Sharemarket records vs end of Magnificent 7 vs Bitcoin booming

Published Dec 22, 2024, 5:00 PM

Sean Aylmer, Michael Thompson and Adam Lang each nominate their top markets story from the year - and choose a winner.

Welcome to the Fear and Greed Summer series sponsored by Vanter, specialists in compliance led growth. I'm Michael Thompson, and good morning, Sean Aylmer, Good morning, Michael, and good morning Adam Lang.

Good morning Michael.

Now in just five minutes, we are each going to put forward a big story about markets today from the last year, and at the end we're going to decide who wins, because we are very competitive and we must have a winner at all times. Adam, would you like to go first?

Al Michael inshured for me. It's the rise of the ASEX two hundred and the S and P five hundred share markets are an expression of investor belief in future profits of publicly listed companies, and these measures shows that belief has been at record levels and closes the year with a great deal of strength. The Standard and Poors five hundred index tracks the share price performance of the largest listed companies on the stock exchange in the United States, and that is the biggest economy in the world. The S and P five hundred began twenty twenty four worth over US four three trillion and closes more than twenty five percent higher. Meanwhile, the Australian Stock Exchange our S and p ASX two hundred accounts for over eighty percent of the total market capitalization, and it has been a similar but different story. The total index has flirted with nine percent growth this year and occasionally crept into double digits. We don't have the Magnificent seven, but we do have our favorites. Our banks lead the way with five in the top ten, Commonwealth National, Australia, West, pank A and ZED mcquarie, with then BHP, CSL, West Farmers, Goodman and fourtes Q rounding out a powerful rise in twenty twenty four.

You know, Adam, that is spectacular growth overall.

Is the word flirted?

Yeah, I know that made it quite kind of erotic, that kind of thing. Yes, Look, you're a big picture guy. I want to narrow the view here just to one particular asset. I mean, this is extraordinary because twenty twenty four for me was the year that coin boomed. Now consider that at the start of the year January one probably didn't need to point out when the year started, but at the start of the year bitcoin was sitting around forty three thousand US dollars a unit. Now at the end of twenty twenty four, it has hit record after record after record after record. It passed one hundred thousand US dollar mark in early December, continued well past that point. A few reasons for that, obviously, that earlier in the year, right, we got a big hit of credibility when the SEC in the US proved spot bitcoin ets from major institutions like black Rock and Fidelity. Then a bunch of other things happened throughout the ar Do you like how I went to summarize everything, Just a bunch of stuff happened. But then you're fast forward towards November, Right, Bitcoin took off when Donald Trump won because he'd come across in his comments as pro crypto. Then he announced a crypto advocate as his nominee to run the SEC, and bitcoin and other cryptos as well kind of just went through the roof. Now it's just extraordinary how long they'll stay there. Kind of as anyone's guest, but to go from kind of forty three thousand US dollars to more than one hundred thousand US dollars in less than a year, with a huge amount of that happening just in the week since the US election, That is huge. That is spectacular growth.

Sure is, Michael, I agree my market story for the year the Magnificent seven, maybe the end of the Magnificent seven. The single biggest question facing global markets in twenty twenty five is whether the mag seven textos can keep running. We're talking Apple up thirty five percent this year, now worth close to four trillion dollars. Good last couple of months, but really slowed in that July taber period. Microsoft it's up twenty two percent, been a bit choppy this year. And Video Wow up one hundred and seventy four percent best of all, but it has totally stalled since July. Amazon up fifty five percent, great last couple of months of the year, Alphabet up forty two two percent. It's done well recently, but really came off the boil in the second half of the year. Met has risen steadily all year, about eighty percent. Tesla Tesla, Tesla Tesla, It's back at record levels on the back of that Trump election. The Magnificent seven account for the value of about one third of the S and P five hundred fifty percent of the indexes. Twenty two percent gain is on the back of the Magnificent seven. Incredible story, but can they keep running?

Great question, I say, three good stories.

Look, I would like to nominate myself as the winner, but I think it might be at It is hard to go past that.

Michael.

Well, yeah, I mean, I mean you were justifiably the winner in terms of the rise of the market.

Well, I just like to say that mag seven was the reason the markets raise.

But I'm just it's fair.

I'll go without them.

Okay, but please, I don't somebody think of the bitcoin.

Yeah, I'll take the win.

Well, okay, we will declare you the winner. Adam, it shall not last.

And Michael, excellent third.

I don't get.

Ron was third Daylight or was Michael?

Michael, Well, this is nonsense. We are off to a terrible start here. Thank you very much, Sean, Thanks Michael, and thank you Adam.

Thank you Michael.

Make sure you hit follow on the podcast. This is the Fear and Greed Summer series, brought to you by Vantera. Vanta automates compliance for frameworks like ISO twenty seven one, SoC two, CPS two three four and Essential eight, saving time and money while building trust. Join over eight thousand companies like a Lassian Dovetailfireant and Tactic dot io managing real time risk. Get one thousand dollars off at Vanta dot com. Slash Fear and Greed. I'm Michael Thompson, and this is fear and greed