AlgovestIQ · Sector Intelligence
Stock Market Sector Performance Today
All 11 stock market sectors ranked by price performance, with the AIQ breadth reading that shows how many stocks in each sector are actually behind the move.
Data as of 2026-09-10, market close · Select Sector SPDR ETFs, price return · Breadth across 1,194 covered stocks
Energy leads over the past three months at +11.47% while Real Estate lags at -4.22%. 7 of 11 sectors are higher over the past three months. Energy, Financials, Healthcare are beating the S&P 500 on narrowing participation.
Narrowing leadership
Early improvement
No sectors in this bucket for the selected period.
All 11 sectors ranked
| Sector | ETF | 1D | 1W | 1M | 3M | YTD | vs SPY (pp) | AIQ Breadth | Improving | State |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Energy | XLE | -0.58% | -0.26% | +6.39% | +11.47% | +44.87% | +7.00 pp | 46% | 25% | Narrowing leadership |
| Financials | XLF | -0.33% | -1.37% | -1.81% | +8.88% | +3.83% | +4.42 pp | 52% | 41% | Narrowing leadership |
| Healthcare | XLV | -0.55% | -3.93% | -1.65% | +8.38% | +7.02% | +3.91 pp | 37% | 12% | Narrowing leadership |
| Technology | XLK | -1.41% | +0.88% | -1.93% | +4.86% | +28.65% | +0.40 pp | 41% | 51% | Confirmed leadership |
| Materials | XLB | -1.23% | -4.14% | -3.46% | +2.34% | +11.93% | -2.13 pp | 42% | 23% | Confirmed weakness |
| Industrials | XLI | -0.72% | -1.29% | -8.25% | +0.52% | +9.95% | -3.94 pp | 34% | 42% | Confirmed weakness |
| Communication Services | XLC | +0.60% | -0.82% | +1.12% | +0.44% | -5.28% | -4.02 pp | 40% | 26% | Confirmed weakness |
| Consumer Discretionary | XLY | -0.44% | -2.52% | -5.03% | -1.35% | -6.24% | -5.81 pp | 33% | 19% | Confirmed weakness |
| Consumer Staples | XLP | +0.05% | -2.85% | -2.34% | -2.81% | +6.96% | -7.27 pp | 28% | 15% | Confirmed weakness |
| Utilities | XLU | -0.98% | -0.35% | -3.01% | -3.36% | -0.40% | -7.83 pp | 29% | 36% | Confirmed weakness |
| Real Estate | XLRE | -0.83% | -1.55% | -3.24% | -4.22% | +6.69% | -8.69 pp | 30% | 5% | Confirmed weakness |
| S&P 500 | SPY | -0.60% | -0.96% | -1.90% | +4.47% | +11.13% | — | — | — | Benchmark |
How sector performance is measured here
Sector returns use Select Sector SPDR ETFs and reflect price return, not total return. AIQ Breadth measures the share of covered stocks with AIQ ≥ 7/10; Improving measures the share whose AIQ composite rose over the past seven days. Funds are excluded from breadth.
Full methodology and state definitions
Dividends are excluded, so year-to-date figures understate the higher-yielding sectors — Utilities, Real Estate and Consumer Staples — by roughly their yield. These funds hold S&P 500 constituents, so they describe large-cap sector exposure rather than every listed company in the sector.
AIQ Breadth is a level reading of how much of the sector is currently in constructive shape. Improving is a change reading on a 0–100 scale, so the two columns are related but not the same number. Both are computed across 1,194 individual stocks in the AlgovestIQ universe.
The ETF says what the sector did; breadth says how many companies were behind it. State is derived from those two numbers alone.
- Confirmed leadership
- A sector beating the S&P 500 with most of its stocks improving — the benchmark move has participation behind it.
- Narrowing leadership
- A sector beating the S&P 500 while fewer than half of its stocks improve — the move is being carried by a shrinking group.
- Early improvement
- A sector lagging the S&P 500 while most of its stocks improve — conditions across individual names are strengthening before the benchmark shows it.
- Confirmed weakness
- A sector lagging the S&P 500 with fewer than half of its stocks improving — price and participation agree.
These labels describe the current relationship between price and participation; they are not forecasts.
Where the movement is concentrated
Sectors are an exhaustive classification framework across the equity market. Themes are selective baskets built around a single driver, and can pull names from several sectors at once — which is where a sector move often turns out to be concentrated.
Stock market sectors — frequently asked questions
Which stock market sectors are performing best today?
Sector performance on this page is ranked by the corresponding Select Sector SPDR ETF over the selected window, with the S&P 500 (SPY) shown as the benchmark. The table covers all 11 sectors across 1-day, 1-week, 1-month, 3-month and year-to-date price returns, so the leaders over one horizon can be compared against the leaders over another.
How are stock market sectors different from market themes?
Sectors are an exhaustive classification framework across the equity market. A theme is a selective basket built around a specific driver — AI infrastructure, or defense and space — and can draw its members from several sectors at once. Sectors tell you how the market is organised; themes tell you where a particular move is concentrated. Sector performance is on this page; theme activity is on Most Active Market Themes.
What does AIQ breadth mean?
AIQ breadth is the share of covered stocks in a sector carrying an AIQ score of 7 or higher on the 1 to 10 scale. It is a level reading: it says how much of the sector is in constructive shape right now. The separate Improving column is a change reading — the share of the sector's stocks whose underlying AIQ composite rose over the past seven days. That composite runs 0 to 100 with 50 neutral, so the two columns are related but sit on different scales. Breadth is computed across individual stocks only; funds are excluded so their holdings are not counted twice.
Why does AlgovestIQ use sector ETFs for sector performance?
Each sector's price return is taken from its Select Sector SPDR fund — XLK for Technology, XLF for Financials, and so on. That makes every number on this page a single published series a reader can verify anywhere, rather than a proprietary average that would have to be taken on trust. The AIQ breadth columns then add what an ETF cannot show: how many individual stocks were behind the move.
Are these sector returns total returns?
No. They are price returns, compounded from daily closing prices, and they exclude dividends. This matters most for the higher-yielding sectors — Utilities, Real Estate and Consumer Staples — where a year-to-date price return understates total return by roughly the sector's yield. Compare these figures against other price-return sources rather than total-return ones.
What does it mean when a sector is rising but breadth is falling?
It means the sector's benchmark is being carried by a shrinking number of names — labelled Narrowing leadership on this page. The reverse case, Early improvement, is a sector lagging the S&P 500 while a majority of its stocks show improving AIQ signals, meaning conditions across the individual names are strengthening before the benchmark reflects it. Neither label is a forecast; both describe the current relationship between price and participation.