If you managed to sleep through May or simply avoided your brokerage app, congratulations.
You might be sitting on some gains despite the major averages punishing investors with gut-wrenching drops of up to 10% at the month’s lows.
When the dust settled, the S&P 500 (^GSPC) finished fractionally higher while the Dow (^DJI) inched up just 13 points. The Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) lost just over 2.1% in May.
A six-day rally to close the month of May stemmed the hemorrhaging, but reality still smarts. The Nasdaq Composite just posted its fourth monthly loss of the year — something it hasn’t done since 2002.
That index — along with the S&P 500 consumer discretionary (^SP500-25) and communication services sectors (^SP500-50) — are all still down more than 20% in 2022.
Energy stocks were again the standout in May, minting another 16% for the Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLE). XLE is now up an eye-watering 57% this year thanks to the efforts of Warren Buffett-owned Chevron (CVX) and Occidental Petroleum (OXY) — among many others.
On the retail front, consumer staples stocks are getting hammered just like their discretionary cousins, with these sectors down 4.1% and 5.1%, respectively, this month.
Those Walmart (WMT) and Target (TGT) earnings that led to their biggest drubbing since the 1987 crash? Those losses stung, with Walmart settled down 16% for the month of May, and Target off 29%. And some smaller names in the sector fared worse, with Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) shedding 41% and Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY) plummeting 37%.
One bright spot in May was the semiconductor industry.
These stocks largely avoided the pounding that most of the market took, and used the latest rally to claw back early-month losses and then some.
Most of the chip names (yellow, below) closed in the green for May, though they’re all sitting on losses — some substantial — for the year.
Nvidia (NVDA) is the worst off in the basket — down 37% year-to-date. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) gained 19% in May but is still down 29% in 2022. Fabricators and analog integrated circuit-makers are the…
..
