AMD and Ouster lead AI stock gains as Broadcom and monday.com retreat

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NASDAQ: AMD) surged 6.5% and Ouster Inc. (NASDAQ: OUST) climbed 7.9% on Friday, with AMD extending its post-earnings rally on doubled data-center revenue and Ouster pressing its lead in commercial AI-perception on strong Q2 results and a major traffic-management contract win. Broader markets pulled back from record highs: the S&P 500 fell 0.17% to 7,785.76 and the Nasdaq Composite declined 0.28% to 26,729.16, capping a third consecutive weekly gain. The SOXX semiconductor ETF held nearly flat at 550.42, down just 0.06%.

Top AI stocks today: August 14, 2026

AMD rises 6.5% as data-center demand accelerates

Advanced Micro Devices continued its post-earnings ascent on Friday, closing at $514.39 and extending a 130% year-to-date gain that ranks it among the best AI stocks to buy in 2026 by total return. AMD's Q2 2026 results, reported August 4, showed data-center revenue doubling year-over-year to $6.7 billion, representing 58% of the company's $11.54 billion in total revenue - up 50% on an annualised basis. The company guided Q3 revenue to approximately $13 billion, implying 41% year-over-year growth. CEO Lisa Su told CNBC the company expects data-center sales to double again in 2027. Friday's session saw continued buy-side rotation into AMD as the most credible challenger to NVIDIA Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA) in the data-center GPU market, keeping it a central name among top AI chip stocks into Q3.

Ouster jumps 7.9% on Q2 beat and Utah traffic-AI contract

Ouster Inc. posted the session's largest percentage gain, closing at $48.71 after Q2 results showed revenue of $55 million, up 56% year-over-year, with net loss narrowing to $18.1 million and Q3 guidance of $54.5M to $57.5M. The catalyst: distribution partner Econolite secured a multimillion-dollar expansion contract with the Utah Department of Transportation to deploy Ouster's BlueCity AI-powered traffic-management system across 160 additional road intersections. The win takes OUST's commercial story firmly beyond autonomous vehicles into civil infrastructure AI, a market that analysts have long argued is larger and more durable. StartupHub.ai data shows 260 autonomous-vehicle companies and 2,124 computer-vision startups in the private market, underscoring the breadth of commercial demand for AI perception technology that Ouster is beginning to capture at scale on the public side. The stock sits 17% above its 20-day moving average and 58% above its 200-day. Readers tracking AI stocks to watch this quarter should note Ouster's Q3 revenue band implies growth deceleration; that print in November will test whether today's multiple holds.

monday.com drops 7.2% as workforce cut overshadows Q2 beat

monday.com Ltd. (NASDAQ: MNDY) was the session's sharpest large-cap decliner, falling 7.2% to $87.52 after the work-management platform announced a 20% workforce reduction while simultaneously issuing Q3 revenue guidance below Wall Street expectations. Q2 revenue of $364.6 million beat estimates - up 22% year-over-year - but investors prioritised the weaker forward guide and, as Benzinga noted, monday.com "flagged short-term disruption from [the] 20% workforce cut." The company did raise its full-year adjusted operating margin outlook to approximately 16%, framing the restructuring as an AI pivot rather than a distress signal. Among the 8,246 enterprise software companies tracked on StartupHub.ai, the pattern of cutting headcount while guiding for higher margins is the defining narrative of the 2026 AI pivot wave; MNDY is now the clearest public-market test case for whether investors will wait for the payoff. The stock is down 39% year-to-date. For context on how enterprise AI SaaS has traded this week, Monday opened the five-day period up modestly before Wednesday's guidance disclosure reversed the move.

Broadcom retreats 5.9% in profit-taking

Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ: AVGO) shed 5.9% to $392.99 with no company-specific news driving the move, a classic post-rally giveback after the stock had climbed over 13% year-to-date on expectations of growing custom-ASIC revenue from hyperscaler clients including Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) and Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ: META). Broadcom remains among the highest-conviction AI infrastructure stocks in institutional portfolios, and the pullback may be reentry-level for investors who missed the earlier run.

