What If You Bought the Dot-Com Survivors at the 2000 Peak?
In early 2000, tech stocks were priced for a future that everyone agreed was coming. Then the dot-com bust arrived.
The stocks that survived are still around. Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Oracle, IBM, Intel, Qualcomm, eBay. If you bought any of them in early 2000 and held through everything that came after, here is exactly where you would stand 26 years later.
The headline
$1,000 invested in each of eight major tech stocks in early 2000. Held continuously through the dot-com crash, the financial crisis, the 2020 pandemic, the 2022 selloff, and the 2026 tariff shock. Sorted by outcome.
| Stock | $1K became | Total return |
|---|---|---|
| Apple | $423,013 | +42,201% |
| Amazon | $76,548 | +7,554.8% |
| Microsoft | $17,274 | +1,627.4% |
| eBay | $15,306 | +1,430.6% |
| Oracle | $6,916 | +591.6% |
| Qualcomm | $4,730 | +373.0% |
| Intel | $4,252 | +325.2% |
| IBM | $4,151 | +315.1% |
For comparison, $1,000 in the S&P 500 (SPY) starting in 2000 is worth approximately $8,718 today - a +771.8% return at 8.4% annualized.
The two outliers: Apple and Amazon
Apple turning $1,000 into over $423,000 is the most extreme survival story in the data. The split-adjusted price in early 2000 was about $0.78. Today it sits above $300. That is a 423-fold increase. The iPod (2001), the iTunes Store (2003), and the iPhone (2007) all came after you would have bought the stock.
Apple was underwater for only four years. By 2005, the stock was already well past its dot-com peak. Investors who held through the 2001 lows were the only ones who captured the entire run.
Amazon's path was longer. The stock fell over 90% from its dot-com peak and stayed underwater for eight years. $1,000 held through that entire stretch is now worth about $76,500.
Microsoft: 13 years underwater
Microsoft is the survival story most people forget. The stock peaked in late 1999, then spent 13 years in the wilderness. Anyone who bought in early 2000 and held was underwater every single year from 2001 through 2013. The stock did not break above its 1999 high until 2014 - a 14-year round trip just to get back to even.
From 2014 to 2026, Microsoft compounded at about 25% annually. The full $1K-to-$17,274 return is almost entirely a post-2014 phenomenon. The first 14 years were dead money.
Intel: 18 years underwater, then a rebound
$1,000 invested in Intel in early 2000 sat below its starting value at 18 of the 26 yearly checkpoints. The low point came in 2009, when the position was worth about $287. A sharp 2026 rebound changed the math: the position is now worth about $4,252, a +325% nominal return, or about 5.5% per year.
That puts Intel seventh of the eight survivors in the table, just ahead of IBM (+315%) and behind Qualcomm (+373%). All three finished well behind the S&P 500.
The lesson the data tells
Buying tech survivors in early 2000 produced a stunning range of outcomes:
- Two stocks (Apple, Amazon) crushed the S&P 500 by orders of magnitude.
- Two more (Microsoft, eBay) also beat the index, Microsoft only after holding through 13 underwater years.
- Four (Oracle, Qualcomm, Intel, IBM) trailed the S&P 500.
Buying "the survivors" was not a guaranteed win. Buying all eight equally and holding for 26 years would have beaten the S&P 500 overall, but almost entirely on the strength of Apple and Amazon. Strip those two out and the typical survivor only roughly matched the index, with an enormous amount of variance within the group. The decision that mattered was which specific stocks you owned, not whether you owned tech generally.
Run any combination of these tickers in our comparison tool with a 2000 start date, or browse individual stock pages for full year-by-year breakdowns.
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