In this post, we look at the biggest 2025 stock market winners and losers. But first, our disclosure:
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2025: The Year Of Hot Air
My investing days stretch back to the dot-com bubble, and I can honestly say this might be the biggest year of hot air I have ever seen. People in the news and on social media often blow things out of proportion, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite like what I observed in 2025. It seems like every molehill became a mountain.
As is usually the case, those peddling the fear and hype in 2025 turned out to be mostly wrong. Proving once again that most predictions and forecasts are just a bunch of hot air. All air, no substance. For example:
The S&P 500 was coming off back-to-back years of returns exceeding 20%. However, the prospect of the Trump tariffs had economists, the media, and pundits calling for a recession or another Great Depression. There were predictions of hyperinflation and empty shelves, which never came to pass. Instead, outside of a brief pullback, the S&P 500 broke record high after record high.
On the other side of the fence, there were the crypto bros calling for Bitcoin to hit $250,00 or more as the first “crypto president” was sworn into office. They went so far as to predict that a Bitcoin treasury company, MicroStrategy, would soon be the largest company ever, usurping the Mag 7. Instead, crypto flopped like an NBA player trying to draw a foul.
So with this in mind, let’s take a look at the 2025 stock market winners and losers, starting with the winners.
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2025 Stock Market Winners:
S&P 500: The Defiant Winner
You might be wondering why I placed the S&P 500 at the top of the winner board, given that other assets, like gold, outperformed it by a mile. Heck, the S&P 500’s 2025 return was even below its 2023 and 2024 returns. So, why did I put the S&P 500 at the top of the 2025 stock market winners leaderboard? Because it defied expectations.
No other winner on this list, besides maybe Alphabet, faced the same level of pessimism as the S&P 500. The Trump tariffs had an endless number of “experts” and pundits predicting runaway inflation, empty shelves, and a recession, if not another Great Depression.
In April, when Trump announced the reciprocal tariffs, it seemed as though the doomsayers would be right. The S&P 500 tanked, and the barrage of fear porn in the media appeared destined to keep it down. But like a prized fighter, the S&P 500 didn’t stay down for long. Despite all the headwinds, the S&P 500 rose from the mat and went on to win the fight.
The S&P 500 stared down the tariffs and doomsayers and went on to record almost 40 new all-time highs in 2025. That is not a typo. The S&P 500 hit 38 new all-time highs in 2025 alone! The result was an amazing 17% return for the year. That’s well above its long-term average and more than enough for me to put it at the top of my list of 2025 stock market winners.
Alphabet (Google): Still The King Of Search
When OpenAI’s ChatGPT came on the scene in late 2022, it seemed like all the experts and talking heads rushed to write Alphabet’s obituary. ChatGPT represented the first real threat to Alphabet’s dominance in search. To many investors, ChatGPT marked the beginning of the end of Alphabet’s prized possession, Google.
Everywhere I looked, people were predicting that Google would go the way of AOL and Netscape. The drumbeat of Google’s impending doom grew louder with each new large language model (LLM) released, like Grok and Perplexity. Alphabet’s own LLM, Gemini, was originally met with scorn and mocked for its responses.
To make matters worse, Google faced an antitrust lawsuit brought by the Department of Justice (DOJ) that threatened to break up Google and its Chrome browser. The DOJ claimed Google maintained a monopoly on search by paying billions of dollars to companies, like Apple, to be their default search engine. They were found guilty, but in a twist of irony, it was ChatGPT that saved the day for Google (and Alphabet) in 2025.
When ruling on the case, the judge could not ignore the threat to Google’s search dominance posed by a growing number of LLMs. In a turn of events few expected, the judge stopped short of breaking up Google and the Chrome browser in 2025, largely due to ChatGPT.
Meanwhile, Alphabet continued to improve on Gemini and seamlessly integrated it into Google search. The result is that not only did Google maintain its search dominance, but it actually grew the business. It blew away earnings quarter after quarter.
The end result is that Alphabet not only survived, but it thrived in 2025. returning over 65% on the year. Talk about proving the doubters wrong!
Gold: The Shiny Metal That Shined
Gold returned over 60% in 2025. Let me repeat: GOLD RETURNED OVER 60%!
Gold, the ancient, boring, shiny chunk of metal, even outpaced all the hip and exciting Mag 7 companies, except for Alphabet. This means that gold’s 60% return beat the individual returns of Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nividia and Tesla.
The icing on the cake for gold enthusiasts was that it trounced its younger digital competitor, Bitcoin. While gold finished up over 60% in 2025, Bitcoin finished down 6%. It turns out that in times of higher inflation and economic uncertainty, many investors still run to gold, not Bitcoin.