Notable but quieter

Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT) dropped 5.1% to $507.18, likely positioning ahead of earnings due next week; the chip-equipment leader is up 89% year-to-date and any guide miss would hit hard. Cloudflare Inc. (NYSE: NET) fell 4.6% to $315.78 without a specific catalyst, part of a broad security-software fade. CrowdStrike Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: CRWD) slid 3.8% to $216.95, Palo Alto Networks Inc. (NASDAQ: PANW) retreated 3.0% to $384.27, and Oracle Corp. (NYSE: ORCL) gave back 3.7% to $150.52 - all three report earnings next week, and investors are lightening up ahead of prints. Palantir Technologies Inc. (NYSE: PLTR) eased 2.8% to $174.04 on no specific news, still holding a 3.7% year-to-date gain. Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MU) was the quieter gainer, up 2.3% to $971.66 and +208% year-to-date, the standout memory name among top 2026 AI stocks.

What are the top AI stocks to buy in August 2026?

Across semiconductor hardware, hyperscale cloud, and enterprise SaaS, the consensus best AI stocks to buy in August 2026 include AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) and Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU) on the chip side; NVIDIA Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA) for hyperscale AI infrastructure; and ServiceNow Inc. (NYSE: NOW) for enterprise AI workflow automation. Wall Street's 2026 focus has shifted from training-cluster buildout to inference deployment and AI-agent monetization, reshuffling which top AI stocks 2026 lead each session. The Magnificent 7 AI stocks - Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, NVIDIA, Tesla, and a rotating seventh - remain the most-watched group, though the YTD spread between them has widened considerably, with META now negative and AMD outpacing the cohort by a wide margin. For more AI stocks to watch, see the full AI Stocks Daily archive.

What to watch next week

A dense earnings run could reprice the entire AI sector heading into late August. Applied Materials (AMAT) delivers chip-equipment demand signals on Monday; Salesforce Inc. (NYSE: CRM) and ServiceNow Inc. (NYSE: NOW) give enterprise AI software reads mid-week; CrowdStrike Holdings (CRWD) and Palo Alto Networks (PANW) report cybersecurity results; MongoDB Inc. (NASDAQ: MDB) signals AI data-platform demand. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. (NYSE: BABA) and Baidu Inc. (NASDAQ: BIDU) also report, providing visibility into China's AI-infrastructure investment pace. The Federal Reserve's Jackson Hole Symposium begins August 27; rate-path commentary between now and then will shadow risk assets, particularly the Nasdaq-heavy AI names.

Not investment advice.

Core watchlist

Chips

Nvidia (NVDA): -0.06% on very heavy volume (75.2M shares). Flat on the day but the AI chip stocks bellwether; every data-center build still routes through NVIDIA's GPU stack. Next catalyst: Q3 FY2027 guide in November.
AMD (AMD): covered above.
Broadcom (AVGO): covered above.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (NYSE: TSM): -0.96% on moderate volume (6.3M). AMD's data-center beat is a positive read-through for TSMC advanced-node demand; next hard catalyst is the Q3 print in mid-October.

Hyperscalers

Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT): -0.30% on light volume (14.4M). Azure AI the revenue carrier; one of the core Magnificent 7 AI stocks with the clearest near-term monetization path. Next print late October.
Alphabet Inc. (GOOGL): -0.13% on moderate volume (16.9M). Gemini infrastructure investment is the thesis; Q3 due late October.
Meta Platforms Inc. (META): -0.86% on light volume (8.4M). YTD -9.3%, the only Magnificent 7 AI stock in negative territory in our universe; Llama investment spending the friction point with the market.
Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN): -0.94% on moderate volume (25.9M). AWS AI build-out sustains the long-duration thesis; Q3 print in late October.

Enterprise SaaS

Oracle Corp. (ORCL): -3.65% on heavy volume (21.8M). Oracle Cloud Infrastructure the AI infrastructure play; reports next week.
Salesforce Inc. (CRM): -2.56% on moderate volume (8.2M). Agentforce monetization is the entire thesis; reports next week.
ServiceNow Inc. (NOW): -2.55% on heavy volume (14.6M). Workflow AI agents the multi-year narrative; reports next week.
monday.com (MNDY): covered above.

Vol / retail

Palantir Technologies (PLTR): -2.78% on moderate volume (23.9M). No specific catalyst; still up 3.7% YTD after a strong H1 run. Government AI contract expansion is the durable thesis.
Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ: TSLA): +0.68% on heavy volume (44.8M). Held constructive; FSD data and the upcoming robotaxi rollout are the autonomy-AI catalysts Wall Street is tracking into Q3.
Snowflake Inc. (NYSE: SNOW): -2.51% on light volume (2.6M). Reports next week; the AI data-platform print is the key read for the enterprise data cohort.