The S&P 500 is within striking distance of 7,000 points, the latest milestone for the index in its nearly 70-year history as stocks have accelerated on the growth of big tech, though some economists have warned the success of the markets has become disconnected from the economy over the last decade.
The index was boosted earlier following a lighter-than-expected inflation report.
Key Facts
The S&P dropped roughly 12 points (0.1%) as of Tuesday morning to 6,965 points, despite an earlier boost in premarket trading following a lighter-than-expected inflation report.
The index came within 15 points of the 7,000-point milestone on Monday, during which the S&P traded as high as 6,986.
Intel, AMD and Moderna headlined broader gains across the S&P, rising 6.5%, 12.1% and 5.8%, respectively, while Salesforce (4.7%), Visa (4.9%) and Super Micro Computer (6.6%) declined.
Surprising Fact
The S&P 500—tracking 500 of the largest American companies since 1957—reached 6,000 points on Nov. 8, 2024, after surpassing the 5,000-point milestone on Feb. 8 earlier that year. The index crossed the 4,000-point mark in April 2021, just under two years after surpassing 3,000 points in July 2019.
Big Number
Nearly 16%. That’s how much the S&P 500 grew by in 2025. The index grew by 24% in 2024, which marked only the index’s sixth-best year since 2000.
What To Watch For
When the Dow Jones Industrial Average reaches the 50,000-point milestone. The Dow dropped by 324 points to 49,265 as of Tuesday morning. The Dow surpassed 40,000 in 2024, marking another 10,000-point milestone after reaching 30,000 in November 2020. It took 103 years for the index to top 10,000, reaching the milestone during the dot-com boom in 1999, before crossing 20,000 in January 2017.
Key Background
The stock market has been dominated by big tech since the early 2000s, though growth for those firms has only accelerated in recent years. Four of the largest companies eclipsed the $4 trillion market valuation in the last year, including Nvidia, Apple, Microsoft and Alphabet, which account for more than 22% of the S&P’s value. Nvidia, valued at just over $2 billion in 2000, became the first company with a $5 trillion market cap in October 2025, marking a roughly 227,000% growth amid growing demand for AI tech.
Chief Critic
JPMorgan economists wrote last year the U.S. economy and equity markets have diverged since 2010, arguing that indexes like the S&P 500 have outpaced the “real economy,” or the parts of an economy where goods and services are produced, sold and used by people, like jobs and consumer spending. Analysts Joe Sydl and Federico Cuevas said that, while tech has headlined a 350% earnings per share growth since 2000, the “average” U.S. company has only grown about 47%. The stock market relies on earnings, margins and the impact of buybacks—the process in which a company reduces its number of outstanding shares—for growth, whereas the U.S. economy is “powered” by wages, consumer spending and the labor market, each of which has declined over the last year, Sydl and Cuevas wrote in a separate note. About 30% of the revenue generated by the S&P also comes from overseas, the analysts said.
This article was written by Ty Roush from Forbes and was legally licensed through the DiveMarketplace by Industry Dive. Please direct all licensing questions to legal@industrydive.com.