The new financial year began this week, and as we reach the halfway point in calendar 2026, the ASX 200 has not moved. It has of course moved plenty in between, with more whipsaw and volatility than most investors would ideally like to see, yet the total return YTD has seen the bluechip index move just 3.30 points to the downside ahead of tomorrow’s open.
A time for some reflection on the biggest movers over the past year then, as we press ahead into FY27 looking for clues as to what may lay ahead.
Top ASX 200 shares from the past year
Despite the ASX 200 only sitting 1.5% higher over the past year, there have been more than the fair share of significant outperformers, with a medical imaging company’s regulatory breakthrough and surging commodity prices delivering some extraordinary returns to Australian share investors.
4DMedical shares have been the outright leader, with a 17-fold gain that stands ahead of a cohort of mining stocks that made up nearly three-quarters of the ASX 200’s top 20 performers.
4DMedical closed the financial year at $4.53 per share, representing a staggering 1,787% gain that outperformed the combined returns of the next six best performers on the benchmark index. The first two sessions of FY 2027 so far have been quite the contrast, with 4DX giving back 10.38% as a little shift towards beaten down names takes place.
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Among miners, Minerals 260 delivered a 508% return to $0.73, whilst the lithium cohort of Elevra Lithium (up 256% to $9.60), PLS Group (up 229% to $5.02), and Liontown (up 129% to $1.69), capitalised on a 160% rebound in lithium prices from July lows.
So what has been driving the biggest movers of the year?
4DMedical’s Breakthroughs
The company’s CT:VQ software transforms standard CT scans into detailed lung ventilation and perfusion maps, offering clinicians quantitative functional imaging without specialised hardware. Back in September 2025, the product secured FDA 510(k) clearance as the first and only CT-based ventilation/perfusion technology approved in the United States, fundamentally de-risking the commercial pathway in the world’s largest healthcare market.
Within four months of clearance, 4DMedical announced adoption by Stanford Health Care, Cleveland Clinic, University of Miami, and UC San Diego Health, institutions that collectively represent validation from the top tier of American academic medicine. The rapid uptake signals that the technology addresses a genuine clinical need in pulmonary assessment, where traditional nuclear medicine V/Q scans require dedicated equipment and radioisotopes.
Materials Sector Dominates
Fourteen of the 20 best performers came from the Materials sector, reflecting a range of commodity-specific tailwinds.
Lithium producers benefited as spot prices recovered sharply from mid-2024 lows, driven by tightening supply and stabilising demand forecasts for electric vehicle batteries. Elevra Lithium (formerly Sayona Mining) completed a corporate rebrand and share consolidation in September 2025, then announced in May 2026 that its North American Lithium mine expansion delivered a 102% increase in project net present value alongside accelerated production timelines.
Gold miners including Westgold Resources (up 66% to $4.70), Kingsgate Consolidated (up 107% to $4.95), and Alkane Resources (up 97% to $1.37) held onto gains accumulated during 2025’s bullion rally, as geopolitical uncertainty and central bank buying supported prices that hit $5200 per ounce early in 2026.
Rare earths specialist Lynas Rare Earths climbed 117% to $18.06, benefiting from Western governments’ push to diversify supply chains away from Chinese dominance in critical minerals.
Copper producers captured record or near-record metal prices throughout the period, with Sandfire Resources advancing 68% to $19.19 and IGO rising 71% to $7.37. The rally reflected structural demand from grid electrification, data centre expansion, and electric vehicle manufacturing, even as traditional construction activity softened in China. Whilst not one of the absolute top % gainers, BHP shares benefited from a strategic shift that saw shares add 50%, with $100bn in market cap the most significant dollar move.
Defence Technology and Industrials
Electro Optic Systems delivered a 277% gain despite governance headwinds. In August last year, the company announced a world-first export order for a 100-kilowatt high-energy laser weapon system to a South Korean customer, valued at approximately US$80 million with delivery scheduled for 2027. The contract positioned EOS at the forefront of directed-energy anti-drone systems, a category seeing accelerated defence procurement globally.
The company secured inclusion in the S&P/ASX 300 index in September 2025, bringing passive fund flows, then entered the ASX 200 in June 2026 following a trading halt for a material remote weapon systems contract and joint venture announcement.
Industrial services providers NRW Holdings (up 142% to $7.44), SRG Global (up 137% to $3.98), and Monadelphous Group (up 80% to $30.99) rode elevated mining and infrastructure capital expenditure, securing multi-year construction and maintenance contracts as producers expanded capacity.
What Lay Ahead?
Markets now face the question of sustainability.
For 4DMedical, the path forward hinges on converting early adopter enthusiasm into scaled deployment across hundreds of U.S. hospital systems, a process that depends on demonstrating cost-effectiveness to payers and seamless integration into radiology IT infrastructure. Reimbursement pathways remain under development, and the company trades at a valuation that assumes rapid penetration of a multi-billion-dollar addressable market.
Whilst the share price remains the outright leader by a large majority, all of the gains came through the first half of the financial year, and second half of calendar 2025. The current year-to-date performance reads -10.57%, a long way removed as some of the earlier gloss came off the top.
Commodity-exposed stocks could also confront cyclical headwinds if metal prices reverse. Lithium’s 160% rebound has restored project economics, but oversupply concerns persist as new capacity from Africa and South America reaches the market.
Copper’s structural demand story remains intact, yet any slowdown in AI infrastructure spending or Chinese stimulus disappointment could pressure prices. Gold miners face sensitivity to real interest rates and the US dollar, both of which have shown recent volatility.
The ASX 200’s top performing shares have seen plenty of optimism priced in; now execution and macro conditions will determine which of these stories compounds from here and which unwind.
