Boeing Remains the DJIA’s Best Performing Stock This Year

Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) stock rose more than $4 to close Friday essentially up nearly 2% week over week. The stock’s year-to-date share price gain reached 54.4%, solidifying Boeing’s hold as the best performing stock among the 30 stocks in the Dow Jones Industrial Average index.

All but nine Dow stocks have posted year-to-date gains with the best — aside from Boeing — being Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL), up 41.6%; Visa Inc. (NYSE: V), up 33.2%; McDonald’s Corp. (NYSE: MCD), up 31.3%; and Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT), up 27.5%. Last week’s moves fell in a range of up about 0.7% for McDonald’s to up 1.5% for Apple.

Last Tuesday Boeing announced that the World Trade Organization (WTO) had reversed a November decision that found the company had received illegal subsidies from the state of Washington to build its new 777X plant in the state.

The reversal was expected, and even rival aircraft maker Airbus seemed to take the reversal in stride. Airbus chose to focus its response to the WTO decision on a different ruling handed down in a different case.

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The United States fired the first shot in this battle in 2004, accusing the European Union of illegally subsidizing Airbus. The EU and Airbus filed a counter suit against the United States and Boeing, and the WTO has not resolved either one.

The winner in the remaining disputes could impose tariffs to level the playing field, but that is not the only remedy available. Given the president apparent fondness for tariffs, however, if the cases are resolved during his administration, big tariffs are a real possibility, and not just on airplanes.

Boeing stock closed at $238.78 on Friday, up about 1% for the day, in a 52-week range of $126.31 to $246.49. The 12-month consensus price target was unchanged last week, remaining at $252.20, and the highest target remained at $302.

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