You’ve likely heard noise in the media recently about the potential of the Dow hitting 20,000. We recently wrote about the history of the Dow and want to remind you that the media has a tendency to add hype where it is not warranted. In our reading over the weekend we found an article that illustrates our feelings about the Dow and the recent hype around it quite well.
In the article, Why Dow 20k doesn’t matter, published in the Chicago Tribune, author Jill Schlesinger said, “I think the Dow is perhaps the least meaningful U.S. stock index available. Sure, it’s got history on its side — it was created by Charles Dow in 1896 in order to provide investors with a snapshot of how the overall stock market was doing. But it includes only 30 large companies, and considering that Amazon, Google and Facebook are not part of the Dow, it is hard to make the case that it reflects the broader market.” (source)
The full article can be read here and we think it is a worthwhile read.