Dec 31, 2024 - Technology
The biggest S&P 500 winners and losers of 2024
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It was a good year for AI-linked companies in 2024, as they led the stock market with eye-watering returns.
- Execution problems plagued some well-known businesses, though, causing their shares to sink.
Why it matters: Those AI names helped the S&P 500 to its best two-year gain since the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s.
By the numbers: Nine S&P 500 stocks doubled in value (or more) this year, while four lost at least half their value.
- Three AI-linked stocks topped the list: Software company Palantir gained more than 340%; Vistra, a power producer that serves data centers, rose almost 260%; and chipmaker Nvidia gained more than 170%.
- If the bottom of the list has a theme, it's execution. Walgreens Boots Alliance (closing stores, heavily indebted, possibly for sale) lost more than 64% of its value. Intel (sinking AI market share, heavy layoffs) shed more than 60%, and Moderna (pulling back on new vaccines as COVID revenue tails off) dropped almost 60%.
Yes, but: Past performance does not guarantee future results.
- While AI names led the market this year, tech stocks have pulled back of late, with the Nasdaq down about 4% in just the last two weeks.
- The vast majority of the year's top gainers were down on the last trading day of 2024.
