S&P 500 Annual Sector Total Returns Since 1990

Below is a reference table showing the S&P 500 sector total returns by year since 1990. The color-coding shows how each sector performed relative to other sectors in each specific year.

Most sectors have had their day in the sun at some point over the last 29 years. Industrials is the only sector that hasn’t been the top-performing sector in any year over this time period, and it has only ranked second once (1993).

Technology has been the top-performing sector in terms of average annual returns as well as consistency. Tech has ranked as the top sector on a total return basis in nine years since 1990, and it has only been the worst-performing sector twice (2000 and 2002). Health Care and Energy are typically either big winners or big losers. Both have been the top-performing sector in four years, while Energy has been the worst sector five times and Health Care has been the worst six times.

You’ll notice that big gains or losses typically come in bunches for sectors. Lately, Energy has been a significant loser, while Tech is on a winning streak. The contrarian in us would bet that these trends are due to reverse sometime soon.

In 2019, the top three sectors are currently Technology, Utilities, and Real Estate. This isn’t a trio you’d expect to see, as normally Tech and defensives like Real Estate and Utilities have quite a bit of performance divergence.

2008 is by far the worst year in the table as Financials fell 55.32% and three other sectors fell more than 43%. Only one other year since 1990 has seen just one sector fall more than 40%, and that was Tech’s drop of 40.9% in 2000. In 2008, the best performing sector (Consumer Staples) still fell 15.44%!

The best year since 1990 was 1995 when the S&P posted a total return of 37.54%.That year, every sector gained 20% or more if you round up the gain of 19.99% for Materials. While 1995 seems like a seminal year for Tech with the introduction of Microsoft’s Window 95, it was actually Health Care and Financials that performed the best that year with gains of 58% and 54%, respectively. Tech returned a very pedestrian (kidding) 39.45% in 1995.

The best sector return in any year since 1990 was Tech’s 78.74% gain in 1999 — the peak of the Dot Com Bubble. The remarkable thing about Tech’s 78% gain in 1999 is that the sector was up 78.14% in 1998! Following those two banner years for Tech, the sector fell 40.9% in 2000, 25.87% in 2001, and 37.41% in 2002, more than erasing those gains from 1998 and 1999.

At the bottom of the table, you’ll see summary info for each sector. Notably, every sector has been up in at least 70% of the years since 1990, while the S&P 500 as a whole has been up in 80% of years.  

(Click on image to enlarge)