Small and Medium Caps to Watch: Small Caps Are Up 20% in 2026, and This Is the Weekly List
Independent research on undercovered companies listed on United States exchanges, across energy, shipping, defence, space, artificial intelligence, critical materials, industrial technology and consumer. Every report goes past the headline to what changed, what the filings actually say and which risk would break the thesis. Since this edition the page also carries a weekly list, rebuilt every Saturday from the week that has just closed.
+20.25%Small caps, 2026
+14.63%Mid caps, 2026
+12.94%S&P 500 tracker, 2026
17Names on this week’s list
Small caps are ahead of the index in 2026, and that is not where most coverage is looking
Measured close to close from the last session of 2025 to 4 September 2026, the small-cap tracker is up 20.25%, the mid-cap tracker 14.63% and the S&P 500 tracker 12.94%. The gap is roughly seven points in favour of the smallest listed companies, and it has been built in a year whose headlines were about artificial intelligence infrastructure and the de-rating of enterprise software, that is, about very large companies.
That is the practical case for reading further down the market capitalisation scale. Small-cap and mid-cap companies sit in the least efficiently covered part of the public market: fewer analysts follow them, liquidity is thinner, and a single contract, financing decision, regulatory step or quarterly print can change the whole narrative in one session. The same conditions that produce the opportunity produce the risk, which is dilution, execution and gaps in price, and this page treats both with the same attention.
Nothing here is a model portfolio, a ranking or a recommendation to buy or sell. Because market-capitalisation classifications differ between index providers, the terms small cap and mid cap are used as practical research categories rather than as index definitions.
The weekly list: small and mid caps to watch, 7 to 11 September 2026
Week of 31 August – 4 September · published 5 September 2026Seventeen companies, chosen for one reason each: something verifiable happens to them in the coming week, or something verifiable happened to them in the week that just closed. The criteria are set out under the table. United States markets are closed on Monday 7 September for Labor Day, so the week has four sessions, with the producer price index on Thursday and the consumer price index on Friday, both before the Federal Reserve decision of 16 September.
Energy, shipping and critical materials
Crude gained 9.45% on the week and the energy sector 2.20%. These three report or file inside the theme.
| Ticker | Company | Market value | Week | 2026 | Next event | Why it is on the list |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $TEN | Tsakos Energy Navigation | $1.32B | +2.87% | +95.09% | Results on 10 September | A crude and product tanker operator reporting in the week after the oil tracker gained 9.45%. The company’s own commentary on charter rates is the part that is verifiable; the freight consequences of the shipping disruption in the Gulf are not yet in any published figure. |
| $UROY | Uranium Royalty | $1.69B | +4.35% | +25.42% | Results on 10 September | A royalty and streaming structure rather than a miner, so the release is about realised prices and physical uranium held, not production. The uranium tracker gained 1.08% on the week and the stock is 18.7% below its 2026 high. |
| $UAMY | United States Antimony | $0.78B | +7.22% | +3.59% | Three directors bought, 31 August to 1 September | Joseph A. Carrabba, Lloyd Bardswich and Blaise A. Aguirre filed Form 4 purchases inside the week, for $200,285 in total. The shares are 58.8% below their 2026 high and the rare earths and strategic metals tracker fell 2.27% over the same five sessions. |
Defence and space
Aerospace and defence fell 3.10% on the week. Both names below are trading a long way from their 2026 highs.
| Ticker | Company | Market value | Week | 2026 | Next event | Why it is on the list |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $AVAV | AeroVironment | $7.32B | -2.22% | -40.20% | Fiscal first-quarter results on 9 September | The aerospace and defence tracker lost 3.10% in a week with an active shipping conflict, which is the opposite of the reflex reading. AeroVironment is 63.2% below its 2026 high going into the print, so the release lands on a share price that has already moved a long way. |
| $ASTS | AST SpaceMobile | n/d | +7.34% | -14.21% | Director purchase filed 31 August | Director Adriana Cisneros reported a $619,200 purchase, held across a spouse account, a family investment entity and an adult child’s account, all disclosed in the footnotes. The market value is not computed here because the company’s share count is split across classes and is not published in the single field this page uses. |
Software after the de-rating
The application software tracker lost 4.50% in five sessions and three companies that raised full-year guidance still fell.
