Jim Cramer, host of Mad Money, discussed the current state of the homebuilders sector on Thursday.
“We’re starting to wind down for the year, but there’s still some big reports coming from industries that are real battlegrounds. Take the home builders… This is a group that Wall Street’s wanted to like for a long time. The iShares US Home Construction ETF, that’s called the ITB, rallied more than 40% from early April to its highs in early September, mostly in anticipation of another round of… rate cuts from the Fed. But now those rate cuts are here, and the situation is not playing out the way the bulls hoped. See, long-term rates, the ones set by the bond market that actually control the cost of your mortgage, they haven’t really played ball.”
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Cramer highlighted that the 30-year Treasury yield currently sits at 4.8%, slightly down from its peak near 5%, but still higher than levels that would significantly ease mortgage costs. Since mid-October, yields have been trending upward, which offered only modest relief. He explained that homebuilders’ stocks began to decline in September and continued falling until mid-November, only stabilizing when investors started to anticipate a December rate cut from the Fed. He noted that now that the cut has occurred, the sector has struggled to find direction. He explained that homebuilders are not in strong shape, and anyone considering an investment is effectively betting on a meaningful improvement in 2026, which remains uncertain.
“The bottom line: At the end of the day, you don’t need to be a hero in the housing space. If you want to make a bet on a turnaround for the builders, I think you should start small for now and wait for a clear sign that the buyers are returning before you make any big bets. And we are most certainly not there yet.”
Our Methodology
For this article, we compiled a list of 13 stocks that were discussed by Jim Cramer during the episode of Mad Money aired on December 18. We listed the stocks in the order that Cramer mentioned them. We also provided hedge fund sentiment for each stock as of the third quarter of 2025, which was taken from Insider Monkey’s database of 978 hedge funds.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 427.7% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 264 percentage points (see more details here).
Jim Cramer’s Latest Insights on These 13 Stocks
13. NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 234
NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. Cramer mentioned the company while discussing two of his “favorite” stocks. He remarked:
“The rest of tech took its cue from Micron and broke the recent downtrend, even though the supply-demand situation for most of these companies, quite different from Micron. For instance, let’s say two of my favorites, Broadcom and NVIDIA, both of which are up today. They simply do not have the same situation at all… NVIDIA and Broadcom are what’s known as fabulous companies. They make their chips through Taiwan Semi. That’s who actually does the manufacturing. If demand overwhelms supply, it’s Taiwan Semi’s problem. That’s why even though Micron’s crying about demand, it doesn’t exactly translate to Broadcom and NVIDIA, unlike Western Digital and Seagate, which are basically in the same kind of business as Micron, albeit with less intellectual property.”
NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) develops accelerated computing and AI platforms, GPUs for gaming and professional use, cloud services, robotics and embedded systems, and automotive technologies. Cramer discussed the stock during the December 15 episode and said:
“Understand, I’m not trying to say that tech stocks can’t be owned here. We own a bunch of them for the Charitable Trust, we always have, along with NVIDIA and Broadcom. I really like them. I’m just a lot less enthusiastic than I used to be because there’s competition all over the place, and they’re spending like crazy, and the stocks have still had big moves.”
12. Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 105
Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. Cramer noted that it makes sense for the company to “blow away the estimates,” as he commented:
“Yes, it makes sense for Micron… to blow away the estimates and see its stock fly 10% today. This may be the second-largest beat I’ve ever seen, only behind the monster quarter that NVIDIA put up two years ago. It was magnificent. But you must realize that, as great as this is, there’s a very simple reason for Micron’s strength. Demand overwhelms supply…
Look, there have been many times when Micron’s had more demand than it can handle in the 30 years I… [have been] following the company. This time seems much more lasting because there are extreme shortages for all the machines Micron would need to expand its production capacity…
Micron… is the way business should be done. Micron is not paying anyone to take their stuff. There’s just so much demand in these memory chips that they can’t possibly make enough of them. They’re trying hard to allocate what they can give to customers. In the end, that makes me like Micron a lot more than some of these other companies that have an air of desperation around them. I’m a simple guy. I don’t want a stake in a company that wants to buy products because I have no idea what that stake might… be worth. I want to be paid with cash on the barrelhead. Micron’s a cash machine. When in doubt, you know what? You always go with cash. The other methods may come back to bite you.”
Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) develops memory and storage solutions, including DRAM, NAND, and SSD products, under the Micron and Crucial brands.
