5 Stocks: 35% of S&P’s YTD Returns
…and some fun facts.
The chart above, produced by Goldman Sachs Investment Research, highlights five stocks that account for 35% of the S&P 500’s year-to-date returns as of December 9, 2021. The y-axis illustrates each stock’s share of the returns; the x-axis lays out each stock’s corresponding index share at the start of the year. The diagonal line demarks whether the stock has outperformed or underperformed the index, on a weighted return basis.
At the start of the year, Microsoft’s (MSFT) market cap made up nearly 6% of the S&P 500 total value but contributed approximately 10% of the index’s YTD returns. The cluster of dots on the lower lefthand part of the chart represents the return/weighted ranking of 493 of the index’s other stocks. The dots representing Facebook (FB) and Amazon (AMZN) indicate these two stocks have underperformed the S&P 500 index, YTD.
A person that has a $100k portfolio invested wholly in an S&P 500 Index fund has approximately:
- $1,000 invested in NVIDIA
- $1,800 invested in Tesla
- $3,000 invested in Alphabet
- $5750 invested in Microsoft
- $7,000 invested in Apple
These five companies account for $18.5% of the portfolio's total investment value — and 35% of the portfolio’s YTD returns.
Below are the individual YTD price charts of the five best-performing S&P 500 stocks — and some fun facts for you to digest as your head moves up and to the right, while wistfully (or perhaps cheerfully) analyzing them.
Microsoft (MSFT)
Responsible for 10.25% of S&P 500 YTD Returns
Fun Facts:
- The company’s original name was hyphenated, “Micro-Soft”.
- Employees call themselves “softies”.
- Microsoft Office was originally developed for Macintosh computers.
- Microsoft had an opportunity to buy YouTube for $ 500 million, almost half of what Google ended up paying.
Alphabet (GOOGL)
Responsible for 8.75% of S&P 500 YTD Returns
Fun Facts:
- The original name of Google was Backrub.
- The name Google comes from the number Googol (1.0 × 10¹⁰⁰).
- The Google homepage is available in 80 languages.
- One-third of all Google searches are keyed on a smartphone.
Apple (AAPL)
Responsible for 8.0% of S&P 500 YTD Returns
Fun Facts:
- Apple’s market cap is larger than the GDP of 25 countries.
- Apple launched a clothing line in 1986.
- Apple holds the patent for the “slide to unlock” feature.
- Steve Jobs is an Italian fashion label created by two Neapolitans in 2012 upon realizing “Steve Jobs” had not been trademarked by Apple.
NVIDIA (NVDA)
Responsible for 5.75% of S&P 500 YTD Returns
Fun Facts:
- NVIDIA invented the GPU market with the 1999 release of GPU GeForce 256.
- NVIDIA calls its GeForce GTX 1080 Ti chip “the world’s fastest gaming GPU.”
- NVIDIA chips initially powered Tesla’s autonomous driving technology.
- The name “NVIDIA”, is a combination of “n” (usually used as a mathematical variable) and “video” (Latin: to “see”)
Tesla (TSLA)
Responsible for 2.25% of S&P 500 YTD Returns
Fun Facts:
- In 2021 Time magazine named Elon Musk Person of the Year.
- Since 2019, Tesla manufactures its own chips using Arm processors.
- Tesla’s Elon Musk opposes NVIDIA’s proposed $40 billion acquisition of the U.K chip designer Arm over the deal’s impact on competition.
- Tesla has become the world’s most valuable automaker after nearly going bankrupt — twice (2008 and 2017–2019).
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