerospace -22.3% -27.4% N/A N/A 19.0 N/A
Trade Desk -21.7% -21.8% -62.8% -67.7% 13.6 17.9