Regarding YTD Returns, Which Stocks Are The 'Biggest Winners' In 2024?

As the last FOMC meeting of 2024 comes to a close, all major agendas for the US stock market this year have been completed, which makes now a great opportunity to analyze which stocks are the biggest winners this year.

S&P 500

According to the trend so far this year, the one expected to have the year-to-date gains among the S&P 500 index component stocks is the big data analytics software company, Palantir, with a year-to-date increase of 331%.

The key to Palantir's leading increase is its accurate timing of several hot spots this year. The company's main business is intelligence analysis of massive data, which is naturally linked to AI/machine learning and big data. At the same time, the company's main customers are defense and security contractors, which also hit the hot defense concept in the overseas market this year. Finally, its natural B2B attribute also makes the company take off in the AI application trend.

It is very interesting that the second and third runners-up, or perhaps the only challengers, both come from the energy sector. Among them, American power giant Vistra Energy has risen by 249% this year, and GE Vernova, the sustainable energy business spun off from General Electric, has increased by 175%.

Vistra Energy, in addition to having coal-to-gas and nuclear power concepts, is also an impressive repurchase maniac in the US stock market. According to statistics earlier, since 2021, the company has spent a total of $4.25 billion on repurchases - the company's latest market value is only $45.2 billion.

In fourth place, with a chance to break into the top three, is Nvidia (+167% year-to-date), which has been written about too much by all sorts of analysis this year.

The fifth-ranked company is Axon Enterprise (+142%), also known as Taser International in Chinese, which is known for making stun guns. In addition to non-lethal weapons, the company's main business also includes law enforcement recorders, drones, and digital evidence management platforms - the company also increases revenue by signing subscription contracts with law enforcement agencies. By the way, the company also has AI services, which are said to help the police extract valuable information from a large amount of video and data.

The companies currently ranked sixth to eighth are United Airlines (+124.63%), TPL, and Broadcom, which has recently appeared on the headlines of major financial media.

Nasdaq 100

The contenders in this category are very familiar to investors. The current leader is the AI application leader Applovin, with a year-to-date increase of 707.3%. Even if Palantir is included in the Nasdaq 100 Index at the end of the year, the huge gap in gains between the two is likely to pose no threat to the former.

The remaining names are familiar to most investors, including NVDA, AVGO, and NFLX. However, notably, Constellation Energy, which has been thriving on the concept of AI nuclear power station, became the dark horse on the list. Its YTD gains even topped big companies like Netflix, Arm, and Tesla. 

Country Thematic Investment: Chinese ETFs appear at the forefront

As the market with the most comprehensive range of ETFs globally, the US stock market also has a reference for global asset trends. According to related statistics, after removing those gambling-type ETFs, the Argentine ETF is likely to become the best-performing country-themed ETF of 2024, showing overseas investors' expectations for the country's turnaround from difficulties.

The Israeli ETF ranks second, focusing mainly on the generic drug giant Teva, as well as a series of cloud, network security, and financial technology companies.

ETFs targeting Peruvian and Singaporean assets have also increased by more than 20%, while China and Turkish ETFs have increased by roughly 13%, all of which are the best in their respective thematic ETFs