What's The Best Performing Stock Since 1981?

On CNBC yesterday, billionaire investor Ken Langone posed the question on CNBC's Squakbox: 

What's the best performing stock in the S&P 500 since September 1981?

Wait for it...wait for it:

Home Depot

• Up 1,000,000%... you read that right. ONE MILLION PERCENT!
• 28% annual compounded return
• $1 invested then equals $10,000 today

See the video.

My nephew was born in 1981. That was before GiveAshare.com existed and even before my wife and I started giving Boston Celtics stock as a gift to friends and family. Just think if we gave him (his parents) a share of Home Depot stock as a new baby gift instead. Cha-ching!!! Well, hindsight is 20/20, but it still hurts. 

"Who knows what 18 years will bring" is popular text that customers want engraved on their plaque when they buy a stock as a baby gift. Isn't that the truth! Could as easily go the other way, but that's the fun.

It's no surprise that Langone touted Home Depot because he co-founded the company, but the data is still impressive. As a sidenote, in the same video, Langone predicted that Eli Lilly would become the first trillion-dollar drug company because of its rich drug pipeline that includes a leading obesity drug. Surprised he didn't tout Novo Nordisk, too, the scandinavian drugmaker that's going gangbusters because of its Ozempic weight-loss drug used by celebrities including Oprah Winfrey, Amy Schumer, Tracy Morgan and Sharon Osbourne.

Let's watch to see if he's right.