Proxy for market return?

I'm calculating CAPM for a company listed on the NASDAQ, and I was wondering if anyone could suggest a proxy I could use for the market return (to arrive at the market risk premium)? I'm doing DCF for 2001-2009, and I've looked at historical index data (closing - opening / opening) and I get negative return over the past 9 years for the NASDAQ, so I can't use that. 2009 saw a large rebound from the end of 2008, so the return is huge (think 40%+) and thus I don't think it's a great proxy. 2005-2009 saw ~3.8% return - this is pretty much identical to the risk-free rate... Any suggestions?

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