Top 10 Stocks to Watch — Tuesday, August 25
Markets brace for Nvidia's earnings tomorrow as tech sells off and gold catches a bid. Here are ten names worth watching for buy-side setups today.
Wall Street is holding its breath on Tuesday morning. All eyes are trained on the event that has defined this quarter: Nvidia's earnings, due after the close on Wednesday, August 26. The AI infrastructure giant has become the single most-watched data point on the calendar — its guidance will either validate the trillion-dollar buildout thesis or introduce the first real dose of doubt.
In anticipation of that print, traders spent Monday lightening up on tech. NVIDIA itself fell 2.94% to close at $208.41 (prior close, August 24), Tesla dropped 3.83%, Super Micro Computer shed 5.56%, and Palantir slid 2.25%. The selling has the look of pre-event risk management rather than any fundamental shift.
While tech retreats, precious metals are catching a serious bid. Gold ETF GLD closed at $426.69 on Monday, up 0.79%, sustaining a run that has the metal near multi-year highs. That has lifted miners broadly — B2Gold gained 3.62% and Coeur Mining held firm near its 52-week highs. The commodity complex is getting an additional boost from iron ore and copper demand signals, with Vale up 3.08% on heavy volume.
Three catalysts round out the day's agenda. Dick's Sporting Goods delivered a Q2 beat before the open this morning. Intuit and Zoom Communications both report after the close tonight. Add in Bitcoin's sharp recovery from its summer lows — erasing three months of losses in a single week — and Tuesday shapes up as one of the more information-dense sessions of the summer, even before NVIDIA dominates the headlines tomorrow.
Here are the ten names worth watching for potential buy-side setups today.
1. $NVDA — NVIDIA Corporation
Prior close (Aug 24): $208.41 | Prior session: -2.94% | Pre-market (Aug 25 est.): ~$210.97 (+1.19%)
Nvidia reports Q2 FY27 earnings after the close on Wednesday, August 26. The company's Q1 FY27 posted revenue of $81.6 billion and a profit margin of 71.5% — figures that make virtually every other company on this list look modest. Monday's 2.94% pullback reflects pre-event hedging, not conviction selling. Wall Street's average price target sits at $304.73, roughly 46% above the current price.
The question is whether guidance on Blackwell AI GPU demand and data center capex will come in above, at, or below the elevated bar the market has already set. Every AI infrastructure trade flows through this print. The 52-week range is $164.07–$236.54; the stock is sitting mid-range.
Watch for: A pre-market gap the morning of Aug 27 following the earnings call. Position size into that gap, not ahead of it — the overnight move after print will set the tone for weeks.
2. $INTU — Intuit Inc.
Prior close (Aug 24): $369.92 | Prior session: +0.80% | Reports: Tonight, Aug 25, after market close
Intuit reports Q4 FY2026 tonight with analyst consensus at $3.59 EPS. The company has been repositioning itself as an AI-powered financial operating system — TurboTax, QuickBooks, and Credit Karma represent massive proprietary data moats that AI layers can exploit in ways competitors cannot replicate easily.
At a $101 billion market cap, INTU has corrected sharply from its 52-week high of $705.08, trading near the lower end of its annual range. That reset base means tonight's print drops into a setup with less downside and more room for a re-rating on any guidance upside. Any signal of AI-driven revenue per user (ARPU) expansion inside QuickBooks or TurboTax Live could restart a larger move.
Watch for: Revenue guidance on the SMB segment and any commentary on AI Assist adoption rates. The bull case lives in cross-sell attach rates across the platform.
3. $DKS — DICK'S Sporting Goods
Prior close (Aug 24): est. ~$164 | Reports: Q2 FY2026, before the open today — beat
Dick's beat analyst estimates on both earnings (EPS surprise: +0.21%) and revenue (sales surprise: +1.87%) in its Q2 FY2026 report this morning. This is a consumer health read-through at a time when the market is acutely divided on whether US spending is rolling over or holding firm.
DKS trades at a forward P/E of 10.03, which is low for a profitable, dividend-paying retailer with 29.58% insider ownership. The company offers an estimated forward dividend yield of 3.03%. A beat with a guidance hold or raise, combined with a cheap valuation, is precisely the setup that tends to attract institutional accumulation into weakness.
Watch for: How the stock opens relative to its Aug 24 close. A beat-without-a-pop opens the door for a fade; a beat with conviction volume signals the setup is real.
The entries below — ranks 4 through 10 — cover tonight's two additional earnings catalysts (Zoom and Intuit's sector peer read-throughs), the full breakdown on the gold and commodity complex setup, the Bitcoin recovery trade, and the specific watch levels and trigger criteria for each name.
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