The major Wall Street averages are trading near their all-time high by the end of the year, with the reference index hovering below 3,700.
Recently, investors have been particularly encouraged by the positive developments in COVID-19 vaccines and the growing hope for a new fiscal stimulus package from US lawmakers.
While most of the focus of this year's rally was on popular tech stocks from megacaps, such as Apple (NASDAQ :), Amazon (NASDAQ 🙂 and Microsoft (NASDAQ :), stay-at-home winners such as Zoom Video Communications (NASDAQ :), Netflix (NASDAQ 🙂 and DocuSign (NASDAQ 🙂 are also in the spotlight. More recently, reports of value names such as JP Morgan Chase (NYSE :), General Electric (NYSE 🙂 and Walt Disney (NYSE 🙂 have sparked investor interest as hopes for an economic recovery escalate.
There have also been other, perhaps less followed, winners. Below, we highlight three that significantly outperformed the S&P 500 in 2020.
1. Etsy
Opening price, January 2, 2020: $ 45.19
Closing price, December 15, 2020: $ 177.80
Profit in 2020 YTD: + 301.3%
In the burgeoning online shopping space, Etsy (NASDAQ 🙂 has been a standout player this year, benefiting from increased sales as people around the world flocked to its online marketplace platform during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since the start of the year, the Brooklyn, New York-based e-commerce company's stock has more than tripled, rising 301% to easily outpace the profits of about 14% of the S&P 500 in the same time frame .
ETSY shares, outperforming other top industry names such as Amazon and eBay (NASDAQ 🙂 since the start of the year, closed a new high of $ 177.80 on Tuesday. At its current level, the fast-growing technology company has a market capitalization of $ 22.4 billion.
As a sign of how well Etsy & # 39; s business has performed amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the company has exceeded revenue expectations in every quarter this year. During the first nine months of 2020, Etsy's revenue grew by 102% year-on-year, while total gross merchandise sales (GMS) – a key metric used in the e-commerce industry to measure transaction values ??- by 101% increased.
In addition, Etsy & # 39; s number of active buyers increased 55% year-on-year at the end of the third quarter to 69.6 million. It also saw an increase in the number of merchants on its platform, with active sellers up 42% from a year earlier to 3.68 million.
With the height of the Christmas shopping season just around the corner, Etsy should continue to enjoy a boost from its already tremendous financial performance on the way into the New Year.
2. PayPal
Opening price, January 2, 2020: $ 110.75
Closing price, December 15, 2020: $ 220.79
Profit in 2020 YTD: + 104.8%
PayPal Holdings (NASDAQ 🙂 was one of this year's biggest winners, with the digital payment processing company benefiting from the accelerated shift to online shopping and e-commerce amid the coronavirus health crisis.
Investors were also encouraged by strong growth rates for its popular, personal mobile payment app Venmo, as well as the recent announcement that customers can buy, sell and hold cryptocurrencies, including and.
Stocks of the digital payments leader far outperformed the S&P 500 in 2020, up nearly 105% with only a few weeks left in the year. PYPL shares, which hit an all-time high of $ 223.16 on Monday, finished at $ 221.60 yesterday, earning the San Jose, California-based fintech company a valuation of $ 260.1 billion.
In early November, PayPal reported a blockbuster hit, with the digital payments giant experiencing the highest growth since it split from eBay in 2015.
Revenues were up 121% from the same period last year to $ 1.07 a share, while revenues grew 25% year-over-year to $ 5.46 billion. Meanwhile, total payment volume (TPV) – a close measure for the company – rose 36% from a year earlier to a record $ 247 billion.
PayPal added a record 15.2 million new accounts in the three months ended September 30, an increase of 55% year-on-year. In total, the e-commerce company now has about 361 million active accounts on its payment network.
The Venmo payments app continued to grow at lightning speed amid the pandemic, with the number of people using the service increasing to 65 million since the most recent quarter.
We expect PayPal's stock to rise in the new year as the current work environment has created a perfect backdrop for digital payment providers.
TeraDyne
Opening price, January 2, 2020: $ 69.68
Closing price, December 15, 2020: $ 120.44
Profit in 2020 YTD: + 76.6%
Teradyne (NASDAQ :), which develops and supplies automated testing tools used by semiconductor, printed circuit board and wireless network module manufacturers, is one of the top performing companies in the semiconductor equipment industry this year, with a share of 76.6 %. in 2020.
While that is impressive in itself, it is even more remarkable that the stock also rose by 117.3% in 2019.
Shares of TER outperformed bigger rivals such as Applied Materials (NASDAQ 🙂 and ASML Holdings (NASDAQ 🙂 this year. The stock hit a new record high of $ 120.44 last night, bringing the North Reading, Massachusetts-based semiconductor test equipment manufacturer to a market cap of $ 20 billion.
TeraDyne reported positive earnings surprises for the year, crushing Wall Street's earnings and revenue expectations due to strong demand for its automatic test equipment (ATE) products from memory chip, wireless network module and 5G wireless system manufacturers.
Revenues were up about 53% from the same period last year in the last quarter, while sales were up about 41%, both exceeding expectations.
The company counts IBM (NYSE :), Intel (NASDAQ :), Qualcomm (NASDAQ :), Analog Devices (NASDAQ :), Texas Instruments (NASDAQ 🙂 and Samsung (OTC 🙂 among its high profile customers
Looking at the full year, TeraDyne expects earnings of $ 4.50 per share and revenue of $ 3.0 billion in fiscal 2020. That would indicate year-over-year growth of 57% respectively. and 33%, reflecting the strength of the company. testing companies, including memory and storage test shipments and System on a Chip (SOC) test shipments.
Despite the huge profits made over the past 24 months, the TER stock still looks attractive going forward given the strong demand for its ATE products and services.
