Health Care Select Sector SPDR Fund

XLV

Market cap $40.9B

Vanguard Health Care ETF and Health Care Select Sector SPDR Fund both benefit from healthcare innovation tailwinds, earning a buy rating. VHT offers broader diversification and greater exposure to small-caps and biotechs, providing stronger upside potential compared to XLV's mega-cap pharma focus. XLV's concentrated portfolio delivers higher dividend yield and stability, but exposes investors to greater idiosyncratic risk from top holdings like LLY.

Josh Brown, CEO of Ritholtz Wealth Management, joins CNBC's 'Halftime Report' to explain why he's spotlighting Health Care in his "best stocks in the market." The Committee debates their health care strategy.

GLD gains attention as AI bubble fears rise, with investors eyeing hedges and ETFs geared toward market downside protection.

LLY's expanding AI alliances highlight how pharma-tech partnerships are transforming healthcare and lifting key sector ETFs like XLV.

Amid rising AI bubble fears, ETFs like TAIL, HDGE, PGHY and XLV offer ways to hedge tech risks and diversify portfolios as tech valuations apparently run hot.

Step aside tech stocks in the S&P 500. Health care stocks are taking over a leadership role — although it might be short-lived.

Drugmakers are making notable deals, biotech is coming back, and much of the worry about tariffs and interest rates has faded away.

The healthcare sector's renewed momentum offers fertile ground for investors wanting to outperform by picking the best stocks from the broader indexes. Goldman Sachs identified 29 healthcare stocks in the Russell 1000 universe with positive recent consensus revisions to 2026 EPS estimates and that trade at attractive valuations. Goldman sees "more opportunity for alpha than beta" as wide return dispersion and increasing M&A activity in healthcare may favor selected winners.

Several large-cap drugmakers have been climbing and are bringing the sector higher. There's also a flight to safety, as investors reallocate funds from high-flying tech stocks.

Jared Holz, Mizuho, joins 'Fast Money' to talk the uptick in biotech and pharma M&A, what it is signaling, and how to play it.