Every four years, a Summer Olympics competition is held with viewers around the world tuning in to cheer on their country’s athletes in the hope to top the medal count and celebrate the pride of their country.
While the Olympics are important to media companies, sports fans and others, here’s a look at their impact on the stock market.
Stock Markets During Summer Olympics: The stock market doesn’t close for the Summer Olympics, but could see volatility for several companies that could be impacted by the games including U.S. media rights holder Comcast Corp CMCSA.
Other than stocks with direct ties to the Olympic games, the stock market sees little correlation between the games and price action. The country that wins the most countries often doesn’t see a material impact from taking the top honors.
One market that is more heavily impacted is the stock market of the host country, which often sees a spike when the country is selected as the host and shortly before the games before cooling off during the games and directly after.
The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust SPY, which tracks the S&P 500 Index was up 1.0% and 1.1%, respectively, during the duration of the 2016 Summer Olympics (Aug. 5, 2016-Aug. 21, 2016) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and the 2020 Summer Olympics (July 23, 2021-Aug. 8, 2021) in Tokyo. Japan.
While the past two Summer Olympics produced minimal returns for the S&P 500, the SPY was up 2.9% and 2.4% respectively during the duration of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, England, and the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China.
For comparison, a look at the country-specific ETFs of the Olympics host nation turned in lower returns than the S&P 500.
In 2020, the iShares MSCI Japan Fund EWJ was flat during the Summer Olympics, going from $67.78 to $67.82, or a total gain of 4 cents.
The iShares MSCI Brazil ETF EWZ was up 1.0% during the 2016 Summer Olympics.
The 2008 Summer Olympics may stand out as an example of volatility with the games. While the U.S. won the most medals overall (112 to China’s 100), China took home the most gold medals (48 to USA’s 36). This is the last time the U.S. didn’t finish first in the gold medal race.
The iShares China Large-Cap ETF FXI was actually down 2.1% during the 2008 Summer Olympics, compared to the 2.4% gain for the SPY mentioned above.
A Bespoke Investment study shared by Business Insider in 2016 found that the S&P 500 averaged a +1.75% gain during the duration of each Summer Olympics from 1928 to 2012. The study also found that the benchmark indices of host countries had a similar gain of +1.74% during each Summer Olympics.
One result also stands out in the study with the S&P 500 up 9.41% during the 1984 Summer Olympics, hosted in Los Angeles, California.
The Summer Olympics return to Los Angeles in 2028, the first time the U.S. has hosted since the 1996 games in Atlanta, Georgia.
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U.S. Medal Dominance: The U.S. has dominated the medal counts in the Summer Olympics, ranking with more than 1,000 medals ahead of the next closest country.
The U.S. has 2,975 total Olympic medals according to the Olympic Foundation and a CBS News report. Ranking behind the U.S. are the Soviet Union with 1,204 medals and Germany with 1,058 medals.
For gold medals, the U.S. ranks first with 1,179, followed by the Soviet Union with 473 and Germany with 342.
In the 2016 Summer Olympics, the U.S. had 121 total medals, ranking ahead of China (70) and Great Britain (67). The U.S. had 46 gold medals in 2016 topping Great Britain (27) and China (26).
At the 2020 Summer Olympics, the U.S. had 113 total medals, topping China (89) and the Russian Olympic Committee (71). USA led the way with 39 gold medals in 2020 topping China (38) and Japan (27).
The U.S. is once again favored to win the most medals and gold medals. Odds from DraftKings Inc DKNG give U.S. odds of -2500 to win the most medals, followed by China at +900 and Japan and Great Britain tied with odds of +5,000.
The odds for most gold medals are slightly closer with U.S. favored at -750, ranking ahead of China (+350) and France (+6,500).
The 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris are July 26 through August 11.
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