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 September 25:

Moderna Stock Soars as Melanoma Vaccine Fuels Rally

Moderna stock soared 29.11% this week, as traders extended a rally built on the growing conviction that intismeran autogene will clear its biggest test next month. The personalized cancer vaccine, developed with Merck, already hit its primary endpoint of recurrence-free survival and a key secondary endpoint of distant metastasis-free survival in patients with resected melanoma when tested alongside Keytruda.

Wall Street reacted fast when the initial data broke in August. TD Cowen analyst Tyler Van Buren, addressing the trial’s readout at the time, called it a landmark moment and significant validation of Moderna’s underlying mRNA platform. William Blair’s Myles Minter went further, upgrading the stock and projecting the melanoma indication alone could eventually generate $5.4 billion in peak annual sales. Those calls set the floor under the stock heading into September.

The company disclosed on September 21 that three abstracts on the therapy were accepted for the European Society for Medical Oncology Congress in Madrid, with the melanoma data landing a Presidential Symposium slot on October 24, the session ESMO reserves for first-time disclosures of practice-changing trials. Earlier-stage data on pancreatic cancer and early-stage lung cancer are also slated for poster sessions, extending the drug’s reach beyond melanoma alone. Investors have spent the days since bidding up the stock on the assumption that a slot that prestigious does not go to data that disappoints.

Datadog Extends Upswing

Datadog shares surged 16.62% this week.

The AI-powered observability and security software platform climbed just over 4% on Friday, continuing a strong stretch that has seen the stock gain nearly 12% over the past five sessions. DDOG closed the regular session at $268.13, up $11.21 on the day.

DDOG has now climbed in 9 of the past 10 sessions.

Cadence Design Systems Stock Pops on A 8-Day Winning Streak

A six-day run in Cadence Design stock has now moved higher for 8 consecutive trading days. The shares poped 15.28% this week.

For anyone holding the shares, the streak is a sharp, positive reversal. The stock is down 17.0% over the trailing three months, a period that includes this recent rally.

Qualcomm Secures Extension to Global Patent Licensing Pact with Apple

Qualcomm said ​on Thursday Apple has extended its patent-licensing agreement with ‌the chip designer, even as the iPhone maker looks to cut its reliance on the company's modem chips.

The semiconductor company did not give a ​timeline for the latest move. The current agreement ends on ​March 31, 2027, with an option to extend it ⁠by two years.

Qualcomm shares jumped 13.65% this week.

Intel Stock Jumps as Muse, Analyst Upgrades and Intel Foundry Progress Boost Sentiment

Intel shares jumped 13.26% this week, driven by improving sentiment in the semiconductor sector.

The release of Meta's Muse AI agent has sparked renewed interest in chip demand, potentially benefiting Intel's infrastructure needs.

Analyst upgrades have bolstered investor confidence, with price targets raised due to stronger demand and progress in Intel's turnaround efforts.

Despite the positive momentum, Intel faces challenges from competitive pressures, shareholder dilution, and the need for sustained execution in its recovery strategy.

Wall Street Expects Meta's AI Agent to Shape into a New Revenue Engine

Meta Platforms shares rallied 12.9% this week.

Wall Street has turned bullish on Meta Platforms, betting that its new AI agent Muse could open a new revenue stream for the social media giant and reshape ​the company's AI monetization prospects.

Muse, launched on September 8, is an AI assistant that can send emails, book travel and ‌complete transactions such as selling a car on behalf of a user. The basic version is free, with subscriptions priced at $20 and $100 a month for heavier use.

AMD Stocks Move Higher as $1 Trillion Demands Full Systems

AMD, the chip designer, advanced 12.65% this week.

The move kept its market value above $1 trillion, a milestone Reuters reported it first reached on Monday. Investors are betting AMD can win a bigger share of AI infrastructure spending.

The bet goes beyond selling a faster accelerator. AMD's Helios plans bring its GPUs, server CPUs and networking technology into a rack-scale offering. That could give AMD a larger role in each customer deployment. It also raises the bar: customers need the hardware, software and support to work together at scale.

MPWR Stock Climbs As AI Demand And Foundry Deal Boost Outlook

Monolithic Power stocks gained 12.29% this week amid strong AI-chip demand and upbeat analyst upgrades.

StoneX initiated coverage of Monolithic Power Systems with a Buy rating and a $1,800 price target, highlighting lean costs, top-tier margins, and AI-driven power demand as core growth drivers.

A long-term manufacturing deal with GlobalFoundries will put MPWR’s power-management tech into GF’s Singapore 300mm fab, adding capacity for high-growth markets starting in early 2027.

Warner Bros Discovery Stock Surges on Settlement Progress in Paramount Merger Suit

Warner Bros Discovery shares surged 11.01% this week as Paramount Skydance settled a major legal battle standing in the way of its $110 billion acquisition of the company.

Paramount reached a deal with a California-led group of state attorneys general and the Writers Guild of America, clearing one of the biggest hurdles left before the merger can close.

The settlement is a big win for Paramount CEO David Ellison, who spent months fighting the states to push the deal forward.

Supermicro Stock Rises on Nvidia Vera Rubin Rack Shipments

Super Micro Computer shares rose 10.67% this week after the company announced it has begun shipping NVIDIA Vera Rubin NVL72 racks integrated with its Data Center Building Block Solutions and direct liquid cooling technology.

The company said its DCBBS now supports computing infrastructure for NVIDIA Vera Rubin NVL72 deployments, featuring a full liquid-cooling stack optimized for the platform. Each NVIDIA Vera Rubin NVL72 rack contains 72 NVIDIA Rubin GPUs and 36 NVIDIA Vera CPUs in a single liquid-cooled rack, with 18 compute trays delivering 20.7 TB of HBM4 memory and up to 54 TB of LPDDR5X.

Supermicro’s DCBBS Blueprint defines a bill-of-materials from 5 MW to gigawatt scale, with 1,152 GPUs and 331 TB of HBM4 per Scalable Unit. The company provides integration services including site survey, project design, integration, testing, on-site deployment, and ongoing support.