The stock market finished mixed on Monday as investors remained cautious over the escalating trade tensions globally, with President Donald Trump threatening to slap China with another 50-percent tariff if the latter does not withdraw a countermeasure.
The Dow Jones declined by 0.91 percent, while the S&P 500 dropped by 0.23 percent. In contrast, the tech-heavy Nasdaq inched up by 0.10 percent.
Meanwhile, 10 companies, predominantly in the Artificial Intelligence sector, bucked an overall market pessimism, posting strong gains during the day.
In this article, we have identified Monday’s top performers and detailed the reasons behind their gains.
To come up with the list, we considered only the stocks with $2 billion market capitalization and $5 million in trading volume.
A trader cheers his market gains. Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko on Pexels
10. Transocean Ltd. (NYSE:RIG)
Transocean Ltd. snapped a three-day losing streak on Monday as investors resorted to bargain-hunting to take advantage of its cheap valuation.
The company touched a new 52-week low of $1.97 at intra-day trading before buying persisted throughout the day to push the stock higher at the close.
Generally, investor sentiment in the company was pulled down by global trade war escalations, coupled with Zacks Research’s more pessimistic outlook for its first-quarter earnings performance.
According to the investment firm, it now expects RIG to post $0.01 earnings per share, down from the $0.04 forecast previously. The consensus forecast for the company is currently at $0.14.
Zacks Research also issued estimates for Transocean’s first quarter EPS, at $0.01 in the first quarter of 2026, $0.05 in the second quarter, and $0.21 for the full year 2027 period.
RIG, a leading international provider of offshore contract drilling services for oil and gas wells, stands to largely benefit from the US government’s plan to bolster energy supply to unlock the country’s full energy potential. It secured several contracts in the US Gulf of Mexico, including the Deepwater Conqueror, Atlas, and Asgard.
9. Upstart Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:UPST)
Upstart Holdings ended a two-day losing streak on Monday, adding 8.56 percent to close at $37.78 apiece as investor funds shifted anew to artificial intelligence stocks to mitigate risks from the escalating global trade tensions.
On the same day, UPST announced that it would release its first quarter performance on May 6, 2025. A copy of its earnings release and presentation will be available on its website after market close.
Founded in 2012, UPST operates as an AI lending marketplace and connects millions of consumers to more than 100 banks and credit unions that leverage its AI models and cloud applications to deliver credit products.
With Upstart AI’s models, lenders are able to approve more borrowers at lower rates. Its platform includes personal loans, automotive retail and refinance loans, home equity lines of credit, and small-dollar “relief” loans.
8. IonQ Inc. (NYSE:IONQ)
IonQ Inc. bounced back from two straight days of losses, finishing Monday’s trading higher by 10.01 percent at $22.75 apiece as investors appeared to be placing bets back onto stocks riding the artificial intelligence boom.
IONQ traded higher in line with its quantum computing peers such as Super Micro Computer Inc. (NASDAQ:SMCI) and Rigetti Computing Inc. (NASDAQ:RGTI).
Last week, IONQ launched its newest flagship quantum computer, Forte Enterprise, which is now officially available to customers globally through Amazon Braket, a managed quantum computing service from Amazon Web Services (AWS), as well as the IonQ Quantum Cloud.
Forte Enterprise joins Aria and Forte in its series of products “capable of meeting Amazon’s high bar for commercial availability.”
In a statement, IONQ President and CEO Niccolo de Masi said that the goal was to get its quantum technologies into the hands of developers to support the development of new commercial applications.
“This collaboration with AWS makes Forte Enterprise accessible for new and existing customers to leverage our quantum computing systems for real-world impact,” he added.
7. Super Micro Computer Inc. (NASDAQ:SMCI)
Super Micro snapped a two-day losing streak on Monday, ending 10.66 percent higher at $33 apiece as investors resorted to bargain-hunting on stocks riding the AI boom amid the ongoing global trade tensions.
SMCI traded higher in line with its quantum computing counterparts IonQ Inc. (NYSE:IONQ) and Rigetti Computing (NASDAQ:RGTI), as well as other AI stocks.
In recent news, SMCI partnered with Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ:NVDA) and Weka to develop a new optimized storage server for high-performance software-defined storage workloads.
The project is expected to “allow customers to benefit from NVDA’s innovations in both CPUs and DPUs.”
The server uses an NVIDIA Grace CPU Superchip with 144 Arm Neoverse V2 cores which enable high-performance I/O for software-defined storage workloads.
“We have demonstrated that the system can fully unleash the system’s PCIe Gen5 performance SSD bandwidth with linear scalability. Supermicro continues to bring to market the most advanced and optimized storage solutions available,” SMCI said.
6. Oklo Inc. (NYSE:OKLO)
Oklo Inc. ended a two-day losing streak on Monday, closing 10.76 percent higher at $21.93 apiece as investors resorted to bargain-hunting to take advantage of the recent drop.
Monday’s share price marked a rebound from last week’s drop that was weighed down by the overall market pessimism and news that Sam Altman, the high-profile CEO of OpenAI and a key investor in the company, reduced his stake in OKLO to 4.8 percent from 8.2 percent previously.
Meanwhile, Jim Cramer, former hedge fund manager and currently the host of the Mad Money show, recommended investors to sell their stocks in OKLO.
