On June 29, 2026, traders work at the New York Stock Exchange.
new york stock exchange
of Nasdaq-100 is set to rise about 18% in 2026, but traders at prediction market platform Kalsi don’t think the index will rise that much in the second half of 2026.
Speculators believe there are 50-50 odds that the tech stock ratio will end 2026 above 30,000, the level it first crossed in late May. As of midday trading Tuesday, the index was still just about 1% below 30,000.
Kalsi’s contract asks speculators to trade “yes” or “no” for or against whether the Nasdaq 100 index will end the year within a certain point range. Contracts will be resolved based on December 31st index prices provided by Google Finance.
The Nasdaq 100’s biggest rally in 2026 came after the U.S. stock market hit an Iran war-induced low on March 30th. Between then and June 2, the Nasdaq index of the top 100 non-financial stocks rose more than 33% on the back of renewed confidence in artificial intelligence trading.
Confidence disappearing
But traders today seem to think the bull market doesn’t have much momentum left.
Another contract gives a 40% chance that the Nasdaq 100’s 2026 high will end up above 32,000. The previous intraday high of 30,762 units was recorded on June 3rd.
Changes in the NASDAQ 100 since the beginning of the year.
Traders say there is only about a 27% chance that the Nasdaq 100 index will rise above 33,000 by the end of the year.
UBS Notes said in a report on Tuesday that it expects the broad market rally to continue into the second half of 2026, with technology potentially no longer the leader. This could weigh on the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100, which just welcomed SpaceX as a new member on Tuesday.
“The strong rally in semiconductor stocks in the second quarter of this year is prompting investors to look beyond technology to other sectors as they reassess the next stage of the AI trade,” said Ulrike Hoffman Burchardi, chief investment officer for the Americas at UBS. “While we remain confident in AI’s growth story, we also emphasized that the next share price rally is likely to be characterized by expanded market leadership.”
Disclosure: CNBC and Kalsi have a commercial relationship that includes customer acquisition and minority ownership.
