Stock Market History: 100 Years of U.S. Returns, Crashes and Recoveries
One index, 98 calendar years, 73 declines and a 439× price gain. The averages are easy; the distribution behind them is the useful part.
A century in three numbers
Stock market history in the United States is unusually well measured: the S&P 500 and its predecessors have a continuous record back to 1928, and the whole of it sits behind this page as JSON. Three numbers carry most of it:
- Price: +6.4% a year. The index went from 17.57 on 1928-01-31 to 7,719 on 2026-09-04 — 439× — without counting a single dividend.
- Total return: about +10.1% a year compounded, +11.9% as a simple average of the 98 calendar years since 1928. The gap between the two averages is the volatility tax.
- 72 up years, 26 down years. Finishing the year higher is roughly a 73% base rate, and it has not changed much by era.
Everything else in this article is the distribution behind those three averages — because the average year almost never happens. Only 7 of 98 years landed within two percentage points of the mean.
The full annual ledger, 1928 onwards →
The crashes, and how long they lasted
Our drawdown register counts 73 declines since 1928, of which 12 reached bear-market depth (−20% or worse). The deepest:
| Started | Decline | Days to trough | Cause |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1929 | −86.2% | 989 | — |
| 2007 | −56.8% | 517 | Global financial crisis |
| 2000 | −49.1% | 929 | Dotcom bust |
| 1973 | −48.2% | 630 | — |
| 1968 | −36.1% | 543 | — |
| 2020 | −33.9% | 33 | COVID pandemic |
The median entry in that register is far tamer than the famous ones — −8.2% over 34 days. That is the honest shape of stock market history: routine corrections, punctuated by a handful of events that redefine a generation's risk tolerance. The United States has also run through 15 NBER recessions in the same window, and the index recovered from every one of them.
Every drawdown with its cause and recovery →
Volatility is the price, not the accident
Across 99 years the average intra-year drawdown is −16.2% — and the average year still finishes +8.1% on price alone, with 67 of them positive. The worst intra-year hole on record was 1931 at −57.5%.
The VIX puts a market price on that fear: 9,266 trading days of history, a mean of 19.4, a record close of 82.69 on 2020-03-16, and 208 days above 40 — 2.2% of all days. It closed at 14.53 on 2026-09-04.
Intra-year drawdown vs the year's outcome → · VIX since 1990 →
Where the century leaves valuation today
- Shiller CAPE 41.4× as of 2026-09-04, against a long-run mean of 17.6× — the 98th percentile of its own history. The record is 44.2× in 1999-12.
- Forward P/E 20.1× on consensus estimates (2026-09-05), trailing 27.2×.
- Household equity allocation 46.8% as of 2026-01-01, the 98.7th percentile since the series begins — the single valuation measure with the tightest historical link to subsequent ten-year returns.
- The largest seven companies are 33.5% of the index (2026-09-05), up from 13.0% in 2018.
None of those is a timing signal. All of them are reasons the next decade's return is unlikely to be drawn from the same distribution as the last one.
Shiller CAPE since 1881 → · Household equity allocation → · The Magnificent 7's index weight →
What a century of stock market history actually supports
- Time in the market beats timing it, but the horizon is long. Five-year rolling windows have been negative often enough to matter; the record's comfort arrives at ten years and beyond.
- Recovery has been universal, not guaranteed. Every one of the 73 declines was eventually recovered. That is a fact about the past, and whoever bought the 1929 peak waited 25 years to get back to even on price.
- Valuation sets the odds, not the date. Starting multiples explain a large share of ten-year returns and almost none of next year's.
Five-year rolling annualised returns →
FAQ
What is the average stock market return over 100 years?
The S&P 500 compounded at about +10.1% a year with dividends reinvested, and +6.4% on price alone, from 1928 to 2026-09-04. The simple average of the 98 calendar years is +11.9%.
How many stock market crashes have there been?
73 distinct declines since 1928 in our register, 12 of them bear markets of −20% or worse. The deepest was −86.2% in 1929–1932.
Is the stock market overvalued right now?
By the two long-history measures on this site, it is expensive: Shiller CAPE 41.4× against a 17.6× mean (98th percentile), and household equity allocation at the 98.7th percentile. Both are ten-year signals, not next-year ones.
Computed from /api/sp500/annual-tr.json, /api/sp500/century.json, /api/sp500/drawdowns.json, /api/sp500/pe.json, /api/sp500/vix.json and /api/aiae.json. Market data through 2026-09-04; datasets published 2026-09-05. The page is regenerated on every refresh, so the numbers here and on the charts are the same numbers.