S&P 500 Gains 17% in 2025 — Did Benzinga Readers Nail The Prediction?
The S&P 500, which is tracked by the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSE:SPY), set several record highs in 2025 and ended the year in positive territory. Here's how Benzinga readers' year‑end prediction stacked up against the final result.
S&P 500 Year-End Gains
The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust is up 17.1% year-to-date with just hours left to go before 2025 bows out, likely hitting the top range of a question asked by Benzinga earlier this year.
Benzinga polled readers asking what the return of President Donald Trump to the White House meant and if it could produce similar stock-market returns to his first year in office previously.
In 2017, the initial year of Trump's first presidency, the SPY was up 21.7%.
“What do you think the return will be in 2025, his first year back,” Benzinga asked readers in January 2025.
The results were:
- 16%+ gain: 26%
- 11% to 15% gain: 22%
- Will Decline: 22%
- 6% to 10% gain: 19%
- 0% to 5% gain: 12%
The largest share of respondents went with the most bullish prediction, with 26% expecting the index to rise at least 16% for the year — and that group ultimately proved correct.
The second‑most popular pick, calling for an 11% to 15% gain, came close but ended up slightly conservative.
Those who chose the "Will Decline" option — which tied for the second‑most votes — missed by the widest margin, as SPY finished the year up more than 17%.
And while readers nailed the S&P 500's overall direction in 2025, they were far less accurate when predicting the top‑performing Magnificent Seven stock.
Readers predicted NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) to be the top gaining of the seven stocks, with a near majority (48%) picking the semiconductor company. Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL), which outperformed the rest of group in 2025, had ranked fifth with only 6% of the vote.
What's Next
After a strong and record-breaking 2025, investors want to know if 2026 will bring similar returns or better. The first year of Trump's second presidency marked the fourth best return in the last five years for the S&P 500. Here are the recent returns:
- 2024: +24.9%
- 2023: +26.2%
- 2022: -18.2%
- 2021: +28.8%
The 2025 return of 17.1% is also the fourth best of five years that Trump has been in office for the majority of the full year. Here are the past returns with Trump in the White House:
- 2020: +18.4%
- 2019: +31.2%
- 2018: -4.6%
- 2017: +21.7%
Investors likely would love to see the same strong returns in three of the four years with Trump in office previously and also see a return to the 24% or more gains they saw in three of the last four years prior to 2025.
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