The Market Is Up 10% in 2026 -- Are These ETFs Still Worth Buying Now?

The article recommends four ETFs for long-term investors: Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (0.03% expense ratio, 15.4% average annual return over 10 years), Invesco QQQ Trust (21.8% annualized over 10 years), Vanguard Growth ETF (413% total return over 10 years), and Schwab U.S. Dividend Equity ETF (12.5% average annual return and a 3.3% yield). It argues that despite a strong market run, dollar-cost averaging into broad, growth, and dividend ETFs remains attractive, with AI and technology stocks continuing to drive performance. The piece is broadly supportive of ETF investing rather than a specific company catalyst.

Analysis

The article is really a momentum confirmation signal, not a valuation argument: broad beta is still working, but the internal leadership is increasingly narrow and AI-linked. That matters because funds like VOO and VUG are not just “market exposure” here; they are effectively leveraged proxies for a handful of megacap winners, so any pause in AI capex or multiple compression will hit them harder than the headline S&P 500 implies. The real second-order effect is that passive inflows continue to mechanically reinforce the same large-cap cohort, extending the winner-take-most dynamic.

NFLX stands out as the quiet beneficiary of this regime. It is not pure AI, but it trades like a high-quality growth compounder with strong pricing power and underappreciated operating leverage, so it can absorb style rotation better than lower-quality software names if rates stay range-bound. NVDA remains the highest-beta expression of the AI theme, but the risk/reward has shifted from “fundamental under-ownership” to “positioning and expectations”; from here, upside needs another leg of capex acceleration, while downside can come quickly if hyperscaler spending cadence normalizes even modestly.

NDAQ is the contrarian placeholder in the data: little direct thematic punch, but it becomes relevant if retail activity and ETF churn stay elevated because its index/market-structure franchise benefits from higher trading volumes and more listed-product activity. The interesting hedge is that dividend/value exposure via SCHD tends to outperform when growth gets crowded or the market breadth deteriorates, so the article’s pro-growth message is also a warning that factor dispersion may widen. In other words, this is a good tape for winners, but a bad tape for complacency in broad-market beta.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Maintain core long VOO/VUG exposure, but reduce concentration risk by trimming 10-15% into strength over the next 2-4 weeks if semis keep extending without breadth confirmation.
• Express AI upside with a defined-risk long NVDA call spread 3-6 months out; target continuation into the next earnings cycle, but cap premium given elevated positioning and event risk.
• Add NFLX as a relative-quality growth long versus unprofitable software: long NFLX / short IGV or an equal-dollar short basket of lower-multiple software for the next 1-3 months if rates remain stable.
• Use SCHD as a hedge against growth-factor crowding: rotate a small sleeve into SCHD on any 3-5% pullback in QQQ/VUG, with a 6-12 month horizon and lower drawdown risk.
• Avoid initiating new outright NDAQ longs here; only consider it as a volume/volatility hedge if market activity data accelerates, since the setup is more defensive than catalytic.