Powell Performance - Winners And Losers Since Fed Chair Began

The S&P 500 fell 1.36% on Fed Chair Powell's penultimate FOMC day on Wednesday (3/18/26).  While a hallmark of Powell's tenure as Chair has been the stock market's tendency to trade sharply lower in afternoon trading on Fed Days, the market has also done very well over the entirety of his 8+ year term.

When Powell became Fed Chair in February 2018, the combined market cap of stocks in the S&P 500 was $23.5 trillion.  That number has ballooned by $35.4 trillion up to $58.9 trillion today.

The S&P 500 has gained more than 180% since 2/5/18 when Powell became Chair, representing an annualized total return of 13.7%.  The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 has gained much more at 300.9% (18.7% ann.), while the Dow 30 is up 123%.

Compared to the rest of the world, Powell has kept US markets in a dominant position.  The S&P has beaten the rest of the world by more than 100 percentage points since his time as Chair began.

Looking at sector performance, Technology has more than doubled the next-best sector (Communication Services) during Powell's tenure.  As shown above, Tech has returned 418% since Powell took over, while Materials and Real Estate are the only two sectors that haven't at least doubled.

Of the current S&P 500 members that were trading back in early 2018 when Powell became Chair, 59% have gained at least 100% since then.  There are nearly just as many S&P 500 stocks up 500%+ (39) since Powell's tenure began as there are stocks that are down (45).

Below is a table showing the best-performing S&P 500 stocks since Powell became Chair, with the seventeen "10-baggers" highlighted in green.

You may have thought NVIDIA (NVDA) would be at the top of this list given its place as the largest company in the world right now, but a company that's just over a tenth of NVDA's size actually has it beat.  Comfort Systems (FIX) -- which builds out the mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems for AI data centers and other infrastructure projects -- is actually #1 when it comes to share-price performance under Powell.  As shown, FIX is up 3,555% compared to a gain of 3,314% for NVDA.

Most of the names on the list of big winners since Powell became Chair are directly related to the AI Boom, but some that are not include Axon Enterprises (AXON) -- which sells Tasers and police bodycam hardware and software, Carvana (CVNA) -- which sells used cars, and Eli Lilly (LLY) -- which sells weight-loss drugs and other pharmaceuticals.