Investing in Big Tech companies used to be simple and straightforward. You could simply scoop up a basket of the five internet giants—Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta, and Google’s parent firm, Alphabet—and count on them to outperform the market. Their share prices didn’t move strictly in tandem, but you could expect a close sector-wide correlation. Now, in the AI era, all that’s gone out the window.
Looking at the share performance of the Big Five this year, it’s hard to believe these companies are in the same category. Three of the group are lagging slightly behind the overall S&P 500 index, which is on track for a roughly 16% gain this year. The group—Microsoft, Apple, and Meta—is instead pacing at around 13%, 12%, and 10%, respectively. A fourth, onetime market darling Amazon, is floundering far behind with a miserable 1% gain. Then there is Google, whose current gains of around 62% make it one of the best performing stocks of 2025.
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