While most headlines this year have fixated on artificial intelligence, one of the market's quietest and oldest industries has been posting numbers that would make most tech investors jealous. Railroad stocks, the literal backbone of the American economy since the 1800s, are outperforming the broader market in 2026.
While the popular SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSEARCA: SPY) is up about 12% year-to-date (YTD), the major rail names have delivered gains two to three times that size. And unsurprisingly, almost no one is talking about it.
