Every time I hear someone say “Europe is finished” I can’t help but roll my eyes.
Sure, the politics can feel messy, growth has been anaemic for years, and the latest round of US tariffs isn’t helping. But here’s the thing I’ve learned after two decades watching markets: the best companies don’t need a perfect economy to thrive. They just need a moat, a global customer base, and a management team that thinks in decades, not quarters.
And right now, some of the widest moats I’ve seen in years are sitting right here in Europe.
Why Boring Can Be Beautiful
Let me take you back to 2008. While banks were collapsing and whole countries looked like they might default, a handful of European names just kept growing earnings year after year. They weren’t flashy tech stories. Most people had never heard of them. But they owned niches so completely that recessions barely left a scratch.
Fast forward to today and the pattern feels eerily familiar. Except this time the winners are even more global, the barriers to entry are higher, and the structural tailwinds look stronger than ever.
I recently spent time with one of the continent’s most respected (and stubbornly concentrated) fund managers. He runs a portfolio of fewer than 25 stocks – something that makes most consultants nervous – and has beaten the European index by a country mile since the turn of the millennium. When he talks about “special companies”, I listen.
He walked me through three businesses that perfectly illustrate why Europe still produces world-beating compounders – even when the headlines scream the opposite.
1. The Quiet Monopoly Powering the LNG Boom
Picture this: a French engineering company that designs the giant metal boxes inside liquefied natural gas carriers. Sounds thrilling, right?
Stay with me.
These aren’t ordinary boxes. They have to keep gas at minus 162°C while a ship bounces across oceans for 20-30 years. One tiny leak and you’ve got a catastrophe. Because the safety standards are insane, only a handful of technologies in the world are approved. And one company has well over 80% market share in the newest, most efficient systems.
That company is Paris-listed Gaztransport & Technigaz, better known as GTT.
Here’s why I find this story so compelling. Global LNG demand is in a structural uptrend that could easily last 20 years. Coal plants are closing. Data centres need 24/7 power that renewables can’t yet provide alone. Gas is the bridge fuel – and shipping it efficiently requires more carriers.
After the US policy flipped from moratorium to green-light, the order books for new LNG projects exploded. Each new liquefaction train typically triggers 6–8 new carriers. Almost all of those carriers will use GTT membranes. The royalty-like economics are beautiful: design the system once, earn fees on every ship for decades.
“This isn’t a cycle. It’s a 15–20-year wave of infrastructure build-out. And GTT sits right in the middle with almost no competition.”
– Veteran European fund manager
The stock isn’t cheap on next year’s earnings, but when you model the order backlog and the optionality from hydrogen or ammonia carriers later this decade, the long-term math starts looking very attractive.
2. Europe’s Relentless Low-Cost Machine
If you’ve flown Ryanair lately, you probably have strong feelings one way or the other. Cramped seats, endless upsell announcements, £50 for a suitcase that looked small yesterday.
But love it or hate it, you can’t argue with the economics.
Ryanair today has lower unit costs than any major airline on the planet – by a lot. We’re talking 30-40% below legacy carriers and still 15-20% below other budget peers. That gap has actually widened in recent years.
- Youngest fleet in Europe (average age ~8 years)
- Almost everything owned, not leased
- Single aircraft type (737) = massive maintenance savings
- Highest load factor in the industry (95%+ seats filled)
- Secondary airports = faster turns, lower fees
Every one of those advantages compounds. Lower costs → lower fares → more passengers → more ancillary revenue → more cash → bigger aircraft orders at better prices → even lower costs.
Most impressive? They kept growing through Covid, through soaring fuel prices, through Boeing’s 737 MAX headaches. Market share in Europe has gone from ~15% pre-pandemic to well over 20% now and still climbing.
In a continent where consumers are feeling squeezed, the airline offering £19.99 flights tends to win. Simple as that.
3. The Biotechnology Breakthrough Farmers Have Waited Decades For
This one is a little more off the beaten path, but hear me out because the upside could be enormous.
Genus is a UK-listed animal genetics company. Their core business – selectively breeding better pigs and cattle – is already profitable and growing. But the real excitement is a gene-edited pig that is resistant to PRRS virus.
PRRS costs the global pork industry billions every year. It’s the agricultural equivalent of foot-and-mouth – devastating to young animals and impossible to eradicate once it hits a herd.
Genus spent 15 years and hundreds of millions developing a single gene edit that makes pigs immune. The science is proven. The FDA gave approval in 2024. China and Canada are widely expected to follow.
When you think about the addressable market – the US alone slaughters 130 million pigs annually – and the fact that farmers will pay a meaningful premium for disease-free animals, the revenue potential starts looking like classic biotech optionality attached to an already cash-generative base business.
Best part? Because it’s gene editing (not transgenic), regulatory hurdles are dramatically lower than old-style GMOs. Commercial rollout could begin as early as 2026–27.
Putting It All Together
Three completely different industries. Three common threads:
- Deep competitive moats built over decades
- Global (not European) revenue exposure
- Structural growth drivers that dwarf short-term macro noise
- Pricing power even in tough environments
- Balance sheets that let them invest through cycles
These are exactly the kind of businesses that compound capital for decades. They don’t need Europe to suddenly grow 4% a year. They don’t need perfect politics. They just need to keep executing – something each has proven they can do in spades.
In my experience, the best time to buy these structural winners is precisely when everyone else is distracted by tariffs, elections, and recession fears.
Europe’s headline index might muddle along. But beneath the surface, some of the most attractive long-term growth stories in the world are still very much alive.
And they’re on sale compared to many of the overhyped names grabbing headlines across the Atlantic.
Something to think about.
