NEW YORK — The Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ) closed at $117.75 on March 27, 2000, at the peak of the Nasdaq-100 bubble. An investor who bought $10,000 at that exact top, reinvesting all dividends, holds $72,000 today—a 7.2x return over 26 years.
The path there was brutal. QQQ fell 83 percent, bottoming at $20.06 on Oct. 9, 2002. The $10,000 investment was worth $1,700.
Recovery took 15 years. With dividends reinvested, the position didn't return to its original $10,000 value until February 2015. The fund dipped below that threshold multiple times before finally holding above it in mid-2016. The share price itself didn't close above $117.75 again until September 2016.
Reinvested dividends accelerated recovery by roughly 18 months—small but meaningful over a quarter-century.
The story gets interesting when you look at individual holdings. Cisco Systems (CSCO) closed at $80.06 on March 27, 2000. It didn't close above that price until December 2025—over 25 years later. Intel (INTC) peaked in August 2000 and didn't return to that level until April 2026. Microsoft recovered by 2016.
QQQ's share price surpassed its 2000 peak nearly a decade before Cisco and Intel did. The reason: index composition. The Nasdaq-100 tracks the 100 largest non-financial Nasdaq stocks, weighted by market cap. As leadership rotated from dot-com giants to newer technology leaders—Apple, Amazon, Nvidia, Tesla—the index adjusted automatically. An investor who bought at the worst possible moment benefited from that rotation.
Over 26.5 years, the worst-timed QQQ purchase annualized 7.8 percent. The S&P 500 (SPY) marginally outperformed from the same 2000 entry point. For a buyer at history's worst moment, QQQ delivered solid returns—the value of market-cap weighting and sector diversification.
