Top performing stocks of 2006

These 20 stocks produced the largest total returns to shareholders in 2006. For this list, we included only Fortune 500 companies that traded for at least $2.

By Katie Benner, David Ellis, Steve Hargreaves, Rob Kelley and Keisha Lamothe

GameStop Corp. (<a href='http://money.cnn.com/quote/quote.html?symb=GME'>GME</a>)

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GameStop Corp. (GME)

Total return: 73%

Fortune 500 rank: 426

Put simply, 2006 was a banner year for GameStop. Besides seeing its stock soar, the video game retailer was the fastest growing retailer in the U.S., beating out such titans as Wal-Mart and such popular online firms as Overstock.com, according to the National Retail Federation. Sales in the industry are expected to grow, helped by the next generation of video game consoles released by Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft over the last year.

"Here is a company that's very well managed, they have a terrific product offering and they have these stores down pat," explains Anthony Gikas, an analyst at Piper Jaffray.

See more Fortune 500 data for GameStop Corp.

Full list: Fortune 500

Allegheny Terex AK Steel OfficeMax Level 3 CarMax Continental Big Lots Agco Cablevision DirecTV GameStop Nucor Emcor Oneok Group 1 Automotive General Motors Lexmark Comcast Manpower

Total return to investors includes both price appreciation and dividend yield to an investor in the company's stock. The figures shown assume sales at the end of 2006 of stock owned at the end of 2005.

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