The S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) is composed of 500 stocks from 11 different sectors, including information technology, energy, financials, and real estate. While it is the most diversified of the major U.S. stock market indexes, a select few technology stocks are having a growing influence over its performance thanks to their meteoric rise in value.

As of this writing, the following five companies have a combined market capitalization of $12.5 trillion, accounting for 27.3% of the total value of the entire S&P 500:

The S&P 500 index is up 11.5% in 2024 so far. However, the S&P 500 Equal Weight Index -- which assigns an equal weighting to every stock regardless of its market cap -- is up just 4.9%. The difference can be explained (in large part) by the average year-to-date gain of 26.3% in the above five stocks, which highlights their influence over the performance of the S&P 500.

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Source Fool.com