What if I had invested? › Merrill Lynch
$1,000 in Merrill Lynch in 1976
$1,000 put into Merrill Lynch (BAC2) on January 2, 1976, its first trading day of 1976 in our data, was worth $29,646 on December 31, 2008, its last trading day, with dividends counted. Over the same days to December 31, 2008, $1,000 in the whole US stock market became $29,865.
Merrill Lynch no longer trades. Its last trading day was December 31, 2008; the delisting record says: merged or acquired. The figure above is what the shares were worth at the last trade. What holders received after that (a merger payout, or nothing in a bankruptcy) is not in our price data.
Bought at the close on January 2, 1976, dividends put back in, no costs and no tax. Dividends are counted to the end of 2024; from 2025 on our prices are adjusted for splits only, so dividends paid since then are left out. The stock figure counts dividends; the S&P 500 index figure does not, so compare the stock with the whole-market figure. The market figure is the Fama-French US market return (Kenneth R. French data library), which runs to July 31, 2026. Our stock prices run to September 23, 2026.
Another stock, another year
Merrill Lynch in: 1971 · 1972 · 1973 · 1974 · 1975 · 1977 · 1978 · 1979 · 1980 · 1981 · 1982 · 1983 · 1984 · 1985 · 1986 · 1987 · 1988 · 1989 · 1990 · 1991 · 1992 · 1993 · 1994 · 1995 · 1996 · 1997 · 1998 · 1999 · 2000 · 2001 · 2002 · 2003 · 2004 · 2005 · 2006 · 2007 · 2008
Also in 1976
- Lilly (Eli) · $1,000 became $1,540,800
- Walmart · $1,000 became $11,767,274
- Jpmorgan Chase & Co · $1,000 became $652,999
- Advanced Micro Devices · $1,000 became $1,196,340
- ExxonMobil · $1,000 became $489,555
- Johnson & Johnson · $1,000 became $455,897
- Intel · $1,000 became $1,620,878
- GE Aerospace · $1,000 became $282,228
History, not advice. How these numbers are made.