United Airlines and Nvidia bookend list of 15 soaring S&P 500 stocks in October
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The S&P 500 has risen 0.9% in October, making for a good month overall for investors riding along with index funds. But a look at various sectors tells a different story.
Here are price changes this month through Wednesday for the 11 sectors of the S&P 500 SPX, along with year-to-date price changes and those for the previous two years and from the end of 2021, to factor in the broad decline in 2022. The sectors are sorted by October price changes, with the full index at the bottom. All price changes in this article are adjusted by FactSet for any stock splits and exclude dividends.
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| Sector or index | October price change | 2024 price change | 2023 price change | 2022 price change | Price change since end of 2021 |
| Financials | 3.82% | 25.0% | 10% | -12% | 20% |
| Communication Services | 3.49% | 32.3% | 54% | -40% | 22% |
| Information Technology | 2.66% | 33.1% | 56% | -29% | 48% |
| Consumer Discretionary | 0.25% | 13.5% | 41% | -38% | 0% |
| Energy | 0.04% | 5.7% | -5% | 59% | 60% |
| Industrials | -0.26% | 18.6% | 16% | -7% | 28% |
| Real Estate | -1.71% | 9.6% | 8% | -28% | -15% |
| Materials | -2.06% | 10.3% | 10% | -14% | 4% |
| Utilities | -2.09% | 24.8% | -10% | -1% | 10% |
| Consumer Staples | -2.80% | 13.2% | -2% | -3% | 7% |
| Healthcare | -3.95% | 8.5% | 0% | -4% | 5% |
| S&P 500 | 0.89% | 21.9% | 24% | -19% | 22% |
| Source: FactSet | |||||
Only five of the 11 sectors are up this month — and we had to take the October percentages out to two decimal places to show a slight gain for the energy sector. Four sectors have declined by more than 2%, while only three have risen by more than 2%.
The financial sector has been October’s best performer, with investors enthused over the prospect of increasing profitability. The Federal Reserve began lowering short-term rates late last month. A continuing cycle of cuts for the federal-funds rate would raise many banks’ net interest margins and bode well for investment banking activity, with a lower cost of capital.