Good morning.
2025: The year of the +724% coin and the -69% theme park.
2025 is wrapping up, and if you think you know where all the biggest profits were made, you might want to check the charts.
This week, we’re taking a look back and also giving you the blueprint for what that volatility means for 2026.
The Scorecard: The full list of the winners and absolute losers (and what they have in common).
History Repeats: What the roaring markets of past decades tell us about today’s frenzy.
The 2026 Playbook: Our market outlook for the new year.
Shall we?
Disclaimer: The information provided is for educational and entertainment purposes only. It does not constitute financial, investment, legal, or tax advice, nor a solicitation to buy or sell any security. Past performance is not indicative of future results. All investing involves risk, including the loss of principal
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The Scorecard: Year-to-Date Performance of Assets
Here, we’re going to compare the year-to-date performance (YTD) of many major assets to give a kind of overview of the market in 2025. We’re comparing stocks, crypto, bonds, and precious metals. You won’t find every asset here, but you’ll see a lot of familiar faces.
So without further ado, the great YTD comparison (in descending order):
Zcash (ZEC): +724.80%
Sandisk Corporation (SNDK): +473.12%
Opendoor (DOOR): +315.16%
Western Digital (WDC): +288.83%
Seagate Technology (STX): +229.72%
Robinhood Markets, Inc. (HOOD): +219.70%
Micron Technology (MU): +186.24%
Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD): +182.83%
Palantir Technologies (PLTR): +142.45%
CoreWeave (CRWV): +96.63%
Intel (INTC): +89.00%
Silver: +109.38%
Platinum: +95.78%
Gold: +61.80%
Nvidia (NVDA): +26.54%
Hyperliquid (HYPE): +22.88%
NASDAQ 100: +19.96%
S&P 500: +16.20%
S&P U.S. Aggregate Bond Index: +6.86%
Bitcoin (BTC): -3.50%
Ethereum (ETH): -7.59%
UnitedHealth Group (UNH): -32.63%
Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG): -40.02%
Lululemon (LULU): -45.48%
Trade Desk Inc. (TTD): -68.86%
Six Flags Entertainment Corp. (FUN) : -69.14%
Notes on the Above
Now, it’s been a wild year for markets, and we’ve seen some crazy headlines. More than that, though, we’ve seen such an unbelievable amount of bombshell AI news headlines that markets became desensitized at some point. An example:
Everyone talks about Nvidia all day, every day. The stock has absolutely crushed it this year, right? It’s probably up at least 50% YTD, yes?
But as you can see above, NVDA is only up 26.54% for the year! Still impressive, but lower than you might think.
Also, two things to note in the bottom half of the list: Warren Buffett’s big bet earlier this year was UNH, and that stock is still down 32.63% for the year. Same with Michael Burry’s pick, LULU (down 45.48%). Lesson: investing for the long term is where you’re more likely to make returns than in day trading or swing trading, and the best in the business are making long-term investments. That’s worth remembering.
Next, for all the fuss that Palantir CEO Alex Karp and Michael Burry have been making, you’d think PLTR would rank higher in the overall list… Don’t get us wrong, 142.45% is incredible, but Warner Bros and Seagate were ahead!
And the elephant in the room… this was NOT crypto’s year. We’ve seen this joke on Twitter a lot this week: if you found a penny on the sidewalk today and kept it, you automatically outperformed BTC in 2025. And that is painful.
HYPE did alright at 22.88%, and ZEC… good night. ZEC topped the list, growing more than HOOD, PLTR, and STX combined (724.80%). Absolutely unbelievable.
Quite a rollercoaster this year, but it was obviously an incredible market for stocks and precious metals. Bonds underperformed intensely, but that’s what you get in an economic environment like this one.
We were curious, though: stocks, crypto, and precious metals all did great this year, and bonds did ok. But which assets performed best in past decades, and why? More importantly, what could that tell us about 2026?
History Repeats: What the Past Tells Us About the Market’s Future
Something that’s not talked about in markets very much: different assets perform better over different decades. And we don’t mean this in the sense that different stocks do better than others; we mean that different asset classes outperform others depending on what’s happening in the greater economy.
Here’s what we’re talking about:
Between 1900-1920, stocks did well because of the rise of large-scale corporate America. Meanwhile, bonds did poorly because the outbreak of WWI led to higher spending and an increase in inflation (bonds tend to do poorly with inflation).
In the 1930s, The Great Depression flipped that trend on its head. Bonds performed very well for investors because they preserved capital and offered decent returns while other assets crashed. Stocks did the worst, and returns were largely negative for the entire decade.
From the 1940s-1960s, however, stocks were back on top. First, WWII drove stocks higher and higher; American capitalism then hit its “Golden Age,” and finally, spending on the Vietnam War boosted stocks as well. Real estate also did great in the 50s housing boom. Bonds underperformed.
In the 1970s, gold and other commodities were king, followed by real estate. Gold did so well because that was when President Nixon ended the Gold Standard, meaning that the US dollar was no longer pegged to actual gold (which led to 3180.8% inflation). Interestingly, stocks performed very poorly even though inflation was up because economic growth was slow.
Then the 1980s brought disinflation through interest rate hikes, which meant that both stocks and bonds did extremely well (this was actually the beginning of a 30-year bull market). What asset performed poorly? Gold, of all things, right after its legendary run in the 70s. That’s because gold thrives on inflation, and disinflation kills it.
