This week, which stocks lagged or dragged? Weekly Winners column keeps up with market trends, helping Tigers sort out the week's hottest sectors, stock winners and important news.

Below are top 10 S&P 500 stock gainers for the week ended Oct 2:

Carnival Stock Soars 16% as Analysts Double Down on Upside

Carnival shares have surged about 16% over the past week, as investors responded to a wave of upbeat analyst commentary and strengthening fundamentals in the cruise operator’s recovery story. The stock, which has been trading in the mid‑$20s, is increasingly being viewed as a key beneficiary of resilient consumer demand in the broader Consumer Cyclical sector.

Multiple Wall Street firms have reiterated or upgraded their views on Carnival, helping fuel the rally. J.P. Morgan’s Matthew Boss maintained a Buy rating with a $41 price target, while Jefferies’ David Katz also reiterated a Buy with a $33 target. In addition, research from TipRanks – Anthropic upgraded the shares to Buy, and other banks including Susquehanna and Morgan Stanley have recently raised their price targets. Despite one Hold rating from Truist Financial’s Patrick Scholes and Deutsche Bank, the overall consensus stands at Strong Buy, with average targets clustered around the mid‑$30s, implying meaningful upside from current levels.

Lumentum Rises 15% Weekly After Citi Raises PT to $1,400

Lumentum rose 15.27% this week, trading at $1,085.42/share. The rally was primarily driven by Citi Group raising its target price on Lumentum from $1,200 to $1,400 while maintaining a buy rating — the most aggressive upward revision among recent institutional upgrades.

Citi's move further reinforces a growing bullish consensus among Wall Street analysts. Rothschild & Co had previously raised its target to $1,294.85 from $1,270.27, while Deutsche Bank initiated coverage with a $1,200 target and a buy rating. The average analyst target price now stands at approximately $1,148.76, according to FactSet polling data.

Fundamentally, Lumentum's collaboration with Qualcomm and Corning on high-density optical die-to-die interconnect solutions for AI scale-up systems — demonstrated at ECOC — continues to underpin institutional optimism around its positioning in the AI optical interconnect market.

Synopsys, OpenAI Strike Deal to Develop AI Model for Chip Design Work

Synopsys shares rose 15% to $489.9 this week. The most eye-catching of the company's announcements were its AI partnerships. Synopsys and OpenAI have partnered to launch GPT-Synopsys, a specialized model for chip design. Although the two companies didn't give financial details, they said they would share revenue under a "multiyear agreement" and they are already in talks with leading semiconductor customers over its use.

Meanwhile, Synopsys also said it had agreed a deal worth more than $1 billion to work with Amazon on custom chips. The agreement expands Amazon's current use of Synopsys' intellectual property and its electronic-design automation software. Notably, the deal is an example of Synopsys' new license-plus-royalty business model for its intellectual-property business, meaning payments should rise with production.

Coherent Rises 14% as Morgan Stanley FCC Research Note Continues to Fuel Optical Communications Strength

Coherent rose nearly 14% this week. On the news front, a Morgan Stanley research note following the FCC's final rule on communications supply chain security continued to drive bullish sentiment.

Morgan Stanley identified Coherent and Lumentum as core U.S. domestic high-speed laser suppliers whose strategic positioning is significantly enhanced under the new regulatory framework.

In preceding sessions, Morgan Stanley had also noted after the European Conference on Optical Communication that multiple optical communications suppliers' capacity over the next 12 to 18 months is nearly sold out, with AI-driven optical demand remaining robust. The firm argued the sector's core focus is shifting from demand growth to capacity release and yield improvement supporting margin expansion. Additionally, Coherent recently launched its PhotonLink integrated optics platform and expanded its pluggable optical line system portfolio targeting 800G ZR/ZR+ modules for AI data centers.