Top 10 Best Performing US Stock Market Sectors
Most of us are familiar with using the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) as a measure of the overall direction of the stock market in the U.S., and by proxy, a measure of the overall economy. When people talk about the market have a good run or experiencing a drop, it is usually the Dow they are referring to.While the Dow and some of the other major indexes such as the Nasdaq 100 and the S&P 500 can be useful in generating a broad strokes picture of the status of the market and the greater economy, they have their limitations. Overrepresentation or underrepresentation of certain industries, confounding variables such as massive stock buy-backs, and a general weighing of the stock market towards the top 1% as opposed to the entire population all can result in an index being a less than idea indicator.
When making investments or simply trying to get a feel for the direction of the economy, looking at individual market sectors can be helpful in seeing not just where the markets are, but in better predicting where they are heading.
Market sectors are meaningful groupings of similar industries. Stocks in a sector are grouped according the the type of product or service they provide. In the United States, stocks are grouped into 11 different sectors. By looking at the market history of individual sectors, you can begin to get a better idea of what is currently driving or depressing the economy. For example, the Consumer Discretionary segment which includes companies that sell non-essential "luxury" goods such as sporting goods is a good barometer for consumer confidence and spending power. When people are feeling good about the economy and have enough money to make ends meet, the stocks Consumer Discretionary segment do well.
This list shows the U.S. stock market sectors ranked by their performance. Selecting time periods from the dropdown menu will allow you to rank by current sector performance as well as by the sector's performance over the last few days, weeks, months, and years.
Source: https://www.alphavantage.com/, Created on 4/13/2020
The Top Ten