11. Ciena Corporation (NYSE:CIEN)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 70
Ciena Corporation (NYSE:CIEN) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. When a caller mentioned the stock during the lightning round, Cramer remarked:
“It has moved a great deal. That was an amazing quarter. I think there’s, it was so great. The next quarter is going to be great, too. I’m not going to fight you on it because… this Ciena is much better than the Ciena of 2000 when a lot of us lost money in the first three months of the year, if you remember that.”
Ciena Corporation (NYSE:CIEN) builds networking equipment like optical systems, routers, and switches, and also provides software that helps manage and automate networks. Scout Investments, Inc., an affiliate of Carillon Tower Advisers stated the following regarding Ciena Corporation (NYSE:CIEN) in its third quarter 2025 investor letter:
“Ciena Corporation (NYSE:CIEN) designs and manufactures advanced optical and packet-optical networking hardware, including transport systems and pluggable transceivers. The stock’s outperformance during the quarter was driven primarily by the strength in cloud providers’ demand as Ciena’s high-speed optical networking solutions are critical components of their high-performance computing capacity buildouts. Hyperscalers led the trend while emerging customer groups such as smaller AI-focused cloud data center operators grew rap idly. In addition, recovery in telecommunications network investment continues and is expected to extend into next year.”
10. Credo Technology Group Holding Ltd (NASDAQ:CRDO)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 56
Credo Technology Group Holding Ltd (NASDAQ:CRDO) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. A caller sought Cramer’s thoughts on the stock, and he stated:
“Credo’s a winner. Credo’s, boy, there’s a lot of insider selling in that one. But no, we think that Credo has one of the great growth stories, and I’m not going to back away from it. Look, this is… Right now, people hate what’s inside the data center, but there is good business being done inside the data center. And just because we haven’t figured out how all the financing is going to happen… Credo still works for me.”
Credo Technology Group Holding Ltd (NASDAQ:CRDO) designs high-speed connectivity chips and solutions used in Ethernet and PCIe applications, including active cables, signal processing chips, and serializer/deserializer technology. During the September 26 episode, Cramer said that the company is “like a mini NVIDIA,” as he commented:
“After that report, it’s looking like Credo will be able to put up nearly threefold earnings growth this year. It’s like a mini NVIDIA. It’s a rocket ship…. It’s tremendously profitable with breathtaking earnings growth… All that said, I’m going to give you some caveats because it’s up so much. For starters, this company’s level of company concentration for their customers is way too high… Second issue, lately, we’ve seen some insider selling…
For as long as the data center theme remains real hot, I’d be looking at a pullback like this as a buying opportunity, not a bail. Still, we need to pay attention to the levels here. I think the stock’s become irresistible in the low 120s. That’s where I really want to buy it… Credo’s expected to grow earnings at an almost 200% clip this year. So in theory, you could pay 400 times earnings for this one, but that’s not right. It’s an exceptional year for Credo. If you look out to next fiscal year, Wall Street’s only looking for 24% earnings growth. I suspect those estimates will turn out to be too low, but I like to play it a little cautious with a stock that’s up this much…
Credo Technology Group deserves to be talked about along with all the other data centers, semiconductor network winners… This has got great products and even better financials. I don’t love the customer concentration, but the velocity of Credo’s growth is undeniable, and the stock only gets more attractive as it gets dragged down by the sell-off in all things momentum.
Unlike the speculative plays that are getting hit real hard, this one’s got real earnings, which means it genuinely does get cheaper as it goes lower. You can put on a small position here, that’s fine if you really like it. But I suggest waiting for it to come down to the 120s before you really load up. It’s a special company, but you know what? Price still matters.”
9. Bitmine Immersion Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:BMNR)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 20
Bitmine Immersion Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:BMNR) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. A caller inquired about the stock during the lightning round, and here’s what Cramer had to say in response:
“Okay, now, I think this is part of that year of magical investing that I’m telling you I think is over, and I don’t want you in anything that’s involved in the year of magical investing. Let’s steer clear of that.”
Bitmine Immersion Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:BMNR) focuses on blockchain-related activities, including digital asset treasury management, advisory services, and support for the bitcoin ecosystem. In addition, the company leases and sells mining equipment. During the August 14 episode, a caller asked Cramer whether the stock was a buy and he responded:
“Oh, Bitmine, okay, my colleague David Faber did a very long piece about what’s the real value of this thing in terms of the amount of shares outstanding. And all I can tell you is you don’t want to touch it.”