| Ticker | Company | Market value | Week | 2026 | Next event | Why it is on the list |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $BRZE | Braze | $3.60B | -7.44% | -6.79% | Results on 8 September | The application software tracker lost 4.50% on the week and Braze lost more than that. The guidance line is what matters: in this quarter three companies raised full-year outlooks and still fell, so the release is a test of how far expectations have already reset. |
| $SAIL | SailPoint | $10.67B | -5.09% | -6.97% | Results on 9 September | Identity security, reporting five sessions after Zscaler issued a first fiscal 2027 outlook implying roughly seventeen per cent growth against twenty-five per cent delivered. Whether that reset is company-specific or sector-wide is the open question and this is one of the readings that answers it. |
| $DSGX | Descartes Systems | $6.79B | -3.54% | -9.95% | Results on 10 September | A logistics and customs network whose volumes are tied to global freight. It reports in a week when the shipping disruption is the dominant macro story, which makes management’s own commentary on transaction volumes the item to read rather than the headline number. |
Consumer after the Lululemon guidance cut
Consumer discretionary was the weakest sector of the week at minus 1.96%, and three of these four report on the same day.
| Ticker | Company | Market value | Week | 2026 | Next event | Why it is on the list |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $ASO | Academy Sports and Outdoors | $2.79B | +3.31% | -10.05% | Results on 9 September | Consumer discretionary was the weakest sector of the week at minus 1.96%, and Lululemon cut its full-year revenue and earnings outlook on Thursday night. Academy reports first among the specialty retailers and sets the reference for the rest. |
| $SIG | Signet Jewelers | $3.35B | +3.14% | +2.92% | Results on 9 September | One of the few consumer names positive on the year. The comparison that matters is its own comparable sales against the minus nine per cent Lululemon reported, because it separates a category problem from a company problem. |
| $AEO | American Eagle Outfitters | $2.91B | +3.08% | -34.05% | Results on 9 September | Down 34.05% on the year and 38.3% below its 2026 high going into the print. Apparel with a heavy back-to-school quarter, reporting on the same day as two other specialty retailers. |
| $RH | RH | $2.80B | -1.00% | -17.39% | Results on 10 September | Home furnishings, the part of consumer discretionary most exposed to mortgage rates. The ten-year Treasury yield rose from 4.73% to 4.78% during the week and the real estate sector fell 1.24%. |
Health care and regulatory catalysts
One confirmed decision date and two Form 4 purchases filed inside the week.
| Ticker | Company | Market value | Week | 2026 | Next event | Why it is on the list |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $TLX | Telix Pharmaceuticals | n/d | +5.76% | +59.41% | PDUFA target date on 11 September | The only confirmed regulatory decision date of the week, for Pixclara, a PET imaging agent in glioma. The market value is not computed here because the United States listing is in depositary shares and the ratio has to be read off the filing rather than assumed. |
| $ATRA | Atara Biotherapeutics | $0.10B | +6.09% | -46.05% | Director purchase filed 4 September | Director Brian N. Cherry bought $999,994 of stock on 4 September, and the footnote states the shares came from the issuer through its sales agent under a sales agreement dated 1 November 2023. That is a subscription into the company’s own programme, which is a different transaction from a purchase on the open market. |
| $TENX | Tenax Therapeutics | $0.07B | -8.92% | -84.09% | 10% owner bought, 31 August to 2 September | Funds managed by ADAR1 Capital Management bought $1.38 million over three sessions at a weighted average between $1.77 and $1.80. The shares are down 84.09% on the year, which is the context that makes the filing worth reading rather than the reason to act on it. |
Industrials and the labour read
One company whose executives bought into a 25% weekly decline, and one that reports on corporate hiring itself.
