FTSE 100 Resilience Amid Middle East Tensions

Since the Israeli attacks on Iran began on June 13th, the FTSE 100 has demonstrated remarkable stability, declining just 0.51% despite escalating geopolitical tensions. This minimal movement reflects the index's heavy weighting toward sectors that either remain insulated from Middle Eastern conflicts or actually benefit from regional instability.

The standout performer has been the oil and gas sector, which surged 3.8% over this period as Brent crude climbed back above $77 per barrel. This energy rally has been particularly evident in the major oil companies, with Shell advancing 4% and BP posting an even stronger 5.6% gain.

Personal goods have been the notable in their weakness, falling 5.3% as consumer discretionary spending faces pressure. Most other sectors have traded relatively flat, though industrial metals and mining declined 2.7% - likely reflecting broader concerns about weakening global economic growth and reduced demand for commodities.

In the past 20 years the FTSE100 is showing a tendency to outperform other indices during periods of uncertainty or weakening global economics, but then underperforms during periods of greater upward potential.  Much of the reason behind this is its constituent weightings on the index:

Sector	Market-CAP(£ bn)	Index weight
Financials	£484.10	23.08%
Consumer Staples	373.7	17.82%
Industrials	303.1	14.45%
Health Care	235.3	11.22%
Energy	225.5	10.75%
Materials	155.8	7.43%
Consumer Discretionary	124.4	5.93%
Utilities	88.1	4.20%
Communication Services	58.5	2.79%
Real Estate	25.2	1.20%
Information Technology	23.9	1.14%
TOTAL	£2,097	100%

But maybe of equal importance, is the concentration of the FTSE100 value in 30 companies.

Company Name	Ticker	Market CAP
AstraZeneca PLC	AZN	£161,408.40
Shell PLC	SHEL	£158,275.70
HSBC Holdings PLC	HSBA	£151,895.90
Unilever PLC	ULVR	£111,979.50
British American Tobacco PLC	BATS	£79,629.80
Rolls-Royce Group PLC	RR.	£74,527.70
RELX PLC	REL	£71,418.60
Rio Tinto PLC	RIO	£67,387.00
BP PLC	BP.	£60,240.80
London Stock Exchange Group PLC	LSEG	£57,017.40
GSK PLC	GSK	£56,863.40
BAE Systems PLC	BA.	£56,062.60
National Grid PLC	NG.	£51,332.40
Barclays PLC	BARC	£45,839.10
Lloyds Banking Group PLC	LLOY	£45,269.10
Compass Group PLC	CPG	£42,021.00
Diageo PLC	DGE	£41,795.80
NatWest Group PLC	NWG	£41,146.30
3i Group PLC	III	£39,075.50
Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC	RKT	£34,668.40
Experian PLC	EXPN	£34,467.60
Haleon PLC	HLN	£34,445.70
Glencore PLC	GLEN	£34,048.50
Coca-Cola Europacific Partners PLC	CCEP	£31,678.40
Standard Chartered PLC	STAN	£27,282.00
Tesco PLC	TSCO	£26,421.90
Imperial Brands PLC	IMB	£23,969.40
Prudential PLC	PRU	£23,040.50
Anglo American PLC	AAL	£21,539.00
Carnival PLC	CCL	£20,838.10
		£1,725,585.50

These companies make up 82% of the FTSE100 value.