Key takeaways: 

• Earnings season provided a source of interest in mega-tech shares from Microsoft to Alphabet, Meta Platforms, and a host of others.

• Computing shares also garnered attention at a time where AI and quantum computing have become topical themes. 

US shares faced heavy selling pressure during April as investors refocused their attention on accelerating inflation, and the prospect that interest rates may need to stay higher for longer. Meanwhile, bond yields surged, weighing on growth shares, particularly from the tech sector. 

Last month, the S&P 500 declined 4.2%, whereas the Nasdaq Composite and the Dow Jones booked monthly losses of 4.4% and 5% respectively. 

Corporate earnings also provided investors a focal point to monitor, with mixed results from the market’s biggest names. How did Selfwealth investors respond to all these developments, and what were investors buying and selling? Here is a recap of April’s trading activity. 

US share trading activity

Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) was the most traded US share on the Selfwealth platform last month, with trade volumes up around 10% month-over-month. Just over three-quarters of all trades in the electric vehicle manufacturer were ‘buys’. The company was in the news at the end of the month when reports emerged suggesting Tesla may have cleared a regulatory hurdle in China that is a prerequisite to rolling out its self-driving technology in the key EV market. 

Selfwealth investors also favoured mega-tech names like Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), with buyers accounting for circa 70% of trades. The two companies experienced contrasting fortunes in April, with Apple touching a yearly low, and Amazon trading at an all-time high. The duo ranked third and seventh for monthly trades on the Selfwealth platform, suggesting strong investor appetite for tech themes such as cloud computing and artificial intelligence.  

Making its inaugural appearance among the most actively traded US shares, Sportsmans Warehouse (NASDAQ: SPWH) was the 10th most traded name in April. As it so happens, the stock recorded a rare 100% buy-to-sell ratio, indicating a bullish outlook across the platform. The outdoor specialty retailer reported its fourth-quarter results, which pointed to a reduction in excess inventory, and exceeded the consensus the median consensus forecast (EPSF) amongst Wall Street analysts. 

Another share commanding strong trading interest last month ahead of its earnings report in early May was Danish multinational pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk (NYSE: NVO). The company, which makes diabetes and weight loss drugs Ozempic and Wegovy, has seen its share price climb around 50% over the last year. Its market cap recently eclipsed US$400 million, making it Europe’s most valuable company. In 18th spot, over two-thirds of last month’s trades in NVO were ‘buys’. 

There was also a clear trend where investors sought exposure to technology stocks, with IONQ (NYSE: IONQ), Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU), and Super Micro Computer (NASDAQ: SMCI) all among the top 20 for trades in April. It comes at a time where quantum computing has been a topical theme on home soil as the government expands its investment in this space.

Top 20 stocks by trades

While trade volumes in the iShares Bitcoin ETF (NASDAQ: IBIT) moderated, the fund held onto third position among the top ETFs by volume. However, two new entrants garnered new interest on the platform, as the GraniteShares 2x Long COIN Daily ETF (NASDAQ: CONL) and the GraniteShares 2x Long NVDA Daily ETF (NASDAQ: NVDL) found themselves in seventh and eighth respectively, with investors eyeing leverage to back their conviction in Coinbase and Nvidia.

Top 10 ETFs by trades

After an absence in March, both Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) were back among the trades drawing the greatest money flow on the Selfwealth platform. The pair reported earnings last month, and it was also this event which coincided with notable share price movements and an uptick in trading volumes in these names.  

Meta recorded a double-digit decline in its share price, despite reporting its fastest rate of quarterly revenue growth since 2021. Investors were advised that the company plans to significantly increase its capital expenditure in 2024, while revenue guidance for the current quarter suggested growth may moderate from 27% to a midpoint forecast of 18%. Revenue guidance was something Microsoft investors may have also focused on, as it fell short of the consensus figure compiled by LSEG. 

Elsewhere, even though Walt Disney’s (NYSE: DIS) share price declined by 9.2% last month, the stock returned to the top 20 most traded shares by value. A slight majority of money flow in DIS on the Selfwealth platform skewed towards buying activity, suggesting buyers were happy to ‘buy the dip’. 

The iShares 0-3 Month Treasury Bond ETF (NYSE: SGOV) was also in the top 20. This fund seeks to track the investment results of an index composed of US Treasury bonds with remaining maturities less than or equal to three months. After a second consecutive reading showed monthly inflation accelerating, interest rate speculation picked up and drove a surge in 10-year bond yields. That may have brought some attention to the short end of the yield curve, with the Fed keeping interest rates on hold at the end of the month. 

Top 20 stocks traded by value

Which US shares are the most held? 

The top ten most held US shares were unchanged from with March, with investors clearly favouring the tech sector as six of these holdings came from that sector.  

Nonetheless, a little further down the list there were some changes, with MicroStrategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) down five spots to 16th place. The collective value of holdings in the business intelligence company declined nearly 40% month-on-month. That may have been prompted by a sharp decline in the price of bitcoin during the month, down 15%. Recently, MicroStrategy announced it owns more cryptocurrency than any single country after its bitcoin holdings exceeded US$14 billion. 

Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ: AMD) finished the month in 13th position among the most held US shares, unchanged versus a month prior. However, the collective value of AMD shares on the Selfwealth platform decreased by 14.4%. That drop was slightly more than the 12.3% fall in AMD’s share price last month, the second consecutive month of notable losses. Over that period, AMD’s main rival, Nvidia, announced details for its next-gen Blackwell GPU chip. 

And finally, there were strong monetary decreases in holdings like the ProShares UltraPro QQQ (NASDAQ: TQQQ) and the ARK Innovation ETF (NYSE: ARKK), with the collective value of holdings in these ETFs falling 23.2% and 13.7% respectively over the month.  

In the case of TQQQ, as noted above, more than 60% of money flow in the fund was an outflow, despite the majority of trades being ‘buys’. Alongside steep losses for tech shares, the trading data suggests a limited number of Selfwealth members cut their exposure to the fund, which uses gearing to track the daily performance of the Nasdaq-100 Index.

That’s all for this Trade Trends report, stay tuned for the next edition this time next month!