3 Huge Winners From 2012

In the video below, Fool analyst Austin Smith takes a look at three winners from 2012.

At the very top of Austin's list: banks, tech, and Fools.

Banks were the most hated sector of the market in early 2012. Then, they soared. Bank of America was up 100% in 2012. Citigroup, up 40%. Wells Fargo, up 23% and JPMorgan Chase, up 30%.

This came after headwinds from the London Whale, lawsuits, consumer protection, the fiscal cliff, and Dodd-Frank, Austin says.

Tech also fared well. The Nasdaq 100 was up 15%, almost double the Dow Jones Industrial Average for the year.

The index has a market-cap weighting like the Dow, but can count Apple in its midst. It also has rockstar stocks like Sirius XM, eBay, Amazon.com, and priceline.com, which all had a great year.

Lastly, Fools -- those who took the reins of their own investments -- were also winners, Austin says. Hedge funds underperformed again last year, up only an average 6% in 2012. Meanwhile, nearly two-thirds of both large-cap and small-cap managers underperformed their respective indexes.

What happened in 2012 is not guaranteed to repeat in 2013. But Austin sees all three of these trends continuing through the year ahead.

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The article 3 Huge Winners From 2012 originally appeared on Fool.com.

Austin Smith owns shares of Apple, Wells Fargo, and eBay. The Motley Fool recommends Amazon.com, Apple, eBay, Priceline.com, and Wells Fargo. The Motley Fool owns shares of Amazon.com, Apple, Bank of America, Citigroup Inc , eBay, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Priceline.com, and Wells Fargo. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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