What if you bought Procter & Gamble in 1990?
US Consumer · Household. The hindsight answer, year by year, against the only benchmark that matters.
Could you have picked it? Play20.0× · S&P 500 same money: $19,429
$1,000 in Procter & Gamble at the start of 1990 would be worth about $20,000 today — 20.0 times your money, and ahead of the S&P 500 over the same stretch.
The story
Procter & Gamble is the archetypal consumer staples company, maker of Tide, Pampers, Gillette and dozens of other household brands. In March 2000, a profit warning under a reorganization led by chief executive Durk Jager sent the shares down by about thirty percent in a single day, an unusual event for such a sleepy company, and Jager departed soon after.
Under his successor, A.G. Lafley, P&G refocused on its biggest brands and, in 2005, bought Gillette. The stock recovered and climbed steadily through the mid-2000s, falling less than the market during the 2008 crisis since people still needed toothpaste and laundry detergent. Growth slowed in the early 2010s, Lafley briefly returned as chief executive in 2013, and the company sold or discontinued about a hundred smaller brands. In 2017, activist investor Nelson Peltz waged one of the most expensive proxy fights in history to win a board seat, narrowly prevailing after a recount. The stock then moved to new highs, supported by its dividends and pricing power.
The lesson: Defensive stocks are not immune to sudden drops, but steady demand for everyday necessities tends to provide resilience over a full economic cycle.
$1,000 invested at the start of each year
| Bought in | Price then | Worth today | S&P 500 would be | Multiple |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1990 | $8.00 | $20,000 | $19,429 | 20.0× |
| 1995 | $15.00 | $10,667 | $14,783 | 10.7× |
| 2000 | $55.00 | $2,909 | $4,626 | 2.9× |
| 2003 | $43.00 | $3,721 | $7,727 | 3.7× |
| 2005 | $55.00 | $2,909 | $5,763 | 2.9× |
| 2007 | $64.00 | $2,500 | $4,789 | 2.5× |
| 2008 | $73.00 | $2,192 | $4,626 | 2.2× |
| 2010 | $61.00 | $2,623 | $6,071 | 2.6× |
| 2012 | $67.00 | $2,388 | $5,312 | 2.4× |
| 2015 | $91.00 | $1,758 | $3,301 | 1.8× |
| 2018 | $92.00 | $1,739 | $2,519 | 1.7× |
| 2020 | $125 | $1,280 | $2,092 | 1.3× |
green = beat the S&P 500 · red = lost money
Best entry point in our set: 1990, turning $1,000 into $20,000. The S&P 500 from that same year: $19,429.
Now try it without hindsight. The wheel decides the year and the asset class, you pick the position, ten seconds a pick, and we simulate to today. Procter & Gamble is one of 258 positions on the wheel — including the ones that went to zero.
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