After a 23.4% rise over the past one year, the S&P 500 has continued its bullish momentum this year. The S&P 500 index reached a new all-time high lately, fueled by strong economic indicators, sector diversification, AI advancements, and a solid corporate earnings season. This rally persists despite concerns over a global trade war and uncertainty surrounding the Federal Reserve’s rate cut plans.
The Federal Reserve’s January meeting minutes revealed that officials agree inflation must decline further before cutting interest rates. But investors brushed off President Donald Trump’s warning of potential new tariffs.
Elyse Ausenbaugh, Head of Investment Strategy at JPMorgan Wealth Management, emphasized market resilience on CNBC’s Closing Bell and believes 2025 will offer further growth opportunities as well as sees room for the market rally to continue.
Total earnings for 74% of the S&P 500 are up 12.1% from the same period last year on 5.6% higher revenues, with 77.8% beating EPS estimates and 64.6% beating revenue estimates. This is notably a better performance relative to other recent periods, particularly in terms of the growth pace.
U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew at an annual rate of 2.3% in the fourth quarter, the Bureau of Economic Analysis’ (BEA) first estimate showed on Jan. 30, 2025. This reading followed the 3.1% expansion recorded in the third quarter and came in below the market expectation of 2.6%.
In the fourth quarter, the Gross Domestic Product Price Index increased by 2.2%, below analysts’ estimate of 2.5%. Additionally, the core Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index rose by 2.5% on a quarterly basis, matching the market consensus.
Major investments in AI and related technologies have fueled optimism about future productivity gains and economic growth. Businesses are committing significant capital to AI, expecting long-term benefits that support current market valuations.
Let’s take a closer look at the fundamentals of iShares Core S&P 500 ETF IVV. Then we will highlight the good-performing S&P 500 stocks over the year-to-date frame and one-week period. These stocks have a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) or #2 (Buy). This indicates that these stocks have chances for further outperformance.
The S&P 500 Index measures the performance of the large-capitalization sector of the U.S. equity market. The fund is widely spread across sectors with information technology, financials, consumer discretionary and healthcare accounting for a double-digit allocation each. The fund IVV has a Zacks Rank #1. SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust has an AUM of $610.73 billion and charges 3 bps in fees per year (see: all the Large Cap Blend ETFs here).
Below, we have highlighted the abovementioned five best-performing stocks in the ETF.
Ralph Lauren RL – Up 24.1% YTD, Up 5.4% Past Week – Zacks Rank #2
Ralph Lauren Corp. is a major designer, marketer and distributor of premium lifestyle products in North America, Europe, Asia, and internationally. It offers products in the apparel, footwear, accessories, home furnishings, and other licensed product categories.
Tapestry TPR – Up 36.2% YTD, Up 9.4% Past Week – Zacks Rank #2
Tapestry, Inc., which was formerly known as Coach, Inc., is the designer and marketer of fine accessories and gifts for women and men in the United States and internationally. The Company offers lifestyle products, which include handbags, women’s and men’s accessories, footwear, jewelry, seasonal apparel collections, sunwear, travel bags, fragrance and watches.
Uber Technologies UBER – Up 35.1% YTD, Up 5.9% Past Week – Zacks Rank #2
Uber Technologies Inc. provides a platform which allows users to access transportation and food ordering services. The Company’s operating segments consist of Core Platform and Other Bets. The Core Platform segment consists of Ridesharing and Uber Eats. The Other Bets segment consists of Uber Freight and New Mobility platforms.
Fortinet FTNT – Up 20.9% YTD, Up 5.5% Past Week – Zacks Rank #2
It is a provider of network security appliances and Unified Threat Management (UTM) network security solutions to enterprises, service providers and government entities worldwide.Its solutions are designed to integrate multiple levels of security protection, including firewall, virtual private networking (VPN), antivirus, intrusion prevention (IP), web filtering, anti-spam and wide area network (WAN) acceleration.
Citigroup C – Up 20.2% YTD, Up 4.3% Past Week – Zacks Rank #1
Citigroup Inc. is a globally diversified financial services holding company providing a range of financial products and services including consumer banking and credit, corporate and investment banking, securities brokerage, transaction services and wealth management to consumers, corporations, governments and institutions.
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Citigroup Inc. (C) : Free Stock Analysis Report
Ralph Lauren Corporation (RL) : Free Stock Analysis Report
Fortinet, Inc. (FTNT) : Free Stock Analysis Report
iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV): ETF Research Reports
Tapestry, Inc. (TPR) : Free Stock Analysis Report
Uber Technologies, Inc. (UBER) : Free Stock Analysis Report