5 Top-Ranked Dow Stocks To Buy For 2018

As markets approach the end of an extremely successful year, each of the major benchmarks is nearing ever-new milestones. Currently up more than 25% year to date, the Dow is on course for its best yearly performance since 2013. If the blue-chip index maintains its current trajectory and gains more than 26.5%, it will have registered its best annual performance since 1995. During that year, the Dow had gained 33%.

The index’s blue-chips have not looked this attractive for some time now. And fueling these gains has been a combination of strong earnings and steady economic growth, factors which are likely to hold good in 2018. Adding strong performers from the Dow to your portfolios could help you garner handsome profits in the year ahead.

Benchmarks Near Multiple Milestones

The other major benchmarks are also well on course to create milestones of their own. For instance, the S&P 500 has increased more than 20% this year and is on course to registering its highest gains in four years. Meanwhile, the Nasdaq has surged ahead, gaining almost 30% during a year when tech stocks really came into their own.

Such stellar gains came amid an atmosphere of relative calm. Notably, the S&P 500 has not suffered even a 3% decline at any point since Trump won the presidential elections. Not only is this the longest such period ever recorded, it has come at a time when the market’s fear gauge, the VIX, has plummeted to record lows.

Strong Economy, Bullish Earnings Boost Bourses

Powering this extended stretch of furious gains has been a combination of steady economic growth and impressive earnings results. According to the Department of Commerce’s third and final estimate, U.S. GDP increased by 3.2% in the third quarter, the best pace recorded since the first quarter of 2015.

Meanwhile, the economy added an impressive 228,000 new jobs in November even as the unemployment rate remained at a 17-year low. These readings indicate that the labor market is at its strongest since the start of the 21st century.