The stock market year has gotten off to a turbulent start, but a new megatrend is gaining traction: critical metals! While 2025 was dominated by AI and high-tech stocks, raw material suppliers, essential for maintaining industrial competitiveness, are increasingly moving into focus. Over the past 12 months, they have been able to offer investors dream returns in the three- to four-digit range. At the same time, there has been hardly any growth on the NASDAQ since the beginning of the year. Former high-flyers like Palantir, Nvidia, and Strategy are currently trading below their 2025 highs. International commodity stocks dealing with the issue of “Western supply chains” have now moved up the list of top performers. Without strategic metals, the secure production of electrical infrastructure, renewable energy systems, and defense technology is not possible. It is therefore worthwhile for investors to rethink their tech portfolios and add good commodity stocks to their watch lists. Meanwhile, the automotive sector, under pressure for months, could be stabilizing after the sobering results of 2025. We take a closer look at the key players.
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Avrupa Minerals – Focus on long-term stability of supply chains
Brussels is waking up! Europe is stepping up its efforts to secure its own supply of raw materials in order to reduce strategic dependencies and secure industrial value creation within its own economic area. In this environment, Avrupa Minerals Ltd. (TSXV:AVU) is positioning itself as a project-oriented exploration company with a clear focus on Europe. The business model aims to identify promising raw material deposits at an early stage, upgrade them technically, and then develop them further in joint ventures with financially strong partners. This distributes risks and limits capital dilution for shareholders.
The focus is on industrial metals from volcanogenic massive sulfide (VMS) deposits such as copper, zinc, and nickel. In 2025, the focus was on Finland, where several projects in the Pyhäsalmi district were expanded through the participation in Akkerman Finland Oy. The acquisition of the permit for Lippikylä in the immediate vicinity of the former Pyhäsalmi mine, less than 2 km from the headframe, proved to be particularly important. In addition, the company had already secured the Lehto area, which covers the eastern continuation of the well-known mineralized horizon. Based on historical data, at least five targets ready for immediate drilling were defined.
In addition, in 2025, the KKS reservation area was added with three further VMS target areas north of Pyhäsalmi, where previous operators had already identified massive sulfide lenses at shallow depths. Following the conclusion of a partnership, new programs are planned to start in Lippikylä and the greater Lehto area in 2026. In total, the Finnish partnership controls eight permits with seven copper-zinc-VMS targets within a 40 km radius of the processing plant, which remains operational, offering potential infrastructure advantages.
CEO Paul Kuhn describes current project highlights and his plans for 2026 in a recent interview with Stockhouse.
The projects in Portugal are also interesting. Here, work is focused on the Alvalade project with the Sesmarias copper-zinc discovery, for which an application for a mining license has now been submitted. At the same time, a partnership solution is being sought to further develop the deposit towards resource definition (MRE). In Kosovo, there is also a minority stake in the Slivova Gold project, which is to be reactivated after re-licensing by the authorities. Overall, the company is pursuing a strategy focused on politically stable European regions with a focus on copper, zinc, and gold. In the medium term, Avrupa could advance the EU’s raw materials strategy accordingly. So far, the dynamic company has successfully financed itself through a partnership model, whereby the majority stake in the joint project is regularly transferred to the JV partner. This saves cash and does not dilute existing shareholders. What the very small company with a market capitalization of just under CAD 6 million certainly lacks is initial funding from the EU to increase its output. Should this happen, prices around CAD 0.07 will be history overnight. Risk-conscious investors are therefore cautiously accumulating shares!
BYD – 2026 gets off to a promising start
The e-mobility market is undergoing change. The share price of “Build Your Dreams” (BYD) is a good reflection of the current situation. For many years, it was among the best performers of all Asian blue chips traded in Europe and the US. In the past 12 months, however, the stock has not been able to achieve any growth, with temporary highs of EUR 17.70 selling off to EUR 10.00 by the end of 2025. The share price remains at this level, but the overall conditions are gradually improving.
This is because operations are apparently going very well. BYD recently started trial production at its new car plant in Szeged, Hungary. Series production at the 300-hectare factory is already planned for Q2. According to European management, production will be ramped up to a capacity of 200,000 vehicles per year over several years, with 960 employees to be hired at the brand-new facility at the start. BYD top manager Stella Li announced last year that the company would start with the Dolphin Surf electric compact vehicle. This is primarily the group’s response to the additional tariffs on Chinese-built electric vehicles introduced by the EU at the end of 2024.
In addition, there are the battery assembly plants in Fót and Páty. Last year, BYD consistently relocated its European headquarters from the Netherlands to Budapest. Attached to the new headquarters is a research and development center focusing on intelligent driving technologies and next-generation electric vehicle systems. A second European car plant is scheduled to start operations in Turkey this year. Thanks to a customs union, the vehicles manufactured there will be exempt from EU special tariffs, as will vehicles from Hungary. In addition, according to insiders, BYD is already considering a third car plant in Europe, apparently in Spain. The bottom line is that the Chinese manufacturer now has a market share of just over 1% in Europe, and with this aggressive setup, BYD remains a top competitor to VW and Stellantis. BYD will present its figures for the full year 2025 at the end of March. There are currently 28 “Buy” recommendations on the LSEG platform, with an average upside potential of 42%. With prices around EUR 10.65, the 2026 P/E ratio is only 10.9. Exciting!
Stellantis and VW – Joining forces for the future of mobility
The high momentum in the electric mobility sector is not manageable for all companies. Painful adjustments are often necessary. Stellantis, for example, has recently experienced setbacks. Strategic restructuring for electric vehicles led to write-downs of almost EUR 22 billion, with EUR 15 billion of this amount attributable to the US market alone. As a result, the share price plummeted by a quarter, and the company is foregoing dividends while plans for additional battery factories in Germany and Italy have been put on hold. CEO Filosa explained that the pace of electrification was too ambitious and that actual customer demand was overestimated. The stock recently plummeted to a new 5-year low of EUR 5.77 and is now trading at EUR 6.65. We advise waiting until the sell-off calms down again and the first restructuring successes are reported.
At the same time, Volkswagen is demonstrating strength in the scaling of electric drives, with a new record of 5 million electric units produced and significant efficiency gains in manufacturing. Since 2025, the Wolfsburg-based company has been investing specifically in the in-house production of key technologies such as pulse inverters in order to secure its own innovative strength and technological sovereignty across all brands. These advances are enabling the group to gradually meet the growing demand for powerful electric drives. At just under EUR 103, a 2026 P/E ratio of 4.8 and a dividend yield of around 7%, VW is attractively valued. Figures for 2025 will be released on March 10. Exciting!
Technology stocks have been moving sideways since the beginning of 2026, elegantly overtaken by a pronounced rally in the commodities sector. The figures for 2025 have caused a lot of movement in the EU automotive sector. While BYD is constantly expanding its dealer network and pushing its way onto the markets with force, European manufacturers are still struggling with high costs and less technological persuasiveness. From the middle of the year, BYD will be delivering from Hungary, at which point EU import duties will also fall. This is extremely exciting for investors!
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