15 Stocks That Outperformed the S&P 500 in 2021

It's harder than you probably think to outperform the S&P 500. Out of all the many hundreds of large-cap stock mutual funds out there, fully 82.5% of them underperformed the S&P 500, and a whopping 93.8% of them underperformed it over 20 years. For many people, the best thing to do with that news is to just stick with broad-market index funds, which will offer roughly a market-matching return. If you want to aim higher, though, look at individual stocks. Here are 15 that left the S&P 500 in the dust in 2021.

The returns listed for each stock are as of mid-December 2021, and you can compare them to the S&P 500's return of about 26% over that same period. (Note, by the way, that a 26% return is outstanding for one year. The S&P 500's long-term average annual gain is closer to 10% over long periods.)

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