My Top 30 Index Turns Two

STREET SMART

- JAMES K. GLASSMAN

TWO years ago, I put together Top 30, my own reinvention of the venerable Dow Jones industrial average, which I believe had failed to reflect the changing nature of the U.S. economy. I retained 11 of the Dow’s 30 components and added some of my favorites from my annual 10 Best recommendations for Kiplinger and the Wired Index, concocted by the tech magazine in 1998.

The Dow is weirdly weighted by the prices of its components, so a 1% move in Goldman Sachs has about 12 times the effect of a similar move in Verizon. Top 30 stocks are equally weighted.

The first year for Top 30 was a blowout. It returned 26.5% for the 12 months ending April 30, 2024, compared with 13.3% for the Dow. This past year ... not so much. Top 30 gained only 1.0%, compared with again of 9.5% for the Dow. For the full two years, Top 30 remains comfortably on top (so to speak), returning a total of 34.9% versus 24.0% for the Dow.

The year’s wild ride. The past year provided a lesson in volatility. Stocks are an investment class that suffers extremes. As an investor, you get rewarded—at an average rate of about 10% annually over long periods—for enduring those risks. From the beginning of May 2024 to the middle of February 2025, stocks marched up the hill, with the broad market (including Top 30) returning about 20%. Then came the prospect of a global trade war, with higher inflation and even a recession in view over the crest, and the market slid down the mountain, losing all those gains—and more—in just two months.

Several Top 30 stocks were devastated. Nike, which manufactures most of its shoes and other products in China and Vietnam, fell 37.2% in the 12 months ending April 30, with more than two-thirds of that drop occurring between February and April.

Also harmed by the tariff announcements: goods transporters Union Pacific (down 6.8%) and United Parcel Service (-31.0%); energy companies Halliburton