• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

DQYDJ

  • Blog
    • About Us
    • ———-
    • Investing
      • Personal Finance
    • Economics
    • Real Estate
    • Politics
    • Offbeat
      • Weekender
    • ———-
    • Disclosures
  • Research
    • Investment Research
    • Finance Research
    • Economics Research
    • Demographic Research
  • Interactive Tools
    • Economics Calculators
    • Investment Calculators
    • Personal Finance Calculators
    • Health Calculators
  • Show Search
Hide Search

Inflation and Dividend Adjusted S&P 500 On July 19, 2019

Personal Finance     July 20, 2019 by PK Advertising Disclosures

I won’t bury the lede: the all time closing high on the S&P 500, adjusted for inflation and reinvested dividends, was on July 15, 2019.

Friday’s close (July 19, 2019) was a mere 1.23% below that peak .

The S&P 500 Through July 2019

After Christmas Eve 2018 we talked about how the S&P 500 – intraday – dipped to the definition of a bear market. It temporarily dropped 20% below its nominal all time high.

We’ve since completely erased that bear, even with the currently looming economic issues here in the US (for starters, a Federal Reserve about to cut rates and an inverted yield curve).

That lull now looks like a pothole in an otherwise stereotypical up and to the right graph 📈:

Inflation and dividend adjusted S&P 500 from January 2015 - July 2019.
Inflation & dividend adjusted S&P 500 from January 2015 – July 2019

(Above, blue is the adjusted “index” level and orange is the un-adjusted.)

In fact, by this math we left the bear market on April 19, 2019. The journey hasn’t been entirely smooth since that time – note the volatility increase you can actually see. We can say one thing for certain though: the brief bear market did not affect the general trend of the market.

But you already know that part. I just wanted to show you that we’re at an all time high even adjusted for dividends and inflation.

Floating Near an All Time S&P 500 High

So, even with a bit of weakness last week we’re still sitting near an ATH.

Why bother doing this math?

Frustratingly, even in 2019, the most commonly watched investing numbers revolve around index levels. As you know, dear reader, you don’t (only) make or lose money off the level of an index.

There are two major oft-ignored investment factors:

  • Dividends: what stocks pay out doesn’t show up in index levels, but does show up in your wallet
  • Inflation: even if the value of your investments are increasing, it doesn’t help if the prices of things you buy are increasing faster

(Okay, taxes too – but with worldwide readership on DQYDJ plus all of the various retirement accounts that’s a hairy one)

Anyway, that’s why we do this math – it’s more informative to look at investment results factoring in real world factors like dividends and inflation.

For the newer readers, over the years we’ve built a number of calculators with this philosophy in mind:

  • S&P 500 Return Calculator
  • Dow Jones Return Calculator
  • Treasury Return Calculator
  • Our other investment calculators
    • (many include inflation, all contain dividend or coupon reinvestment if applicable)

And what are you going to do about US stocks?

Earlier this year we laid out our current asset allocation. I told you then we were targeting around 60/40 risky/safe assets. We’re in our mid-thirties, so that’s a conservative allocation.

The stock market success and company equity vest have pushed us past 70/30. I’m looking at trimming it a bit and pocketing 2%+ money market and safe fund returns for now. 2% returns are presumably temporary with the Fed rate cut on the horizon, so hold me to investing hard if we do see weakness.

It’s going to be an interesting next 12 months! In the comments, let us know how you’re approaching the current market.

  • Twitter Transparent PNG
  • Facebook Transparent PNG
  • LinkedIn Transparent PNG
  • Reddit Transparent PNG
  • twitter
  • facebook
  • linkedin

Personal Finance

About PK

PK founded DQYDJ in 2009 to educate and learn from others in finance and investing. By day he writes prose and code in Silicon Valley. He's mid-30s, married, with two kids.

[ Read more about PK ]

Primary Sidebar

Never Miss a Post

POPULAR  IN THE LAST WEEK

  • Income Percentile Calculator for the United States in 2019 Economics
  • Net Worth Percentile Calculator for the United States Economics
  • S&P 500 Return Calculator, with Dividend Reinvestment Investing
  • United States Net Worth Brackets, Percentiles, and Top One Percent Economics
  • 2019 Household Income Percentile Calculator for the United States Personal Finance
  • Net Worth by Age Calculator for the United States Economics
  • Height Percentile Calculator for Men and Women in the United States Health
  • Income Percentile by Age Calculator for the United States in 2019 Economics
  • Stock Total Return and Dividend Reinvestment Calculator (United States) Investing
  • Hours Calculator: See How Many Hours are Between Two Times
  • Who Are the One Percent in the United States by Income and Net Worth? Economics
  • Average, Median, Top 1%, and all United States Household Income Percentiles in 2019 Economics
  • Bond Pricing Calculator Based on Current Market Price and Yield Economics
  • How Many Millionaires Are There in America? Economics
  • S&P 500 Periodic Reinvestment Calculator (With Dividends) Investing

About DQYDJ         

We write posts and create calculators and visualizations to help you understand your finances and take control of your investments.

[ Read More About Us ]

Never miss another post:

© 2009-2019 DQYDJ.com

  • About Us
  • Privacy Policy & Disclosures
  • Recent Posts