Nasdaq 100 tops 20-year returns at 21%; Nifty Midcap leads Indian markets: Which investment created more wealth?
Get the Finance newsletter
Daily finance — markets, central banks, M&A, the prints that move money. Free.
- Nasdaq 100 delivered 21.3% annualized returns over 20 years, the highest among Nasdaq 100, Nifty indices, gold, and real estate; ₹10,000 invested then would have grown to nearly ₹4.75 lakh
- Nifty Midcap 150 TRI led Indian equity indices with 16.3% annualized returns over 20 years, turning ₹10,000 into roughly ₹2.05 lakh
- Gold topped the 3-year and 5-year horizons as the best-performing asset class in the comparison
- Nasdaq 100 also led the 1-year period at 48.4%, while over 10 and 15 years it posted 26.5% and 26% annualized returns respectively
- Nifty Smallcap 250 TRI returned 14.2% over 20 years but managed just 0.1% over the past year
- Nifty 100 TRI posted the lowest 20-year annualized return among equity indices at 12.5% and declined 3.6% over the past year, with the Nifty 500 TRI at 12.9% over 20 years and a negative 1.7% one-year return
Why it matters: The data quantifies a stark wealth-creation gap for Indian investors: ₹10,000 in the Nasdaq 20 years ago is worth nearly ₹4.75 lakh versus roughly ₹2.05 lakh in the best-performing domestic index. That 5-percentage-point annualized gap between the Nasdaq 100 (21.3%) and the Nifty Midcap 150 (16.3%) compounds dramatically over two decades, making currency-adjusted US tech exposure a structural wealth multiplier relative to Indian large-caps.
