New York, Feb 17, 2026, 14:15 EST — Regular session
Bank of America Corp climbed 0.7% to $52.92 Tuesday afternoon. Shares traded between $52.48 and $53.54, with roughly 19.1 million shares moving so far.
This shift carries weight: bank shares remain highly sensitive to U.S. rate expectations. A slight tweak in anticipated cuts can swing net interest income forecasts, since that margin—what banks make from loans after covering deposit costs—hangs in the balance.
The same split showed up again Tuesday—tech names caught more selling, while financials held their ground. “It’s an indiscriminate selling in all things tech,” said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at B Riley Wealth. S&P 500 financials climbed 1.2%, with both Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan tacking on close to 1.5%. 1
Bank of America’s current thesis boils down to this: with rates steadier, deposit pricing pressure eases off and margin talk doesn’t spiral. On the flip side, that same stability reins in the broader “cuts are coming” rally the market’s been chasing.
Federal Reserve Governor Michael Barr didn’t give much comfort to those hoping for a swift policy shift. “It will likely be appropriate to hold rates steady for some time,” Barr said, cautioning that there’s still a significant chance inflation runs above the Fed’s 2% goal, even with last year’s cuts placing rates in the 3.5% to 3.75% range. 2
Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee took a different angle, adding a caveat. “If…we can show that we’re on path to 2% inflation, I still think there’s several more rate cuts that can happen in 2026,” he said. He flagged services inflation stuck at a 3.2% annual clip, even as January headline consumer inflation eased to 2.4%. 3
Traders are hanging onto that tension: cuts might come, just not now. Speeding up the easing process would boost credit demand and underwriting, but there’s a catch—if loan yields drop ahead of deposit costs, interest margins get pinched.
Traders are looking ahead to Wednesday, when the Fed drops minutes from its Jan. 27-28 meeting at 2:00 p.m. ET. 4
Friday brings the Personal Income and Outlays report at 8:30 a.m. ET, a release that features the PCE price index—key for the Fed’s inflation gauge. 5
The setup isn’t one-sided. If inflation surprises to the upside, or if the minutes reveal more hawkish concerns about sticky prices than traders are banking on, expect bets on rate cuts to shrink and bank stocks to take the hit. Tech’s swings remain unpredictable, too — when sentiment turns risk-off, banks usually feel it.
BAC traders aren’t focused on the bank’s schedule right now—they’re tracking what comes out of Washington. Next up, the Fed minutes hit on Feb. 18, followed by PCE inflation numbers set for Feb. 20.
