The US and Israel’s ongoing military escalation across West Asia has helped the aerospace and defense industry outperform expectations
US arms manufacturers have outperformed major stock indexes this year in a rally fueled by Israel’s year-long genocide of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and the expansion of its war against Lebanon.
Stock funds with holdings in the US aerospace and defense industry – including companies like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, RTX, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, and L3Harris – saw their profits soar past expectations this year, outperforming the S&P 500 index.
“That handout of taxpayer funds to Israel coupled with Israel’s, and global, demand increasing for weapons in a period of instability, has been jet fuel for stock prices,” reports Responsible Statecraft.
Lockheed Martin, makers of the F-35 aircraft that Israel has used to relentlessly bomb Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen, produced a 54.86 percent total return from 7 October 2023 to the same date in 2024, outperforming S&P 500 by about 18 percent.
RTX, the makers of 2,000-pound ‘bunker buster‘ bombs that turned most of Gaza to rubble and are currently being dropped inside the Lebanese capital, saw its total return for investors in the past year reach 82.69 percent, outperforming S&P 500 by about 46 percent.
General Dynamics, which also manufactures bunker busters and is behind the BLU-109 bombs that Israel used to level several apartment buildings in the southern suburbs of Beirut during the assassination of Hezbollah secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah, delivered a 37 percent total return for investors, outperforming the S&P 500 by just over 3 percent.
On 1 October, as Israel pushed forward with its ground invasion of Lebanon and Iran launched hundreds of ballistic missiles in retaliation for the bombing of its capital, Forbes reported that the stocks of most US arms makers gained over 2.6 percent in value.
“Both Lockheed Martin and RTX shares booked all-time highs Tuesday, while L3Harris and Northrop Grumman tallied their top share price since 2022,” the US financial publication reported.
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Furthermore, the BlackRock-managed iShares US Aerospace and Defense fund indexing the aerospace and defense sector hit a new all-time high last week, extending its 12-month gain to 43 percent and outperforming the S&P 500 by 33 percent.
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), between 2019 and 2023, Israel accounted for 2.1 percent of all global arms imports. During the same period, the US accounted for 69 percent of Israel’s arms imports, while Germany accounted for 30 percent.
As Washington retains its long-standing hold as the world’s largest arms dealer – controlling 42 percent of the global arms market – the country has also significantly boosted its military spending to assist Israel, blowing through at least $23 billion in one year.
