2026 YTD Monthly Closing
Jan: -5.5%
Feb: -17.5%
Mar: -20%
April 30th: -9.4% YTD (down from a YTD peak of +5% in early January but up from the YTD low on March 30th of down 24%).
April saw a strong recovery that then tapered off with the AI pull back and the AI eating software SaaSpocalypse tug of war continuing. I’m now about a 25% down from the ATH.
The contradicting theses - AI is eating software as well as AI is a Capex bubble that’s faltering continues. Specifically weakness in Shopify, advertising based holdings (including APP) and software holdings facing AI concerns has delivered most of the damage which no amount of strength in Micron, Neoclouds or the Data Center connectivity/AI infra players have been able to withstand.
Thematically, I’m principally invested in:
eCommerce (20%) - Shopify, MercadoLibre, Global e-Online & SEA
AI & Cloud Infrastructure (25%) - Cloudflare, Pure Storage, Nvidia, Nebius, Astera Labs, Micron, Tempus Ai, IREN, HIVE, CoreWeave, Credo, ORCL & EOSE
Software (SaaS/DevOp/Data analytics) (25%) - Palantir, Datadog, Snowflake, GitLab, Monday, Axon & Samsara
Cybersecurity (10%) - Crowdstrike, ZScaler, Rubrik & SentinelOne
Fintech/Payments/Crypto (10%) - SOFI, Toast, Robinhood, Upstart, Bill, Pagaya & Bitmine Immersion Technologies
AdTech (10%) - The Trade Desk, Applovin and Reddit (ad community)
Recent Activity -
I haven’t made many transactions in this portfolio in April beyond a small nibble at Oracle, after topping up of Credo Technologies in March and exiting Electrovaya in February as I’ve been concentrating on sorting out my safe bucket future retirement income producing arrangements.
Considering trimming Palantir further and Pure Storage. Would like to enter Transmedics. Also considering entering Lumentum & Rocket Lab and some energy storage players like Bloom or Fluence as well as Figure, Silicon Motion and Dell.
Holdings in Monday, GitLab, BILL and TTD sit closest to the exit door.
Early Q1 results have been passable, (SoFi, Reddit & Robinhood).
Portfolio holdings -
25+ positions with a long tail of 1-2% positions (made up of high conviction, scaling down and scaling up plays):
SHOP - 9.5%
MU - 8%
DDOG - 6.5%
NET - 6.5%
P - 6%
PLTR - 5.5%
NBIS - 5%
NVDA - 5%
IREN - 5%
ALAB - 4.5%
MELI - 3.5%
CRWD - 3.5%
SNOW - 3%
RBRK - 2.5%
APP - 2%
SOFI - 2%
IOT - 2%
CRWV - 2%
ZS - 2%
HOOD - 2%
UPST - 1.5%
TTD - 1.5%
GLBE - 1.5%
RDDT - 1.5%
S - 1.5%
CRDO - 1%
TEM - 1%
MNDY - 1%
AXON - 1%
SE - 1%
HIVE - 0.5%
BMNR - 0.5%
TOST - 0.5%
GTLB - 0.5%
PGY - 0.5%
BILL - 0.5%
EOSE - 0.5%
ORCL - 0.5%
Bright spots in the portfolio include: Micron & Nvidia as well as Nebius, Credo and Astera Labs which are closest (within 15%) to their YTD highs and that’s about it.
Watch list includes…
Fluence, Bloom, Figure, Sigma, Lumentum, Rocket Lab, Silicon Motion, TransMedics, Sezzle, ROOT, FOUR, Arista, Fortinet, Palo Alto, Raspberry PI and Grab.
Bigger Picture -
As sectors, Cyber Security, AI and Cloud infra/DevOps and ex US eCommerce have been relatively strong - as well as profitable SaaS/software providers that operate a platform play with consumption based revenue models and demonstrable AI bullet proof model. Payments & Fintech had been strong with rate reductions back on the cards, expectation of spending resilience and a boom in crypto/alternative/private investing whilst AdTech is showing signs of weakness in pricing and demand as well as facing a fight back from the walled garden operators going beyond their native home markets.
It feels as though every part of the data space is doing well and reaccelerating; (semiconductor, memory, storage, servers, data center infra, databases & data cloud) and remains AI resilient.
I see the outcomes of 3 challenges: i) the will it won’t it question of “AI eating software”, ii) the alternative scenarios of higher for longer vs an AI bubble and iii) the formulation and reaction to Macro (tariffs & trade), fiscal (tax & spend) & monetary (Fed rates) policies are the critical determinants of market success right now - certainly for my portfolio holdings. Specifically the almost binary outcome of OpenAI and its potential impact on NeoCloud Capex, Oracle RPO commitments and leadership in AI feels a critical risk/reward situation.
One additional competitive risk I am watching carefully is the transformation of X from a social media platform to a fully fledged all-in-one super app with eCommerce and Fintech which could impact a number of my holdings from Shopify to SoFi within US and MercadoLibre and SEA internationally.
I still believe that seeking out growth companies with defensive qualities, (cloud infrastructure, cybersecurity, energy generation, storage and supply even and consumption based rather than seat based software models), might do better in these volatile and uncertain times as well as ex US eCommerce and trading plays that benefit from US currency weakness but more importantly are removed from US import/export movements on an intra regional / local to local basis (e.g. MercadoLibre, SEA and Grab).
Ant