In the 1990s, the Dot-Com/Technology boom hit, and stocks outperformed everything. Bonds did ok but not as well as stocks. Gold and other commodities still did poorly because inflation was quite low.
Then the 2000s hit. The Dot-Com crash and then the housing market crash (along with falling interest rates) caused bonds to do better than anything else. Gold did well too, starting a multi-year bull run of its own. And we all know how stocks did that decade.
But then in the 2010s, stocks were back and better than ever because the Central Bank’s policies essentially forced investors out of cash and into riskier assets in order to make any kind of return. This was when the FAANG stocks became a thing (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google). Bonds did horribly this decade relative to stocks.
And now… the 2020s. This has been a highly volatile decade for many reasons, and different asset classes have performed the best at different times. Here’s the recipe for the past 5 years:
2020-2021: Covid happened. The government pumped money into the economy and the Federal Reserve lowered interest rates. Inflation rose rapidly, and so did stocks (real estate also did insanely well).
2022: Both stocks and bonds did poorly this year because the Fed raised interest rates up again to bring inflation down.
2023-Present: Tech stocks have taken over, dominating the stock market. Bonds have been very volatile as the system has re-adjusted to a world of higher rates, higher debt, and greater political/trade risk. Gold and other commodities have skyrocketed in 2025 specifically.
So the question remains: What happens next?
The 2026 Playbook
We’ll start by saying that we don’t know the future and that this is not financial advice. You should always do your own research!
Everybody is wondering what markets will do in 2026, but to answer that question, we should look more at what they did in 2025 (and why). Then see if any of the “reasons” are changing or not in 2026.
Stocks did unbelievably well in 2025 because of the AI narrative: everyone and their mother wants to invest in the big AI companies at the moment. And the AI trade has been backed by actual company performance, too; earnings reports from top companies have impressed us again and again. (While earnings have impressed, the corresponding market valuations for these top tech companies are elevated, increasing the risk of sharp pullbacks should the growth rate slow.)
The US Government has gotten into the stock market too, acquiring stakes in companies like Intel and MP Materials and making AI and crypto regulations easier for companies to navigate. Trump seems to want to outgrow the US’s $38.3 trillion in debt by supercharging the economy.
Gold prices rose by 60% this year, driven by the fact that it’s a hedge against inflation. Global central banks have been buying it as well as they diversify away from the US dollar (which has lost 9.6% of its value since February of this year).
Ok, so stocks did well because the Fed made rate cuts, the AI industry got hundreds of billions of dollars in investment, people are worried about inflation, and the US government wants to grow its way out of $38.3 trillion in debt.
Is any of that changing next year? Let’s see:
It looks like the Trump administration is going to put a new Fed Chair in who will make lots of rate cuts next year. What’s more, the Fed might have to resort to putting more cash into the economy next year.
AI chips are so in-demand that Nvidia, the king of the AI industry, can’t even keep up with current orders. The Magnificent 7 (seven stocks heavily in AI) have been generally crushing it in their earnings reports with no sign of slowing down. (However, there are a lot of negative predictions about the AI bubble popping next year though, so make sure to read up and decide for yourself.)
Elon Musk agrees that the only way for the US to get out of its debt is to outgrow it by developing AI and robotics.
The 2026 Regime: High Growth, Sticky Inflation, and Easing Policy
What does this all mean? Well, we aren’t financial professionals, and this isn’t investing advice, but in our opinion, this combination suggests the potential for stock market growth (and possibly continued growth for gold if inflation were to rise). Of course, that’s only if the AI bubble doesn’t crash next year. Even if the AI bubble crashes, though, our guess would be that prices would fall for a while before ramping up in the next wave of AI growth (you know, the one where we get actual robots in our homes and ChatGPT is better than humans at, like, everything. Seriously).
Historically, periods of falling rates have allowed bonds to reclaim their role as a portfolio diversifier as well, since falling interest rates increase the price of bonds. While bonds may not offer the massive capital gains of the stock market, the current high yields mean they offer attractive income returns (similar to the 1980s disinflation period), reclaiming their crucial role as a portfolio diversifier.
Gold might have yet another strong year as well… the only things we can think of that would cause it to tank would be a sudden total cease to geopolitical tension AND for the Fed to all of a sudden talk about raising rates. Which would be a wild change of course indeed.
It’s crazy what a rate-cutting Federal Reserve and a growth-focused White House administration can do to financial markets. We’ll see how things play out in reality though! These thoughts could end up being way off the mark, especially if the AI industry ends up crashing.
Wrapping Up
So, in the end, no one knows for sure what’s going to happen. That’s a given.
But it seems like a good idea to take a look at the past and try to learn everything we can about what MIGHT happen next.
What do you think, though? Are we way off? If you totally disagree with us, we’d genuinely love to know; always trying to hear different market views and learn more.
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🫡 See You Next Week
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Until next week,
— Brandon & Blake
The information provided in Stocks & Income is for informational and educational purposes only and should not be construed as financial advice, investment advice, or a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. Stocks & Income is not a registered investment advisor, broker-dealer, or licensed financial planner. Always do your own research and consult with a licensed financial advisor before making any investment decisions. We may hold positions in or receive compensation from the companies or products mentioned. Disclosures will be made where applicable.
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Disclaimer: The information provided is for educational and entertainment purposes only. It does not constitute financial, investment, legal, or tax advice, nor a solicitation to buy or sell any security. Past performance is not indicative of future results. All investing involves risk, including the loss of principal