“I’m a great believer in nuclear power, but that does not make me want to own any of the stocks that are involved in it right now, given the fact that it’s going to be so many years before we actually build it. So I’m gonna have to say [sell, sell, sell] Oklo,” Cramer said in Mad Money’s episode on Wednesday.
OKLO designs and develops fission power plants to provide reliable, commercial-scale energy.
5. Rigetti Computing Inc. (NASDAQ:RGTI)
Rigetti Computing jumped by 11.07 percent on Monday to finish at $8.33 apiece as investor sentiment was fueled by the recent rebound in AI stocks that spilled over into the company.
RGTI traded higher alongside its quantum computing peers namely IonQ Inc. (NYSE:IONQ) and Super Micro Computer Inc. (NASDAQ:SMCI), and other individual stocks riding the AI boom.
In recent news, Defiance ETFs launched the RGTX, the Defiance Daily Target 2X Long RGTI ETF, a single-stock ETF designed to provide amplified exposure to RGTI.
The ETF offers traders a way to seek enhanced returns on RGTI without requiring a margin account.
According to Defiance ETFs, RGTX seeks daily investment results that correspond to 200 percent of RGTI’s daily percentage change.
“RGTX offers investors a way to seek leveraged exposure to RGTI, a known leader in quantum computing technology,” said Sylvia Jablonski, CEO of Defiance ETFs. “As Rigetti continues to develop its proprietary quantum processors and expand its Quantum Computing as a Service (QCaaS) platform, this ETF provides a trading tool for those looking to engage with the company’s market performance.”
4. Frontline Plc (NYSE:FRO)
Frontline Plc saw its share prices jump by 11.38 percent on Monday to end at $14.29 apiece as investors hunted for bargains following three straight days of losses.
FRO, a leading shipping firm of crude oil and refined products, recently earned a “strong buy” rating from Zacks Research.
“An upward trend in earnings estimates—one of the most powerful forces impacting stock prices—has triggered this rating change,” the research firm said.
For the fiscal year ending December 2025, Zacks Research expects FRO to earn $2.23 per share. The figure, if realized, would represent a 25.3-percent increase year-on-year.
On Monday, FRO said that it successfully filed its annual report for 2024. In full-year 2024, net income dropped by 24.5 percent to $495.58 million from $656 million a year earlier, while revenues increased by 13.76 percent to $2.16 billion from $1.8 billion year-on-year.
In the fourth quarter alone, net income declined by 43.65 percent to $66.7 million from $118.37 million, while revenues grew by 6.86 percent to $443.49 million from $415 million.
3. NuScale Power Corp. (NYSE:SMR)
NuScale Power snapped a two-day losing streak on Monday, ending 11.9 percent higher at $14.10 apiece as the company rode the wave in AI stocks amid the ongoing trade tensions globally.
Last week, SMR announced the opening of an Energy Exploration (E2) Center at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV).
Co-funded by the US Department of Energy’s Nuclear Energy University Program, the facility features a 12-module SMR control room simulator providing hands-on nuclear science and engineering learning opportunities.
SMR said the new facility would allow students to experience simulated nuclear power plant operations as control room operators while also serving as an outreach platform to the community to demonstrate the benefits of nuclear power.
2. RH (NYSE:RH)
RH, formerly Restoration Hardware, ended two days of consecutive losses on Monday, surging 12.92 percent to end at $164.48 apiece as investor sentiment was buoyed by an investment firm’s positive outlook for the company.
On Monday, analysts from Stifel lowered the company’s price target to $390 from $450 previously, following the company’s drop in its latest earnings performance, but gave RH a “buy” rating.
Last Friday, RH announced a more optimistic outlook following President Donald Trump’s recent “productive” call with Vietnam’s To Lam, General Secretary of the Communist Party. RH sources a significant chunk of its supplies from Vietnam.
“Just had a very productive call with To Lam … who told me that Vietnam wants to cut their tariffs down to zero if they are able to make an agreement with the US. I thanked him on behalf of our country, and said I look forward to a meeting in the near future,” he said.
If the president responds in kind, RH said its resourcing to Vietnam would be accretive to its margins.
“The company has been operating with 25 percent tariffs from China since the last Trump administration and has successfully resourced the majority of its China production to Vietnam at significantly better than pre-tariff landed China pricing. In addition, the company has successfully resourced a meaningful amount of its China production to its own factory in North Carolina,” RH said.
1. United States Steel Corp. (NYSE:X)
US Steel surged by 16.22 percent on Monday to end at $44.50 apiece as investor sentiment was fueled by President Donald Trump’s order to review anew Nippon Steel’s $14-billion bid to acquire the US company.
On Monday, the White House reportedly ordered the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US to look into Nippon’s planned acquisition of US Steel to determine whether further action would be appropriate and potentially open a path for the Japanese steelmaker to finalize their long-pending agreement.
The fresh review breathed life into the deal that was previously blocked by former president Joe Biden, saying that the steel producers and the American steelworkers “are the backbone of our nation.”
Meanwhile, Trump said earlier this year that he would not mind if Nippon acquired a minority stake in X.
US Steel commended Trump’s order, saying that the president’s decision “validates our board’s bold decision to challenge … Biden’s unlawful order.”
While we acknowledge the potential of X as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. There is an AI stock that went up since the beginning of 2025, while popular AI stocks lost around 25%. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than X but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.
READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and 30 Best Stocks to Buy Now According to Billionaires.
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