The bottom line is that, with thousands of years under its well-worn belt, it is hard for any other asset to unseat gold as a safe haven during times of economic and global uncertainty. In fact, over the past five years, since 2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic, gold has outperformed the S&P 500.
You have to congratulate the ancient metal being among the 2025 stock market winners. I guess someone forgot to tell Gold the days of the Spanish Empire were over!
NVIDIA: Shrugging Off Tariffs
NVIDIA is used to shrugging off bad news, and the tariffs and talk of an AI bubble in 2025 were no exception.
Trump and Xi Jinping’s on-again, off-again relationship has all the makings of a bad Hallmark movie. The will-they-wont-they relationship over NVIDIA’s GPUs and rare earth metals had NVIDIA’s stock price plummeting one day and skyrocketing the next.
Yet, despite all the erratic trade talks between the U.S. and China, NVIDIA recorded another solid year, returning nearly 39%. Even talks of an AI bubble and scrutiny around NVIDIA’s partnerships and financing deals could not stop the train from rushing forward.
The truth is that even if we are in an AI bubble, it doesn’t make AI any less real or revolutionary, just as the dot-com bubble didn’t stop the internet from reshaping our entire lives. The AI bubble will be no different. Of course, there will be overvalued companies, but that doesn’t mean AI will soon become some forgotten fad. It is here to stay and is just getting started.
NVIDIA has positioned itself at the right time and in the right place during the AI revolution. It dominates the GPU and AI data centers market with over 80% of market share. How long will its dominance last? Who knows, but for now it’s roaring ahead.
If some of the terms in this post feel unfamiliar, these stock market flashcards to learn investing terms fast are a solid starting point.
Now onto the losers.
U.S. stock winners and losers visualized — see the heatmap and data
2025 Stock Market Losers
Bitcoin and Crypto Layed An Egg
By the end of 2024, everything was going crypto’s way. It started with the approval of spot Bitcoin ETFs and Bitcoin’s halving. It ended with the election of the first “crypto president,” which was followed by Bitcoin hitting $100,000 in December. Everything was looking up for Bitcoin and crypto as we entered 2025.
The newly sworn-in Trump administration issued an Executive Order on cryptocurrencies that created working groups, supported dollar-backed stablecoins, and restricted Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs). The Darth Vader of Crypto, Gary Gensler, was out at the SEC, while Trump filled his administration with Bitcoiners and crypto enthusiasts. And the good times kept rolling.
Within two months of his inauguration, Trump issued an executive order establishing a Bitcoin Strategic Reserve. In July, Congress passed the GENIUS Act, which created a regulatory framework for dollar-backed stablecoins. Many of the more popular cryptocurrencies were approaching their all-time highs, and by October, Bitcoin reached its peak at $126,000.
Then the wheels fell off the car.
Whales, large holders of crypto, started selling. The CLARITY Act, which was to establish a digital asset regulatory framework, stalled in Congress. The housing and healthcare affordability crisis took center stage. Geopolitical tensions and economic uncertainty came roaring back, sparking a run on gold, not Bitcoin.
Before anyone knew it, Bitcoin’s price plummeted, finishing the year down 6%. Other large cryptocurrencies fared even worse. Ethereum and XRP both finished down around 11%, while Solana was down 34%. Even Litecoin could not be saved by the launch of spot Litecoin ETFs, as it finished down 25% in 2025.
A year that started with so much promise ended in disappointment. Crypto and Bitcoin truly laid an epic egg in 2025.
Strategy (Formerly MicroStrategy): The Dark Side Of Leverage
Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) was originally founded as a business software intelligence company. However, its software business has struggled for years. Its struggles sent Strategy searching for an answer, and it decided on Bitcoin. In 2020, Strategy began purchasing Bitcoin and transitioning into a Bitcoin treasury company.
A Bitcoin treasury company seeks to acquire and hold Bitcoin on its balance sheet rather than cash. Given how Bitcoin performed in 2025, you can probably guess how Strategy’s year went. Not good
The risk with investing in Strategy (MSTR) and other Bitcoin treasury companies is that their entire business model depends on Bitcoin’s price and their ability to raise capital and borrow to purchase more Bitcoin. In other words, Strategy and Bitcoin treasury companies are a leveraged play on Bitcoin. Their entire existence depends on the success of magic internet money. It is volatility layered on top of volatility.
Playing with leverage is like playing with fire. It can cook you a beautifully seared steak or burn your house down. It can amplify your returns, but it can also amplify your losses. When it worked, like in 2023 and 2024, Strategy was one of the top-performing stocks, generating returns of over 300% each year. But when it doesn’t work, like in 2025, it can be disastrous.
