Longest Bull Run in History: The Possible Gains and Future Implications

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All good things must come to an end. Investors need to remember that saying as the US market is now entering the 10th year of its bull run. If we look back, 10 years ago on March 9th, the S&P 500 recorded its last major low point. This means that we’re looking at the officially longest bull run in the history of investing.

A whole new generation of billionaires and multi-millionaires matured over the longest bull run. The amount of wealth which was generated is over $30 trillion. This means that historically speaking, March 9th, 2009 would be the best day in modern history to buy stocks. When we take into account the market outlook then, an investor would have to be very brave (or foolish) in order to attempt this.

So, the S&P 500 closes at the bear market low of 676.53. 10 years later, it closes at 2743.07. This means that the longest bull run in history managed to generate 305% gain for the largest stock market index in the United States.

A not-so-small investment of $250 000 would inevitably net the investor over a million dollars. That being said, the S&P 500 is tracking only the 500 largest United States companies. This means the gains are rounded out. If an investor however, chose his stocks individually, the longest bull run in history would be even more generous towards him.

The longest bull run has created some incredible gains over time

Some of the tech stocks which recorded immense gains over this period are:

nVidia – 1862%.
Expedia – 2170%.
Amazon – 2605%.
Netflix – 6493%.

A simple investment of $10 000 in Netflix would have the lucky investor sitting at $659 300 today. The same investment in Amazon would result in the investor having $270 500 at his disposal. Of course, Netflix and Amazon are well known and are the biggest high-profile winners. The actual biggest winners however are probably unknown to the large majority of investors.

A company named Patrick Industries makes building products. The company managed to soar with over 28821% in just 10 years. This means that the $10K investment would automatically make the investor a millionaire. Other major winners are:

Jazz Pharmaceuticals – 23328%.
Nexstar Media Group – 21448%.

The longest bull run in history came after one of the worst financial crises of modern time. Although a lot of experts unanimously agree that the banking crisis wasn’t fixed just “patched up”, a huge recovery followed it. Low-interest rates managed to kickstart the economy back in gear and the Federal Reserve began printing money like never before. Quantitative easing (QE) began and money was injected into the market with seemingly no end.

All eyes are currently on China and the ongoing trade negotiations with the United States. If the trade deal is struck, experts believe the bull run can go on for another year. Even if that’s the case, talks about a global recession are increasing as the next crisis is bound to make 2008 look like a walk in the park.

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