Alone In The Red

On Friday, Health Care was the only sector in the S&P 500 to close lower as the index itself rallied 0.42%. As shown in the chart below, Moderna (MRNA) led the decline, as the stock fell 11.13%. That drop was enough to make it the worst-performing stock in the S&P 500. Gilead Sciences (GILD) was the fourth-worst performer and second-worst in the sector, as it fell 3.8%. Eli Lilly (LLY), the largest Health Care company by market cap in the S&P 500, was the third-worst performer in the sector and the largest drag on the index, erasing 3.03 points on Friday.

With MRNA being such a standout on Friday, it may not be surprising that the stock has only 17 worse days on record since its 2018 IPO. That puts Friday’s steep pullback among the worst 1% of all days, as shown in the chart below.

Over the last ten years, there have been 21 days when the Health Care sector has been the only sector in the red. Five of those days have come since June 2023, and the last two are within a month of each other.

The 21 days as the lone loser is worse than seven other sectors. The sectors that have more days over that span as the only losing sector are Consumer Staples (23 days), Utilities (32 days), and Energy (63 days).

Communication Services, despite rallying 0.92% as the second-best-performing sector in the S&P 500 on Friday, was the only sector with negative daily net breadth. The daily net breadth of -4 is not out of the ordinary, but when combined with rallies of at least 0.92%, it makes up just 2.7% of all days since the sector reshuffling to include media, internet, and entertainment stocks on 9/24/2018. Since the reshuffling, there have been 11 days when Communication Services was the only sector with negative net breadth, as shown below.

Part of the reason for the price and breadth divergence is Meta Platforms (META)’ (META) 5.97% rally. That climb made META the top-performing stock in the S&P 500 on Friday, and also made it the second biggest positive contributor to the index as it added 10.74 points to the rally. That move also ranked in the 99th percentile of all days for the stock.