The Dow Jones industrial average is on a tear – surging past 22,000 on Wednesday propelled by strong earnings, but the oldest index component has been the biggest laggard.
On the road to Dow 22,000, Boeing, McDonald's, UnitedHealth and Apple were the biggest contributors, while IBM, Goldman Sachs and GE dragged down the index.
While the Dow is on its lengthiest winning streak since February, General Electric, which has been in the index the longest, is tracking for its worst year in nearly a decade — as shares tumbled more than 19 percent.
"It's no doubt. [GE] is the dog of the Dow," Boris Schlossberg of BK Asset Management said Wednesday on CNBC's "Trading Nation."
Furthermore, GE's underperformance "has been a bigger kind of breakdown that was consolidating for quite some time," according to Craig Johnson of Piper Jaffray.
Johnson also added that from a technical standpoint: "I wouldn't be selling here. I'd be looking for some sort of a relief rally ... you look at a daily chart to bring it in to say where could this relief rally ultimately run up toward? It would be about $28, maybe $29, is where you could see that relief rally go."
Nevertheless, "GE is going to be here to stay," Schlossberg said. "It sports a 3.75 percent dividend. That alone should really attract a lot of value investors ... I think GE as a long-term buy is probably an excellent position at this point."
From a fundamental perspective, "the whole idea here is if you think GE here has forward growth at 3.75 percent dividend, it's one of the best values around in the market right now," Schlossberg said.
Shares of GE were trading in the $25.50 range at the market open Thursday.
