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In last Wednesday's Closer, we noted how there was a somewhat elevated share of the S&P 500 experiencing gains of over 100%. Expanding to the Russell 1,000, there were 34 stocks with total returns of more than 100%. Two members of the Financials sector topped the list, Affirm (AFRM) and Coinbase (COIN), with gains of 408% and 391%, respectively. Two mega caps also found their ways into the top of the list in the five and seven spots: NVIDIA (NVDA) and Meta Platforms (META). One of NVIDIA's largest competitors Advanced Micro (AMD) was also an over 100% gainer, though it falls a bit further down the list with a 127.8% gain. Other large caps like Broadcom (AVGO) and Tesla (TSLA) also posted 100%+ gains.

Those semi-conductor names were certainly boosted by the emergence of AI during the year, but other themes were also present among the year's biggest gainers. For starters, cruise liners like Royal Caribbean (RCL) and Carnival (CCL) put big dents in their post-pandemic recoveries with RCL even closing in on pre-pandemic highs. In spite of high rates tamping down demand, housing inventories are historically tight meaning there is an increasing importance on new inventories hitting the market. As we showed in our Annual Report, like AI, housing was also a major theme across earnings calls last year. That offers a potential boon to the homebuilders and it showed in stock performance in 2023. The homebuilder industry had strong representation with names like Builders FirstSource (BLDR), Top Build (BLD), PulteGroup (PHM), and Toll Brothers (TOL) posting over 100% gains.

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