Global Equity Gains Highly Concentrated Among Top 1% of Stocks, Data Reveals

Global Equity Rally Driven by Just 1 Percent of Listed Stocks

A recent analysis by Yes Securities has highlighted the growing concentration of wealth creation across world markets, with nearly the entire global equity rally this year being driven by just 1 percent of listed stocks. The brokerage's study of the top 10,000 listed companies, representing nearly 95 percent of global equity market capitalisation, found that almost 95 percent of the nearly $12 trillion added to global market value in calendar year 2026 has come from only 100 stocks.

The top 100 companies alone contributed around $11.4 trillion in market-cap gains, while the remaining 9,900 companies accounted for only a marginal share of the increase. The report noted that the top 100 stocks recorded around 33.6 percent market-cap appreciation year-to-date compared with just 0.6 percent for the rest of the global equity universe, suggesting headline indices are masking weak market breadth underneath.

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The rally is being overwhelmingly driven by the artificial intelligence theme, with Information Technology accounting for nearly two-thirds of market-cap gains among the top 100 gainers. Communication Services, Industrials, and Energy also emerged as key contributors due to their direct exposure to AI infrastructure.

Global capital is increasingly concentrating around AI monetisation and the infrastructure needed to support it, including hyperscale computing, semiconductor demand, data centre expansion, and rising power requirements. Companies seen as critical to this ecosystem are attracting the bulk of investor flows globally.

Yes Securities also noted that concentration is no longer restricted to a handful of mega-cap American technology companies and has become a broader global trend. China, Japan, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom have all witnessed a similar pattern where a small cluster of stocks generated most of the gains while the broader market lagged.

Even within the United States, the top 53 stocks accounted for $7.4 trillion in market-cap gains, while the broader domestic equity universe recorded a net decline in aggregate market capitalisation. The brokerage said this reflects investor preference for scalable businesses with stronger earnings visibility rather than a region-specific phenomenon.

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Taiwan, South Korea, and Norway were identified as the only major exceptions to the narrow rally trend. Taiwan's broader market, excluding its top gainers, delivered around 35.5 percent gains year-to-date, while South Korea posted nearly 27 percent. The report attributed the broader participation in these markets to deeper semiconductor and hardware ecosystems, allowing AI-linked gains to spread across a wider set of companies.

Norway, meanwhile, saw broader market participation due to energy-linked earnings flowing through a larger section of listed firms. According to Yes Securities, markets with deeper thematic ecosystems tend to witness wider participation in equity rallies.

The brokerage also said the concentration in global markets is currently being supported by earnings growth rather than speculative excess. The top 100 market-cap gainers are witnessing materially stronger FY27 earnings upgrades compared with the broader global market.

Yes Securities said concentration backed by earnings revisions and improving growth visibility differs significantly from rallies driven purely by liquidity or speculative positioning, which historically tend to be more fragile. The report noted that the United States, Japan, China, and several European markets are all showing a similar pattern of earnings upgrades concentrated among market leaders while the broader equity universe remains comparatively weak.