(This is The Best Stocks in the Market , brought to you by Josh Brown and Sean Russo of Ritholtz Wealth Management.) Josh — One of the hidden cheat codes in stock investing is to find the most powerful generational tailwinds and capitalize on them. This means thinking about what people and businesses spend their capital on, pretty much regardless of what happens to the circular economy story. We previously discussed some of these secular tailwinds when writing about CrowdStrike (CRWD) and a number of other cybersecurity stocks. Cybersecurity is essential for businesses, governments, and other organizations. This is not a “nice to have” kind of initiative. If you get hacked badly, it doesn’t matter what else you’re doing. There is a possibility of game over. Cyber has been one of the most durable software themes of the past decade, and you never know what’s going to change that. I think defense spending in a time of endless potential conflict is, unfortunately, a pretty safe bet. I wish it wasn’t, but we both know it will be. Countries around the world, including the United States, are arming their militaries and rebuilding their defense capabilities in ways unlike anything seen in decades. Vladimir Putin is the greatest military salesman the world has ever known. This does not mean that all defense stocks will perform well. That’s why we look for entries and exits and discuss risk management in whatever we buy. Sean profiles law enforcement stocks that once looked promising, but have since failed. Next, we will address other potential setups in the aerospace and defense industry. Before we get into that, we’ll also give you some stats on some of the best stocks on the market. Tighten your straps. Sector Leaderboard As of November 10, there are 188 names on the market’s best stocks list. Top Sector Rankings: Top Industries: Top 5 Blue Chip Stocks by Relative Strength: Spotlight Sean — We’ve evaluated AXON twice this year. The first was on May 19th and the second on June 16th. The stock was removed from the list after it closed below its 200-day moving average on October 14th. Since that day, the stock price has continued its downward trend and is currently down 15% from that date. As you can see, the stock had a messy uptrend, collapsed, and then dropped below 200 before things got really messy. The stock price has fallen 18% since the last earnings report. It missed out on profits, saw margins shrink compared to the previous quarter, and revenue growth slowed year-over-year. After AXON’s poor performance, we wanted to see what other aerospace and defense companies were doing. These other products are doing better than AXON, but the recent selloff has made the technicals a bit noisy. RTX is also something we’ve looked at a few times. RTX is currently the fourth-best performing aerospace and defense stock, up 51% this year. It can be seen that the stock price is clearly on an upward trend. The stock outperformed its top and bottom line results with a 104% increase in free cash flow, record backlog levels of $251 billion, and profit growth across all segments. LHX just reported a record backlog similar to RTX and raised its outlook for the remainder of 2025, with operating margins and organic revenue growth improving 10% year over year. GD had also made a similar report to LHX. Operating margin improved 30 bps sequentially, operating income increased 11% year-over-year, and backlog improved 19% year-over-year. These companies are fine. These companies have a huge advantage in this environment in that most of their earrings come from government agencies rather than consumers. All of this is against the backdrop of strong tailwinds for the defense industry over the past year or so. Consistent geopolitical tensions and changing relationships among U.S. allies have led to increased defense budgets across the U.S. and its allies. The United States alone is expected to spend nearly $900 billion on defense in 2025, an all-time high. Josh talks about technology. Josh: RTX retested the low 170s, but buyers wouldn’t allow it to go back to the recent gap. This is bullish. Currently, it has rebounded from that retest and is gaining momentum with the RSI in the low 60s. You can see how quickly the 50-day moving average was bought around $165. If you decide to trade, your stop is just below that level. Leave a little bit of leeway, but not too much. My guess is that it will hit new highs by the end of the year. L3Harris (LHX) is trickier. Chopping within a horizontal trading range is perfectly fine for investors with long names, but I don’t like this action as a trade entry. Since falling into a downtrend in May of this year, LHX has been a good soldier (pun intended), maintaining a 50-day rally and trending upward. At the moment, this trend line is being tested. Naturally, it only makes the entry decision more difficult. The name is still 21% above its 200-day value, but there’s a lot of room for correction before we can say there’s actually something wrong with it. Risk Management General Dynamics (GD) is still an early chart. Stock prices have been strong this fall, with buyers rushing to buy on the edge. I think this will show $375 before $325. That being said, use the lower end of the July gap, 310, as a pivot point. Violating this level invalidates the uptrend and changes the technical attractiveness of the stock. I think it’s safe to ride until then. Disclosure: (none) All opinions expressed by CNBC Pro contributors are solely their own and do not reflect the opinions of CNBC, NBC UNIVERSAL, its parent or affiliates, and may have been previously disseminated on television, radio, the Internet, or another medium. The above is subject to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. 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