In the second half of this year, investors should rotate out of the ” Magnificent 7 ” stocks and other hyperscalers and into a wider assortment of companies as part of a “broadening out” trade, Josh Brown, co-founder and CEO of Ritholtz Management, told CNBC. “I think you want to focus on non-hyperscalers that are seeing business improvement in the form of upside earnings surprises as a result of their uses of AI,” Brown said Thursday on ” Halftime Report .” “This whole broadening out trade that we’re living through in the markets … is being driven by this idea.” Brown said two insurers, Travelers Companies and Chubb Limited , offer ways to play the trend. He also likes a pair of industrials, Caterpillar and GE Vernova . Brown’s spoke after Google owner Alphabet on Wednesday raised its capital expenditures forecast for the year to between $195 billion and $205 billion to deepen its push into artificial intelligence. The increased spending sparked a sell off in hyperscaler stocks Thursday, with Meta Platforms , Microsoft and Amazon all lower. “You talk about the companies that are going to feel the efficiencies and the productivity from AI use first. These have to be at the top of the list,” Brown said of Travelers and Chubb. Both were between 1% and 2% higher Thursday. Industrials such as Caterpillar and GE Vernova present other opportunities to play the broadening out of the AI trade. Caterpillar was about 1% higher while GE Vernova was ahead 5% Thursday. “When you’ve got the industrials reacting positively to a game on announcement from Alphabet, you look at this market and you say, ‘Okay, I don’t need to worry about whether or not the hyperscalers hold up. I have so many other ways to play what’s going on,'” Brown said.
Josh Brown says the stock market is ‘broadening out.’ Here’s how to play it
Jul 23, 2026
