Defence Stocks Ranked by Return Since 2022
Rearmament after the invasion of Ukraine repriced European defence far more violently than American defence, and both far more than the wider market. The point of ranking them together with the index is that the interesting number is not what defence did, it is the distance between defence and everything else over the same window.
How this is ordered. Ordered by total return from the first available monthly close of 2022 to the most recent, best first, with the S&P 500 shown alongside as a benchmark.
- 1
RHM · Rheinmetall
German ammunition and vehicles
+1,905%Return since 2022German ammunition and vehicles. Ten thousand dollars invested at the start of 2022 would be worth about $200,496 on price alone. Government procurement is slow to start and slow to stop, which is why this sector kept moving long after the headlines that triggered it had faded.
$200,496 from $10,000 since January 2022 - 2
RTX · RTX (Raytheon)
US prime contractor, missiles and engines
+88%Return since 2022US prime contractor, missiles and engines. Ten thousand dollars invested at the start of 2022 would be worth about $18,770 on price alone. Government procurement is slow to start and slow to stop, which is why this sector kept moving long after the headlines that triggered it had faded.
$18,770 from $10,000 since January 2022 - 3
LMT · Lockheed Martin
US prime contractor, aircraft and missiles
+49%Return since 2022US prime contractor, aircraft and missiles. Ten thousand dollars invested at the start of 2022 would be worth about $14,923 on price alone. Government procurement is slow to start and slow to stop, which is why this sector kept moving long after the headlines that triggered it had faded.
$14,923 from $10,000 since January 2022 - 4
NOC · Northrop Grumman
US prime contractor, aerospace and systems
+45%Return since 2022US prime contractor, aerospace and systems. Ten thousand dollars invested at the start of 2022 would be worth about $14,483 on price alone. Government procurement is slow to start and slow to stop, which is why this sector kept moving long after the headlines that triggered it had faded.
$14,483 from $10,000 since January 2022 - 5
SPX · S&P 500
S&P 500, shown for comparison
+40%Return since 2022The benchmark, included so the defence numbers mean something. Ten thousand dollars in the index over the same window became roughly $13,976, which is the figure every row above should be read against.
$13,976 from $10,000 since January 2022
This describes a repricing that has already happened. Buying a sector after the news that repriced it is not the same as having held it beforehand, which is the actual lesson of the period.
Method and limits
Returns run from the first available monthly close of 2022, which is a few weeks before the February invasion, to the most recent close. That start point is a calendar boundary rather than the invasion date itself, so a small part of the move predates the war. Prices come from Stooq with a bundled fallback, exclude dividends, and are converted from local currency for the European listing, so exchange-rate movement is inside the figure.
Recomputed automatically from market data, not hand-written. General information only, and not investment advice. See our disclaimer.
These lists change, and we post when they do
Follow along on Instagram for the short version, or come into the Discord if you would rather ask a question and get an actual answer.