| Ticker | Company | Market value | Week | 2026 | Next event | Why it is on the list |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $ENOV | Enovis | $1.07B | -25.46% | -30.33% | Chief executive bought, 2 to 4 September | The single largest weekly decline in this list. Chief executive Damien McDonald bought 13,035 shares on 4 September and chief administrative officer Oliver Engert bought over 2 and 3 September, for $399,591 between them, with the shares at their 2026 low. |
| $KFY | Korn Ferry | $4.34B | -1.08% | +29.28% | Results on 8 September | An organisational consulting and executive search business, which makes it a direct read on corporate hiring three sessions after payrolls came in at 162,000 against a twelve-month average of 31,000. The shares are 1.1% below their 2026 high. |
How the numbers are built. Market value is a Merlintrader calculation: the share count declared in the company’s most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, multiplied by the closing price of 4 September 2026 from the Marketstack end-of-day series. It is not a company disclosure and it is not a data vendor’s figure. The declared share counts carry their own dates, which run from 31 December 2025 for Tsakos Energy Navigation to 28 August 2026 for Uranium Royalty, so the older ones are the less precise. Two rows show no value: AST SpaceMobile because its share count is split across classes, and Telix because its United States line is in depositary shares whose ratio has to be read off the filing rather than assumed. Weekly and year-to-date changes are computed close to close, the year starting from the last session of 2025. Earnings dates come from the published corporate calendar and the regulatory date from the company’s own filing; both can change, and the primary source remains the one that decides.
How a company gets on the weekly list
The list is not a screen output and it is not a ranking. Each week it is rebuilt by hand from four inputs, and a company needs at least one of them to appear.
A dated event in the coming week
A quarterly release, a regulatory decision date, an advisory committee, a shareholder vote or a scheduled contract milestone, taken from the company’s own calendar or a filing rather than from an aggregator.
A verifiable filing inside the week that closed
Most often a Form 4: an insider purchase or sale read in the original document, with the security type, the ownership structure and any trading plan checked before the row is written.
A macro or sector link that can be stated
A commodity move, a rate move or a sector tracker move that reaches the company through something specific, such as freight rates, order books or mortgage-sensitive demand. If the link cannot be named, the company does not go on the list.
A price history that gives the event weight
How far the shares are from their own 2026 high or low, so that a result lands on a price that has already moved rather than on an abstraction. This is context, never a signal.
What is deliberately absent: analyst price targets, consensus estimates presented as facts, probability of approval, social-media sentiment and anything that would read as a recommendation. Where a figure is a Merlintrader calculation it is labelled as one, and where a company does not disclose something the absence is stated rather than filled with an estimate.
What each company report examines
Catalysts and contracts
Government awards, commercial wins, product launches, regulatory decisions and strategic milestones that can change what the market expects, each with the document that establishes it.
Earnings and execution
Revenue quality, margins, backlog conversion, guidance and the distance between what management said it would deliver and what it delivered.
Capital structure
Cash, runway, debt, share issuance, warrants, convertibles and the at-the-market programmes that quietly reshape per-share value.
Risk and volatility
Liquidity, valuation, concentration, ownership, insider activity and the specific events that would invalidate the prevailing narrative.
Sources and boundaries
- Company filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including Form 4 read in the original XML, and investor relations releases with a readable dateline.
- Prices and index levels from the Marketstack end-of-day series, the paid market-data source used across Merlintrader, computed close to close.
- Macroeconomic data from the issuing agency: the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Department of the Treasury and the Federal Reserve.
- Regulatory dates only where a primary source states them. Windows such as “third quarter” are not converted into a day.
Merlintrader also runs a Weekly Market Pulse on indexes, macro and earnings, an Insider Trading Weekly built from the Form 4 filings themselves, and a Free Biotech Catalyst Calendar for regulatory dates.
Get the weekly list as it goes live
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Join @merlintraderpub_com on TelegramEducational research only. This page is published for educational and informational purposes. It is not investment advice, not a recommendation, and not an offer or solicitation to buy or sell any security. Merlintrader is not a registered investment adviser or broker-dealer. Small and mid-cap securities can be highly volatile and may have limited liquidity. Company filings, market data and scheduled dates can be revised by the issuer or the agency that published them, and past performance does not indicate future results. Always do your own research and consult a licensed financial adviser before making any investment decision. Full disclaimer: merlintrader.com/disclaimer.
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