In this podcast, Motley Fool contributors Travis Hoium, Lou Whiteman, and Rachel Warren discuss:
- Why space is worth watching in 2026.
- Opportunities in healthcare.
- How Hims & Hers is disrupting the healthcare industry
To catch full episodes of all The Motley Fool’s free podcasts, check out our podcast center. When you’re ready to invest, check out this top 10 list of stocks to buy.
This podcast was recorded on Dec. 31, 2025.
Travis Hoium: The calendar is turning to 2026 tonight, so it’s time to talk about stocks we love for 2026. Motley Fool Money starts now.
Welcome to Motley Fool Money. I’m Travis Hoy. I’m joined by Lou Whiteman and Rachel Warren. We’re gonna do something a little bit different today. Given a slow newsweek. We’re going to talk about stocks that we like going into 2026. It’s always one of the times we focus on what is next year going to look like. Lou, let’s get specific. What stocks do you like in 2026?
Lou Whiteman: I’m going to start with the sector, and then we’ll get the stocks. I am really intrigued by space and what will become of the space sector in 2026. This was a real winner in 2025. Lots of excitement. The RCSpace and Defense Innovation ETF, which is one way to look at it, up 50% for the year. That’s not a bad year. A lot of these stocks we’re talking about, we did a lot better than that. That’s how averages work. In one sense, how can this continue. Once you had a year like this, there’s no way you can see that again, or that’s like conventional wisdom. But on the other hand, it turns out SpaceX is going to IPO in 2026.
Travis Hoium: $1.5 trillion is the rumored price, by the way.
Lou Whiteman: We’ll get to that in a second. Just even if they come in at half of that, there’s going to be a lot of discussion, a lot of talk about the potential of space. If that 1.5 trillion valuation does happen, hey, that makes a lot of these today’s speculative stocks. Look, the valuations look really reasonable. I think actually, there can be momentum into 2026. Specific stocks, Rocket Lab is the leader. RKLB is the ticker. I really like them. I’d rather own Rocket Lab than SpaceX, even if SpaceX was public. That’s how I feel about Rocket Lab. But let’s have more fun, something more obscure, something with a little more risk. I’m intrigued by Redwire, Ticker RDW. This is a component manufacturer for space and drones. They make a lot of the stuff that is necessary to get things into space. They have big exposure to areas like solar panels for space. There’s stuff that you just need if you are going to put something into space. Very neat company. Motley Fool members can just check out an interview I did with the CEO, Peter Cantillo. He described it as owning the fundamental building blocks if we’re going to have a Golden Age in space. Did a big acquisition in 2025, diversified to business. I think it’ll move them toward profitability in 2026. Lots of risks, lots of uncertainty, but it trades at 1/30 of the multiple Rocket Lab does right now. Price to sales multiple? Price to sales cause none of them are profitable yet. But the market hasn’t discovered this one. No slam dunk. It could go to zero, but I am very intrigued by the opportunity.
Travis Hoium: One of the questions that I had when I saw this in the rundown is, this is an area where these companies are not profitable. Usually, I go to Lou for very sound, these companies are industrials. This is how they make money. This is how it’s going to be durable for the next 20, 30, 40 years. This is much more speculative. What’s the risk reward here? Because it seems like this could be an area where we go through a 2021 or 2022 style drawdown, where suddenly that space CTF is down 70% in 2026. It could be up another 50%, could be down 70%. Is that a fair way to look at the risk reward?
Lou Whiteman: I think it is. I mean, you’re just setting it up, so I have to take it. It’s a moonshot, baby. [LAUGHTER] But here’s what I’ll say. There are a lot of space start-ups right now. Most of them, and I’ve been following this area for a long time. Most of them, to me, are uninvestable right now because of the risk. What I like about Redwire, look, again, there’s no guarantee the Edge autonomy deal that they did, this big deal they did last year to move them into drones, that will also help cash flow. I think that they have joined Rocket Lab as companies that have enough there to survive a winter. Look, there’s no guarantees if it’s a bad winter.
Travis Hoium: We went from cryptowinters to potential space winters.
Lou Whiteman: Well, winter happens all over, Travis. No, I mean, I do think when you’re looking at this, as optimistic as I am heading into 2026, you do have to realize that none of these things are slam dunks. They all could go to zero. I do try to look at which ones I think can outrun the grim reaper in a bad market. I’m not sure on Redwire. It’s hard to be sure of any equity, but I do like where they’re set up, even if things don’t go as well as I hope they were.
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