S&P 500 Investment Time Machine
Imagine you put $1,000 into either fund 10 years ago. You'd be up to roughly 126.4% — or $3,282 — from VOO and 126.9% — or $3,302 — from SPY. That's not exactly wealthy, but it shows how you can more than triple your money by holding an asset with relatively low long-term risk.
Warren Buffett has long recommended a low-fee S&P 500 tracker fund to amateur investors. Chamath Palihapitiya says it's become riskier as a few stocks now have an outsize pull on the index. Buffett mostly steers clear of tech names, but Apple has been his No. 1 stock for years.
Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ)
The Invesco QQQ Trust is a go-to ETF that tracks the Nasdaq-100 index. It's outperformed the S&P 500 in eight out of the past 10 years, all for a reasonable 0.2% expense ratio. It beats the S&P's one-year return, and it thrashed the S&P soundly in full-year 2023.
S&P 500 Index Versus Nasdaq 100 Performance
Nasdaq 100 has outperformed S&P by a wide margin. The average 10-year return of Nasdaq 100 over these 15 years was around 9%, while that of S&P 500 was about 5%.
Motilal Oswal Flexi Cap Fund and Motilal Oswal Small Cap Fund gave 50.23% and 49.29% returns respectively in the mentioned period. Motilal Oswal Large & Midcap Fund offered 48.84% return in the same time period. HDFC Defence Fund, the only active fund based on defence sector, delivered 48.75% return in 2024.
NYSEMKT: VOOG
The two Vanguard index funds that delivered the best returns in 2024 are listed below: Vanguard S&P 500 Growth ETF (VOOG -0.36%) advanced 35% last year. Vanguard Russell 1000 Growth ETF (VONG -0.39%) advanced 32% last year.
Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway outperforms S&P 500 in 2024.
The 90/10 rule in investing is a comment made by Warren Buffett regarding asset allocation. The rule stipulates investing 90% of one's investment capital toward low-cost stock-based index funds and the remainder 10% to short-term government bonds.
Junk Bonds
Junk bonds are high-yield corporate bonds issued by companies with lower credit ratings. Because of their higher risk of default, they offer higher interest rates, potentially providing returns over 10%. During economic growth periods, the risk of default decreases, making junk bonds particularly attractive.
In his 2013 letter to shareholders, Buffett revealed that his will advises his trustee to allocate 10% of the cash in short-term government bonds and 90% in a very-low cost S&P 500 index fund.
You would have more than doubled your money, with a total investment worth of $2,029.55. That's a 103% return, or a 7.23% annual rate of return. Interestingly, despite Coke's dominance on the world stage, investing in Coke's main rival, Pepsi, 10 years ago would have given you more pop for your buck.
Analysts See 13% Upside For Amazon Stock
The 30-year-old Amazon is among the world's most valuable companies. It is a leader in e-commerce spending and in cloud computing through its Amazon Web Services business. It is also quickly growing its advertising business into a challenger to Google (GOOGL) and Meta (META).
The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Vanguard S&P 500 ETF. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft.