Cluster Rotation

Which market clusters are leading vs lagging the S&P 500

Updated July 17, 2026

Each row is one of the 25 co-movement clusters — groups of stocks and ETFs that historically move together. The columns show how each cluster has performed vs SPY over the last 4 weeks, 13 weeks, and full year (excess return in percentage points), plus a 13-week sparkline of that running excess. Sorted by 4-week excess, so the current leaders are at the top.

The sparkline is the story: a steady climb means consistent weekly beats vs SPY; a bend in the curve is where leadership changed. A cluster with a negative 4W reading but an upward-curving sparkline is closing its gap — the early rotation signal.

Cluster	4W vs SPY	13W vs SPY	1Y vs SPY	Perform
Payments & fintech	+13.5pp	−3.0pp	−40.1pp	21
Card networks and payment processors.
Insurance	+11.1pp	+2.7pp	−12.1pp	45
Property-casualty and life insurers — the steady financials.
Data & analytics	+9.0pp	−4.4pp	−34.3pp	24
Ratings, indices and financial-data franchises.
Health care	+8.5pp	−0.1pp	+1.1pp	54
Tools, biotech and large-cap pharma — defensive growth.
Energy	+7.5pp	+0.1pp	+16.9pp	71
Oil & gas producers and services — the commodity-price trade.
Software / cloud	+7.5pp	+11.5pp	−23.7pp	35
Enterprise software and cloud — the long-duration growth engine.
Banks	+5.5pp	+6.4pp	+2.5pp	61
Regional and money-center banks — the rate-and-credit trade.
REITs / real estate	+4.8pp	−0.8pp	−11.7pp	42
Equity REITs — the property and rate-duration trade.
IT services	+4.7pp	−17.2pp	−45.3pp	17
IT services, consulting and outsourcing.
Aerospace-defense	+4.5pp	−1.6pp	−3.7pp	45
Defense primes and steady-demand contractors.
Media & cable	+4.4pp	−17.4pp	−26.2pp	29
Cable, broadcast and media networks.
Utilities	+3.1pp	−4.7pp	−4.5pp	53
Regulated power and water — the rate-sensitive defensive.
Staples / low-vol	+3.0pp	−2.4pp	−12.0pp	39
Consumer staples and low-vol dividend payers — the bond proxy.
Retail	+2.1pp	−7.2pp	−8.1pp	50
Consumer-discretionary retail — the spending-cycle book.
Industrials / SMID	+1.7pp	−0.5pp	+1.4pp	55
Broad industrial and small/mid-cap cyclicals — the economy beta.
Cash & short duration	+0.4pp	−4.8pp	−19.2pp	30
T-bill and ultra-short / floating-rate funds.
Bonds / fixed income	−0.4pp	−6.8pp	−19.6pp	30
Bond ETFs — the pure duration and credit sleeve.
Travel & leisure	−1.8pp	−1.8pp	−3.7pp	49
Airlines, hotels, cruises and casinos — the reopening trade.
Homebuilders	−2.1pp	−9.1pp	−25.2pp	31
Homebuilders and building products — the housing-rate trade.
Int'l (ex-US)	−2.3pp	−8.0pp	−6.5pp	51
Foreign and emerging-market equity — the weak-dollar trade.
Spec growth	−2.7pp	−6.5pp	−16.4pp	42
High-beta growth, fintech and disruption — the risk-on extreme.
Miners / metals	−4.2pp	−13.2pp	+13.1pp	64
Metals, mining and materials — the hard-asset cycle.
Thematic ETFs	−4.9pp	−9.3pp	+4.5pp	55
Clean-energy, niche-theme and preferred-income ETFs.
Electrification	−8.2pp	−5.1pp	+13.5pp	62
Power, grid and data-center build-out — the AI-capex spillover.
Semis & hardware	−12.6pp	+10.0pp	+71.8pp	77
Chipmakers and the gear that builds them — the AI-cycle epicentre.

Excess returns = cluster equal-weight index minus SPY, both rebased to 100 at the start of each window. Sparkline: 13-week running excess vs SPY, rebased to 0 at week −13 — slope = trend strength, a bend = regime change. Clustering window: trailing 5y. Series built July 17, 2026. Perform score is the cluster average marketBeat1Y from the live universe (— for ETF clusters).