Stocks making the biggest moves midday: Sandisk, Applied Materials, AeroVironment, Cisco Systems, Reddit & more

Cisco fell 2% after HSBC cut its rating to Hold (from Buy) and trimmed its price target to $120 from $137, citing sequential growth deceleration from 2QFY27e and potential valuation multiple pressure. Drone and related aerospace names surged on Trump-imposed import tariffs on drones (e.g., Unusual Machines +24%, Intuitive Machines +10%, Red Cat +8%), while York Space Systems slid 12% after EPS missed and full-year guidance was lowered. Other movers were mixed: Reddit jumped 12% on S&P 500 inclusion (Aug. 18), Fox gained 5% on an acquisition synergy catalyst (Fox-Roku), and Applied Materials dropped 5% despite adjusted EPS of $3.50 on $9.12B revenue.

Analysis

The cleanest signal here is not the day-one mover; it is the market’s preference for cash-flow visibility over forward growth narratives. RDDT has a mechanical buyer base into the index effective date, which can support the stock for 1-3 weeks, but that is mostly a flow trade unless the company can convert inclusion into lower equity volatility and better monetization cadence over the next 1-2 quarters. FOXA is a more durable story if management can turn distribution into pricing power, but the market is likely underwriting synergy too early; any delay in execution or deal economics would quickly unwind the rerating.

CSCO and AMAT look like the same message in different wrappers: investors are less willing to pay up for “good enough” execution when the next leg of growth is deferred. For CSCO, the risk window is 3-6 months as enterprise spending and network refreshes get scrutinized against AI capex alternatives; that is a multiple problem before it becomes an earnings problem. AMAT’s miss is a read-through for semicap beta more broadly, with the most vulnerable names being those relying on a broad-based foundry recovery rather than differentiated process gains.

The drone tariff reaction is likely overstating the fundamental winner set. AVAV and RCAT can trade higher on domestic substitution, but the true monetization path depends on procurement cadence, not retail enthusiasm; if order conversion lags into the next 2 quarters, the move fades. YSS is the more interesting canary: any shift in government acquisition methodology that slows award timing can hit smaller space/gov names with little balance-sheet cushion, including LUNR if contract conversion gets pushed right. The contrarian view is that tariffs protect assembly, but not necessarily the imported sensor/battery stack that drives margin.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Long RDDT into the Aug. 18 S&P 500 inclusion, but plan to trim 50-70% of the position into the event; the upside is flow-driven over days-to-weeks, while the post-inclusion risk is a dead-air trade.
• Short CSCO on rallies or via put spreads for a 1-3 month view; thesis breaks if the next guide inflects higher or AI/networking spend clearly offsets enterprise deceleration.
• Pair trade: long SNDK / short AMAT for a 3-6 month relative-value expression on margin durability vs. cyclical capex disappointment; stop the pair if AMAT guides back to broad-based acceleration.
• Buy AVAV only on pullbacks as a tactical trade, but avoid chasing RCAT/UMAC strength until procurement data confirms actual order conversion; otherwise this is a headline trade, not an earnings trade.