LONDON, June 30, 2026, 15:08 BST
- IAG traded up 0.4% at 477.10p in delayed London trading, still about 3.2% below last week’s 52-week high.
- The company bought 7.7 million shares last week, but its London purchases were less than 5% of London volume over the same five sessions.
- Buyback support is running alongside a fuel-price squeeze, with IAG still guiding to lower 2026 profit than first planned.
International Consolidated Airlines Group SA (LON:IAG; BME:IAG) was holding just below last week’s high on Tuesday, helped by a steady buyback but with the company’s own purchases still small beside market turnover.
The British Airways and Iberia owner traded at 477.10 pence at 13:53 BST, up 1.90p, or 0.4%, with 6.7 million shares traded. The stock opened at 477.50p, hit 484.60p and fell as low as 472.60p, according to delayed market data. The London Stock Exchange was open; its main session runs from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. BST.
| IAG London snapshot | Latest data |
|---|---|
| Last price | 477.10p |
| Day change | +1.90p / +0.4% |
| Previous close | 475.20p |
| Day range | 472.60p–484.60p |
| 52-week range | 333.10p–492.90p |
| Market value | £21.17 billion |
The less-noticed point is the size of IAG’s buying. In a regulatory filing on Monday, IAG said it bought 7,671,926 ordinary shares from June 22 to June 26 under its 500 million euro buyback. London purchases were 4,980,587 shares. On the London market, 105.3 million IAG shares changed hands over those five sessions, based on daily volume data. That puts IAG’s own London buying at about 4.7% of London volume for the period.
| June 22-26 | Shares |
|---|---|
| IAG London buyback purchases | 4,980,587 |
| IAG Madrid buyback purchases | 2,691,339 |
| Total IAG buyback purchases | 7,671,926 |
| London market volume over same five days | 105,266,047 |
| London buyback as share of London volume | 4.7% |
That matters because IAG has run hard in June. The stock closed at 419.30p on June 1 and reached a 52-week high of 492.90p on June 25. Tuesday’s last price leaves it up about 13.8% for the month and 3.2% below that high. IAG fell 1.55% on Monday, versus a 0.23% fall for the FTSE 100 Index (INDEXFTSE:UKX), but the pullback did not break the stock’s June gain.
| Recent London closes | Price | Volume |
|---|---|---|
| June 22 | 465.80p | 50.5 mln |
| June 23 | 467.80p | 11.3 mln |
| June 24 | 480.90p | 14.5 mln |
| June 25 | 488.00p | 16.1 mln |
| June 26 | 482.70p | 12.8 mln |
| June 29 | 475.20p | 38.0 mln |
IAG said Monday’s buyback filing left it with 182,536,360 treasury shares and 4,429,133,167 shares in issue excluding treasury shares. The 7.7 million shares bought last week equal about 0.17% of that ex-treasury share base. The company has said shares bought under the programme will be held in treasury pending cancellation.
The capital return sits against a less clean earnings story. IAG said in May that first-quarter revenue rose 1.9% to 7.18 billion euros and operating profit rose 77.3% to 351 million euros. It also said fuel costs would weigh more heavily later in the year and that 2026 profit would be lower than it had first expected.
“We currently see no issues with fuel availability in our main markets,” Chief Executive Luis Gallego said in IAG’s May statement. On a media call, he also told reporters: “We have been planning for situations like this for many years.” Reuters
The company said it was 70% hedged for fuel needs for the rest of 2026 and put its fuel cost, based on the curve at May 5 and including hedging and sustainability costs, at about 9.0 billion euros. It said it expected to recover around 60% of the higher fuel cost through revenue and cost actions.
The next test for the stock is whether the buyback and premium travel demand can keep offsetting the fuel hit. IAG’s own investor calendar lists second-quarter results for July 31.