8. Kura Oncology, Inc. (NASDAQ:KURA)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 34
Kura Oncology, Inc. (NASDAQ:KURA) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. When a caller highlighted the company’s $135 million milestone payment owing to its U.S. commercial sale of KOMZIFTI, Cramer commented:
“That’s a lot. That is a lot… Now, just understand that, yeah, they are milestone payments, not actual. Now, here’s what you have to understand. I have always felt that if you have something that is for cancer and it works, then you have to own the stock as a speculation, but just as a speculation, because it’s been such a difficult disease. J&J and Merck are the ones that are ahead if you want the majors.”
Kura Oncology, Inc. (NASDAQ:KURA) is developing targeted cancer therapies focused on genetically defined leukemias and solid tumors, with several drug candidates in clinical development. In November, the company, along with Kyowa Kirin received FDA approval for KOMZIFTI (ziftomenib), a once-daily oral targeted therapy for adults with relapsed or refractory NPM1-mutated acute myeloid leukemia. On December 8, Kura Oncology and Kyowa Kirin reported early trial results showing that KOMZIFTI combined with venetoclax and azacitidine was generally well tolerated and showed meaningful activity in AML with NPM1 mutations or KMT2A rearrangements. Gail J. Roboz, M.D., hematologist and leukemia specialist (William S. Paley Professor in Clinical Medicine) said:
“In relapsed/refractory NPM1-m and KMT2A-r AML, overall response rates of 65% and 41% were observed, rising to 83% and 70% in venetoclax-naïve patients, underscoring ziftomenib’s potential benefit even in challenging settings. Importantly, inclusion of ziftomenib was generally well tolerated, paving the way for its integration into front-line and relapsed/refractory regimens through ongoing registrational trials.”
7. SentinelOne, Inc. (NYSE:S)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 42
SentinelOne, Inc. (NYSE:S) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. During the lightning round, a caller inquired about the stock, and Cramer replied:
“No, I don’t think it’s a good, it has been various times I understand shopped and didn’t get a bid. You got to stick with the high-quality ones. Got to stick with CrowdStrike or Palo Alto Networks, both owned by the trust.”
SentinelOne, Inc. (NYSE:S) provides AI-powered cybersecurity that protects devices, cloud systems, and user identities from cyber threats. The company announced results for its third quarter of FY26 on December 4. It posted non-GAAP EPS of $0.07, exceeding estimates by $0.02. The company generated a revenue of $258.9 million, which was up nearly 23% year-over-year and beat estimates by $2.72 million.
SentinelOne, Inc. (NYSE:S) also provided guidance for Q4 FY26 and the full fiscal year. It expects $271 million in revenue for Q4 and a non-GAAP gross margin at 77.5%, along with 5% non-GAAP operating margin. For the full fiscal year 2026, the company expects $1.001 billion in revenues, 78.5% non-GAAP gross margin, and 3% non-GAAP operating margin.
6. FedEx Corporation (NYSE:FDX)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 60
FedEx Corporation (NYSE:FDX) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. Cramer praised the company’s latest quarterly results, as he remarked:
“Look at these numbers from FedEx. After the close today, the freight powerhouse reported a truly strong quarter with higher-than-expected revenues and a 70-cent earnings beat… Even better, management raised the low end of their full-year forecast for both revenue and earnings. This company spent years trying to cut costs and optimize its delivery network. Clearly, those efforts are paying off. And even though the freight division came in a little weaker than expected, that business has been struggling for a while now, and FedEx plans to spin it off next year.”
FedEx Corporation (NYSE:FDX) provides transportation, shipping, and logistics services, including express and freight delivery, e-commerce solutions, and supply chain management. Cramer discussed it as part of his game plan during the December 12 episode and said:
“Next up, I like Thursday… After the close is the biggest night of the week when CNBC Investing Club position, Nike reports, and FedEx also issues its quarterly numbers… FedEx could be the star of the week. This company is the leanest it’s ever been. The leanest. It’s got furious growth of e-commerce… No chance of abating there. FedEx could put up a monster set of numbers. That’s how well-run the company is.”
5. Anywhere Real Estate Inc. (NYSE:HOUS)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 43
Anywhere Real Estate Inc. (NYSE:HOUS) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. Answering a caller’s query about the stock, Cramer commented:
“Yeah, you know what? I know those guys because my wife sold real estate. I don’t want to be in that group. I think that you really need a much hotter market to be able to justify being in that. I’m going to take a pass. It just doesn’t seem right for me right now.”
Anywhere Real Estate Inc. (NYSE:HOUS) provides residential real estate services, including franchising well-known brands, full-service brokerage, relocation support, and title and settlement services. On December 8, Barclays raised its price target for the company’s stock to $19 from $13 and kept an Equal Weight rating. Barclays expects single-family housing starts to keep falling. However, it sees opportunities for building products and brokerage stocks to do well even if new home construction stays weak.
