The Technical Advisory Committee (CAT) of the Ibex will hold its third meeting of 2026 this Thursday, an event where the focus will be on the engineering and infrastructure construction company for the oil and gas industry Técnicas Reunidas, which is the main contender to join the Spanish stock index.
Along these lines, Bankinter analyst Esther Gutiérrez has pointed out that, after almost two years without changes in the composition of the national indicator, "there could be changes on this occasion."
The last review took place on July 22, 2024, when the global premium beauty firm Puig joined the selective index replacing Meliá Hotels. Since that date, the Ibex has had the longest period without adjustments in its structure since its creation in January 1992.
Now, Técnicas Reunidas is emerging as the main option to end this period of stability. "It is the best-positioned contender to join the index," Gutiérrez indicated.
On the other hand, the possible exit would focus on Acciona Energía, given that the trading volume of Acciona's subsidiary is higher than that of another of the current members of the selective index.
However, the specialist from the entity has warned of "a drawback" to materialize the replacement. "Técnicas' capitalization is slightly lower than that required by the Committee. Specifically, it is 0.28% of the average capitalization of the index during the six months prior to the meeting, compared to the required 0.30%," the economist detailed.
Acciona Energía also does not meet this threshold, and with an even greater discrepancy, although this fact does not necessarily imply its exclusion, while it does constitute an essential condition for a stock to enter the index. "In any case, we lean towards the CAT finally announcing the aforementioned change," Gutiérrez predicted.
For his part, XTB analyst Javier Cabrera has stated that he sees it as feasible that Acciona will end up acquiring the percentage it does not yet control of Acciona Energía, close to 9%, an operation that, in his opinion, would leave the Ibex 35 "crippled."
At the close of Wednesday's session, the capitalization of the energy subsidiary stood at around 7,000 million euros, with a share price of 21.66 euros; while Técnicas Reunidas finished the day with an approximate market value of 2,433 million euros and a price per share of 30.3 euros.
According to Cabrera, other candidates such as Viscofan or Vidrala could also be considered, although, in his opinion, Técnicas Reunidas concentrates more attention on entry bets, since its high free float gives it a relevant adjustment factor.
A mega-contract that reinforces Técnicas Reunidas' candidacy
Técnicas Reunidas' possible jump to the Ibex 35 is also supported by corporate news from abroad. The company has recently been selected as a preferred contractor by the Abu Dhabi state oil company, ADNOC, to develop two large packages within the Upper Zakum macro-project.
Specifically, the Spanish engineering firm will assume two of the three engineering, procurement, and construction (EPCI 1 and EPCI 3) contracts, while the third (EPCI 2) has gone to the Emirati NMDC Energy, according to information published by the specialized portal Upstream.
The objective of these three packages is to increase the field's production capacity to 1.5 million barrels per day, with actions on offshore facilities, artificial islands, and Zirku island, in addition to the installation of compressors, storage tanks, and water treatment units.
In this context, Renta 4's estimates place the combined value of the project above 10 billion dollars --8.665 billion euros--, of which the portion assigned to Técnicas Reunidas would be between 5 and 6 billion dollars --up to 5.2 billion euros--.
The contract would become one of the most voluminous in the company's history and would be equivalent to increasing its current order backlog, which reached 9.211 billion euros at the close of the first quarter of the fiscal year, by approximately two-thirds.