Apple Overly Dominates S&P 500 Performance, Still Lags Some Index Titans (SPY, AAPL, MSFT, XOM, SHLD, BAC, NFLX)

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) has one more bit of evidence that it is acting as if it was its own stock index.  Its exceptional share performance is worth a substantial portion of the overall broad market’s gain.  While this is certainly not a new incident, the math behind it shows why fund managers who do not hold Apple have almost an impossible time beating their investment benchmarks.

Apple’s dominance is only exacerbated by the notion that its performance is compounded because it is the largest S&P 500 Index (NYSE: SPY) component by far.  This almost does not seem possible to say, but Apple is up a whopping 50.5% or so in 2012 while the S&P 500 Index is up about 12%.  That shows that Apple’s gain accounts for about 15% of the entire S&P 500 Index gain so far in 2012.

There are reports showing Barclays figures showing that this is the largest single contribution of the entire index from one single stock back to 1991.  Barclays also noted that the last double-digit contribution was from Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) back in 1999.  Apple is worth about 40% more in the S&P that Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM).

What is amazing is that the 51% gain is not the top performance from the index and a screen from Finviz.com shows that Apple was only the #10 performer so far this year.  Sears Holding Corporation (NASDAQ: SHLD) is up 112% year to date even though it is riddled with problems.  The move is followed with the #2 performer as Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC) with a 71% gain so far this year.  The #3 spot was taken Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) with a 66% gain despite its ongoing concerns.

The argument is strengthening that Apple is not just a tech stock nor that it is a consumer products giant.  Maybe it really should be considered its own asset class.

If you think this is too dominating over the S&P 500, what if that one call for Apple going to $1,650 per share by the end of 2015?

JON C. OGG