4. KB Home (NYSE:KBH)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 31
KB Home (NYSE:KBH) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. Cramer discussed the company’s earnings during the episode and said:
“Alright, how about KB Home? Smaller, but it reported after the close. They also had a disappointing set of numbers. Like Lennar, they did beat on some lines for the… quarter. Home… delivered and revenues were both ahead of expectations, even as they fell 9 and 15%, respectively. I told you, this group is very difficult. Adjusted earnings per share beat expectations too, even as it fell 24% from the year ago period, but average selling price was down 7% and missed expectations.
Home building gross margins were down nearly 400 basis points. What did I tell you? That’s the key metric. Fell well short of the Street’s expectations. And KB Home’s home building operating income fell 49% and came in well short of the consensus estimates. Like Lennar, KB Home’s forward-looking metrics looked, well, like the new orders, they’re weak. And its outlook for both the current quarter and the year ahead was far below what analysts were looking for. So, it’s no surprise that KBH’s shares are lower.”
KB Home (NYSE:KBH) builds and sells homes for different kinds of buyers and provides related financial services, including mortgage, insurance, and title services.
3. Lennar Corporation (NYSE:LEN)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 63
Lennar Corporation (NYSE:LEN) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. Cramer said that the company posted “mostly bad set of numbers,” as he remarked:
“Let’s start with Lennar. It turned in a technically mixed but mostly bad set of numbers on Tuesday night. The good news, deliveries came in better than expected, up 4% year-over-year. Total revenues also surprised the upside, although they still declined 6% from the previous year. That’s not good. Within the core home building segment, revenues and average sales price both exceeded expectations even as they represented declines of 7 and 10%, respectively. The bad news, the most important thing, profitability, or the lack thereof. Lennar’s home-building gross margin came in at 17.0%. That was down over 500 basis points year-over-year and well below expectations. I always look at gross margins when I do home builders. That’s my number one metric.
Home building operating earnings were down 52% year-over-year, much worse than expected, and Lennar only earned $2.3 per share. Wall Street was looking for $2.26. That’s an almost 50% decline year-over-year. That’s not good. It gets worse. With every quarter, Lennar also gives us some more forward-looking metrics, and those painted a pretty discouraging picture. New orders, they came in lower than expected. The average sales price for new orders was in line with expectations. That’s good, but still below the average selling prices for deliveries this past quarter, and it was down huge year-over-year.
Lennar’s guidance for the current quarter, weak. The company expects to deliver 17,000-18,000 homes in the current quarter, well below the 20,089 number that Wall Street was looking for. That was shocking to me. Management says the average sales price for these homes will be between $365,000-$375,000. And they’re talking about a home building gross margin coming in between 15 and 16%. Both of those represent deterioration from the quarter they just reported.
How about the full-year forecast for 2026? Lennar’s guidance for deliveries was also weaker than expected. Man. Now, Lennar has been pretty transparent about its strategy. They’re focused on keeping volumes up, and they’re willing to make sacrifices on price and incentives in order to keep moving lots of inventory. Admirable, but their strategy comes with a big hit to profitability. Worse, when you look at the new orders numbers and the forward guidance, it doesn’t seem to be working. Even with Lennar giving buyers great deals, demand still seems to be softening. And you understand, these guys are fantastic at what they do, so this was shocking to me… In my opinion, Miller (CEO Stuart Miller) sounded a little befuddled by how long it’s taken to get the housing market back on its feet. Lennar has already cut its prices a great deal at this point.”
Lennar Corporation (NYSE:LEN) builds and sells single-family and multifamily homes, develops residential land, and manages rental properties for buyers ranging from first-time to luxury.
2. nLIGHT, Inc. (NASDAQ:LASR)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 34
nLIGHT, Inc. (NASDAQ:LASR) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. Cramer noted that the company hasn’t been profitable for the last few years, as he stated:
“I have no idea whether the technology makes sense, but it sure seems like the defense department is willing to spend money on it, which might be all that matters. Now, there’s one thing that’s been nagging at me with this one… It’s a simple fact that nLIGHT doesn’t have a great track record when it comes to, you know, making money. The company hasn’t been profitable for the last three… years. And perhaps worse, its sales peaked way back in 2021 before declining each of the past three years, falling from $270 million in 2021 to under $200 million last year. When you look at those numbers, it’s no wonder nLIGHT stock sunk to an all-time low earlier this year.
