President Trump's first-year stock market gains actually look pretty middling compared with Obama's

Obama&#039;s first-year stock market surge trumps Trump&#039;s

(Image credit: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)

By Peter Weber, The Week US

published 21 December 2017

This past year has been a good time to be invested in the U.S. stock market. Just ask President Trump.

But do you know when else was a good year for U.S. investors? 2009, President Barack Obama's first year in office.

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On Thursday, Axios mapped out the S&P 500 gains and losses of the last seven presidents, and while Trump's 18 percent gain is impressive, it's a touch below George H.W. Bush's 19.6 percent increase and less than half of Obama's 36.9 percent first-year gain.

Obama's first year also saw higher gains than Trump's on the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the NASDAQ, though the presidents inherited widely different economies. You can see a larger version of the chart at Axios.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.