NEW YORK—U.S. stock investors could not be more eager to turn the page on 2022, a brutal year dominated by market-punishing Federal Reserve rate hikes designed to tamp down the steepest inflation in 40 years.
The S&P 500 is down nearly 20 percent year-to-date with only a few trading days left in 2022, on pace for its biggest calendar-year drop since 2008. The carnage has been even more severe for the Nasdaq Composite, which had tumbled by nearly 34 percent so far for the year.
High-profile casualties include the once-soaring shares of Amazon.com Inc., which have slumped around 50 percent this year, while those of Tesla Inc. are down some 70 percent and Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. shares have lost about 65 percent. Meanwhile, energy stocks have bucked the trend by posting eye-popping gains….