In 2025, Strategy (MSTR) lost almost 50% despite Bitcoin being down only 6%. That means an investor in Strategy (MSTR) lost almost ten times as much as if they had simply bought and held Bitcoin. That is not the kind of 10X that investors want when taking a moonshot.
Strategy’s 2025 returns are a great example of what can go wrong when using leverage to amplify returns. Now the question becomes: Is Strategy’s Bitcoin bet in trouble?
Consumer Staples: Exposing The K-Shaped Economy
I invested in a consumer staples fund right after the 2008 Great Recession. I was fleeing to safety during that time, and consumer staples are often considered recession-proof. The idea is that everyone needs toothpaste and toilet paper regardless of what’s happening with the economy.
Since then, as the economy rebounded and grew, the consumer staples sector has routinely lagged the S&P 500, and 2025 was no exception. Consumer staples were one of the biggest 2025 stock market losers.
While the S&P 500 had another amazing year, returning around 17%, the consumer staples sector was flat. It was one of the worst-performing sectors in 2025. In my case, the consumer staples fund I own finished down nearly 7% on the year.
In my opinion, the poor performance of consumer staples in 2025 laid bare the K-Shaped economy and the affordability crisis.
What Is A K-Shaped Economy?
A K-shaped economy is what happens when parts of the economy are doing great while other parts fall behind. Picture the letter “K.” One line is moving up and to the right. The other is moving down and to the right. The top of the “K” is living in a booming economy, whereas the bottom of the “K” is living in what feels like a recession.
Higher-income households and asset owners are on the upward side of the K. If someone owned stocks, 2025 probably felt pretty good. They saw their net worths increase and had plenty of disposable income to spend on luxury goods and travel. Increasing grocery prices were merely an inconvenience, not a crisis.
On the downward side of the “K” were consumers with lower incomes and fewer assets. Many in this group rely on credit cards and loans to make ends meet. Inflation and higher interest rates are squeezing their budgets and increasing their debt load. These households pulled back on their spending as they tightened their budgets.
The problem for consumer staples is that they live right in the middle of this divide. They didn’t benefit from spending at the top of the “K,” but didn’t get the defensive boost they normally do in a real recession. People still bought necessities, but they bought fewer and cheaper ones.
That’s how you end up with a sector that’s supposed to be “safe”, falling behind in a strong market.
See the 2025 sector performance breakdown from Fidelity.
The Disappointing 2025 Stock Market Winners: The Mediocre 5
With the dominance of Alphabet and NVIDIA, you might assume that the other members of the Magnificent 7 were also big 2025 stock market winners. That’s not the case.
As shown in the chart below, only Alphabet and NVIDIA outperformed the S&P 500’s 17% return in 2025. Tesla, Microsoft, and Meta came close to matching the S&P 500, while Apple and Amazon were left in the dust. Given all the hype surrounding the Magnificent 7, it is shocking that 5 of the 7 stocks lagged the S&P 500.
I guess you can say that in 2025 It was more like the “Magnificent 2” and the “Mediocre 5.”
| Company | 2025 Return (%) |
|---|---|
| Alphabet | 66 |
| Nvidia | 39 |
| Tesla | 15 |
| Microsoft | 15 |
| Meta | 13 |
| Apple | 9 |
| Amazon | 5 |
Key Takeaway Of The 2025 Stock Market Winners and Losers
There was a lot of stock market noise in 2025 with wild speculations. If 2025 proved anything, it’s that being loud doesn’t equal being right.
The year started with many loud voices making extreme predictions. In one camp, we had the doom-and-gloom predictions. The tariffs were supposed to lead to hyperinflation, empty shelves, and a recession. The “Great Depression” became a buzzword, and markets were going to head lower.
In the other camp, there were the crypto bros proclaiming this was the dawn of Bitcoin’s dominance over all other assets. It was unstoppable, and Strategy (MSTR) was poised to skyrocket to the top of the leaderboard.
Both camps were wrong.
Inflation cooled instead of exploding. Shelves stayed full, and consumers kept spending. The economy kept growing, and the S&P 500 kept grinding higher. AI leaders NVIDIA and Alphabet soared, and gold thrived as a hedge.
Meanwhile, Bitcoin fell flat on its face, and Strategy (MSTR) tanked. Consumer staples weren’t so safe, and the Magnificent 7 weren’t so magnificent.
The lesson of 2025 isn’t that gold or AI stocks always win, or that crypto always loses. The real takeaway is that the future is unpredictable. In the end, it is reality, not the loudest voices, that does the talking.