But most of that historical weakness was caused by a combination of poor performance from nLIGHT’s industrial business and the fact that the company had to ramp up spending in order to build the types of directed energy weapons that the defense department wants. Plus, this year, their financials have improved significantly… When the company turned in its latest numbers in early November, they delivered another excellent quarter…
So, where do I ultimately come down on nLIGHT? When I saw the stock’s tremendous gains and noticed that the company was focused on laser guns, I was worried that this might be another year of magical investing stock. But after looking into the story in depth, this is a real established company with a legitimate business that has great potential in the future of warfare. The stock’s been roaring this year because it should be. The numbers have gotten better and better. Plus, it’s very encouraging to me that nLIGHT stock has held up so well, right as so many of the other year of magical investing names have fallen by the wayside.
That said, considering how much the stock has run, I find it very hard to recommend this one up here. Right now, nLIGHT’s selling for roughly 80 times its 2027, 27, not 6, 27 earnings estimates. It was just pretty rich…. Also, and this is more instinct than science, I’m a bit worried that while nLIGHT might not be a year of magical investing stock, it certainly traveled with many of those names and could get hurt by a broader cool-off in momentum stocks, and these keep happening. So far, it hasn’t happened, but if momentum names keep getting hit, this one might cool down, too. So, here’s the bottom line: I wouldn’t put new money to work in nLIGHT at these levels, given how much the stock’s run. If you already own it, I say sell enough shares to cover your cost basis so that you’re playing with the house’s money. If you don’t own it and you like the story, I recommend waiting for a pullback, which seems highly likely to me at some point. But if the pullback comes and nLIGHT keeps putting up good numbers, then you’d better believe I’d be a buyer.”
nLIGHT, Inc. (NASDAQ:LASR) makes semiconductor and fiber lasers for industrial, aerospace, and defense use. The company also provides high-energy laser systems and components for precision and directed energy applications.
1. The Boeing Company (NYSE:BA)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 106
The Boeing Company (NYSE:BA) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer offered insights on. A caller asked for Cramer’s long-term thoughts on the stock, and he replied:
“Okay, I’m glad you asked about Boeing. It’s a big position for my Charitable Trust. I will tell you unequivocally that I think Boeing has bottomed. I thought the last quarter was terrific. People sold the stock down, huge, off it. Now, it’s coming all the way back, and that makes a lot of sense. I think that Kelly Ortberg is the person who should have been running Boeing for years. He’s doing that good a job.”
The Boeing Company (NYSE:BA) designs and builds commercial aircraft, defense systems, satellites, and space technologies, and provides related support and service solutions. Cramer discussed the stock in detail during the December 2 episode and remarked:
“Let me show you what a hard and fast bottom really looks like. Let’s talk Boeing. Coming into today’s session, the only word I could use to describe the stock of Boeing was free fall… Today, though, Boeing spoke, and lo and behold, it didn’t take down numbers. In fact, it reaffirmed the previous estimates. When you’re dealing with a company as dysfunctional as this one, that is huge… The chief financial officer who gave the talk did something that signals the bottom almost every single time. He called the end of what’s known as the negative revisions cycle… which is why it shot up 10% today and why it’s most likely, after some churning, not done going higher.
Now, my Charitable Trust has been buying Boeing all the way down in anticipation of this moment, the end of the negative revision cycle. We knew that when we got there, it would be time for CEO Kelly Ortberg to start playing offense, and now I think he will do just that. More important, because of the huge demand for Boeing’s planes, any sign that the negative revision cycle is over means that when it doesn’t really matter when you buy the stock, even up almost 19 as it was today, because so many pessimistic analysts have been waiting for this moment to upgrade… When you own a stock that’s getting clubbed, there’s always a voice in your head saying, Lord, get me out of this one… And the people who listen to that voice, well, they sold Boeing today, and they shouldn’t have.
That’s usually a big mistake because, as much as you want to get out, there are often a lot more people who have been waiting for the green light to get in, to start buying… They want to buy Boeing for 2026 when the planes start coming off the assembly line… [into] desperate waiting hands of not just airlines but whole countries that have promised President Trump that they’ll buy Boeing planes to shrink their trade deficits with us. How do I know that the Boeing CFO is telling the truth? Well, because his career’s on the line… Everyone on Wall Street knows that, which is why Boeing, one of the worst stocks in this entire market, finally bottomed today. And even after this move, do you know what? It’s not too late to buy some tomorrow after the profit-taking subsides.”
While we acknowledge the potential of The Boeing Company (NYSE:BA) as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and have limited downside risk. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than BA and that has 100x upside potential, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.
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