Best Performing Stocks Since Election Day

In a posting yesterday, we highlighted the S&P groups that have traded higher since Election Day. The purpose of this analysis was to look for groups that the market thinks might benefit under the Obama administration. Unfortunately, the search didn't turn up a lot of winners, as only two groups (Consumer Services and Power Producers) were positive over the period.

Today, we highlight the individual stocks that have actually made investors money from Election Day through yesterday's Inauguration. Unlike our search for groups, our screen for individual stocks turned up more results. However, with only 55 stocks rising (11%), it was still nothing to write home about. The chart below highlights the percentage of stocks in each sector that were up over the period. As shown, the sectors with the highest percentage of positive stocks are all defensive in nature (Utilities, Health Care, Consumer Staples, and Telecom Services), while the sectors with the least percentage of up stocks are all cyclical in nature. This highlights that investors are collectively putting more emphasis on the weak economy than they are on any specific policy proposals out of Washington.

The table below highlights the eleven stocks in the S&P 500 that gained more than 10% from Election Day through the Inauguration. Once again, these stocks come from various sectors, with no one sector having a strong showing.

While only eleven stocks have managed to show double-digit gains since Election Day, 31 stocks in the index lost more than half of their value. The common thread between these names is that most come from the Financial sector. As shown below, only five of the 31 names are not from the Financial sector. The market seems to think that whatever policy measures come out of Washington to address the credit crisis, 'Wall Street fat cats' will not be ones that benefit.

Comments

[Moon Kil Woong:]

Thanks for the chart summation. Once again financials get pwned and deservedly so. A few of them should be 100% loss as in bankrupcy please. Only then will we know we are nearing a bottom.

Some will say, sure it's bad for the market. That would mean you are thinking short term. In the long term it is valuable and neccesary to clear out the bad, especially when they are draining public coffers to survive. When companies are rewarded for good behavior and punished for bad that's how the market recovers, not when the bad get rewarded for gluttony (like Bank of America and Citibank trying to become a global banking superpower by overextending themselves or acquiring everyone they can and then asking for $80 or more billion dollars) at the cost to all good taxpayers.

Jan 21 07:08 PM

[Urbane Gori...:]

If you don't break down the sectors into smaller sub-sectors, you miss some of the action. Under transportation, you'll see several airlines.. DAL, LUV, JBLU and AAI all come to mind... Not sure why... Who would want to own airline stocks in this economy..

jegan

Jan 22 04:51 PM