European shares set to close 2025 near record high levels

Sailing away from the US and getting closer to home. How did the EUROSTOXX50 and the AEX do?

Let’s start with the ESTX50.

Overall, the index's strong showing meant that Europe was considered a star market for 2025, outperforming Wall Street for the first time in decades. The index's performance for the full year 2025 was robust. Different ETFs tracking the index reported returns ranging from +21.62% to +22.14%. The STOXX 50 index itself, excluding dividends, advanced by about 18% (start: 4,918, end: 5,796).

The year included a significant dip in April 2025, when the index pulled back into the 4,500-4,900 range, followed by a steady recovery and climb to new cycle highs in the second half of the year.

The strong performance of the EURO STOXX 50 in 2025 was attributed to several macroeconomic and sectoral factors, such as firmer business-activity readings, easing inflation risks, and expectations of potential interest rate cuts by the European Central Bank (ECB). Sector wise, French luxury goods companies, like Louis Vuitton, and major banks, such as Santander and BBVA, were among the top performers, each seeing returns of around 30%. Technology and industrial sectors also performed strongly. Additionally, there was a noted rotation of investors' capital back into Eurozone blue-chip equities (from US equities), partly due to the high valuations of US technology stocks. 

How about our own AEX?

The index also showed positive performance through 2025 but lacked the grand performances of its bigger cousins. The year was not without volatility, with a low in April of 784.7, but the AEX, excluding dividends, managed to gain 8.3% (start: 878.6, end: 951.3). Typical dividend yield in the AEX is around 3-4%. 

As per September 2025, the AEX went through some index updates, including methodology changes to potentially increase constituents and better reflect the market, leading to more diverse large-cap representation in the Netherlands. 

Sources: Google, Apple Tree Capital Partners, Curvo