The Best and Worst Sectors for Stocks in 2025

One industry in particular was dominant last year.

It was another good year for tech stocks. Sectors that performed better than technology stocks In 2025.

The sector that performed best last year was: Telecommunication services to generate approximately 33% revenue in 2025. Telecommunications services primarily include telecommunications companies, but also media and entertainment industry companies. This sector includes stocks such as: Alphabet (GOOG), Netflix (NFLX), Meta (META), Walt Disney (DIS), Verizon (VZ)and Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) Just to name a few examples.

It was media and entertainment companies that led this trend last year. Alphabet rose about 65%, Warner Bros. Discovery surged 170%.Satellite and mobile communications providers EchoStar (SATS) rises approximately 378%. This segment was the best performer for the second year in a row.

Telecom services performed better than: Information technology (IT) with a return of about 24% in 2025. The IT sector includes most of the popular technology and semiconductor stocks, including: Apple (AAPL), NVIDIA (NVDA), Microsoft (MSFT), Broadcom (AVGO), Palantir (PLTR), Micron (MU), Oracle (ORCL), and Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM), Among them.

Top performers for 2025 included. micron, Approximately 240% increasePalantir, Approximately 135% increase, and Western Digital (WDC)It increased by about 290%.

Industrials performed well.

Another sector that outperformed the entire S&P 500 last year was Industrial goods with a return of about 21%. This segment includes two major segments that generated revenue last year: Defense, aerospace, AI data center infrastructure.

Some of the industry leaders include: GE Aerospace (GE); We returned about 86%. Howmet Aerospace (HWM); 90% returned.; caterpillar, It returned 61%. AI data center stocks include Vertiv (VTV) and Applied Digital (APLD).They returned 150% and 231% respectively.

The financial industry also performed well last year, posting a rate of return of about 15%. The surge in retail trading has boosted the financial sector, benefiting businesses such as: robinhood (hood) Soared by about 233%. It was also a good year for M&A, which benefited investment banks such as: Goldman Sachs (GS) Last year, it increased by about 62%.

that The materials sector returned about 12%.This has been driven by a surge in the price of gold and demand for natural resources to power electronics.

MP material (MP)Shares of , a rare earths miner that has contracts with the U.S. government and tech giants like Apple, soared about 275%. Newmont Corporation (NO)While the stock price of , a representative gold mining company, soared 168% last year, Able Horse (ALB)Shares of , which produces lithium for electronics, soared about 56%.

These stocks came from: One industry that will outperform all others by 2025 – Metals and Mining. Stocks in the metals and mining industries returned. Last year, about 85%.

Another tough year for real estate stocks

There was only one industry. Negative returns in 2025 – it will be real estateIt fell about 1%. This is not surprising, as the real estate market has suffered from high interest rates, rising prices, and supply shortages in recent years.

Other industries that underperformed their benchmarks include: consumer staples, I got a profit of about 1%, Consumer Discretionary, It returned about 6%. These sectors have been hit by inflation and consumers’ worries about their wallets.

Finally, stocks in the region energy sector It returned about 7% last year.