Experts have been warning of a new atomic arms race at a time when nuclear-armed states are involved in conflicts in Europe, Asia and the Middle East, while long-standing efforts towards disarmament and non-proliferation appear to be eroding.
In a fresh report released on Friday, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) and another anti-nuclear pressure group, PAX, said a growing number of financial institutions were investing in companies helping the world’s nine nuclear-armed states swell and modernise their arsenals.
As of September 2025, 301 banks, pension funds, insurance companies and other financial institutions had financing or investments in companies involved in producing nuclear weapons, according to the annual “Don’t Bank on the Bomb” report.
That marked a 15% hike compared to a year earlier, reversing years of decline, it said.
‘Risky’
“For the first time in years, the number of investors trying to profit from an arms race is on the rise,” said ICAN’s director of programmes Susi Snyder, a contributing author of the report.
“This is a short-term and risky strategy that contributes to a dangerous escalation,” she warned in a statement, adding that it was “impossible to profit from an arms race without feeding one”.
The world’s nine nuclear-armed states – Russia, the US, China, France, the UK, Pakistan, India, Israel and North Korea – are currently modernising and often expanding their arsenals and “driving demands for these weapons”, the report said.
In February, New START – the last remaining treaty between Russia and the US limiting the top nuclear powers’ deployment of nuclear warheads – lapsed.
The stock market valuation of many major defence contractors had risen sharply, the report said.
Faced with the threat from Russia and growing fears that Europe can no longer rely on Washington’s protection, many governments have argued that investing in the rearmament of Europe should not be restricted by ethical considerations, the report said.
US$709 bn invested
Friday’s report identifies 25 companies that are involved in producing nuclear weapons, with Honeywell International, General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman earning the most, excluding consortia and joint ventures.
Other major producers include BAE Systems, Bechtel and Lockheed Martin.
The top three investors in those companies, measured by the value of shares and bonds, were US firms Vanguard, BlackRock and Capital Group, the report found.
From January 2023 to September 2025, the report said investors held more than US$709 billion in shares and bonds in the 25 nuclear weapons-producing companies – an increase of over US$195 billion from the previous period analysed.
At the same time, nearly US$300 billion was provided in loans and underwriting to nuclear weapons manufacturers, up nearly US$30 billion since the last report, it said.
The top three lenders were US banking giants Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup, the report said.
At the same time, the report stressed that a number of financial institutions had proven it was possible to abandon investments linked to nuclear weapons without giving up on turning a hefty profit.
As of the end of 2025, the total value of assets under management by institutions that explicitly avoid investing in such companies stood at more than US$4 trillion, the campaigners said.