2026 YTD Monthly Closing
Jan 31st: -5.5% YTD (down from a YTD peak of +5% in early January).
January’s second half reversal produced a 10% swing in the month and the drop is starting to become increasingly broad spread. I’m now about a 25% down from the ATH.
The market seems to be on a downer across the board even with contradicting theses - AI is eating software as well as AI is a Capex bubble that’s faltering. 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 has 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, EOSE & Electrovaya
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 any transactions in this portfolio in January, (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 Lumentum & Rocket Lab and some energy storage players like Bloom or Fluence as well as Figure..
Holdings in Monday, GitLab, BILL and TTD sit closest to the exit door.
I’ve actually been quite impressed with the results so far this season. I was very pleased with SoFI’s and am hoping of sufficient re-assurance from Palantir and Micron when we get to it to keep the party going..
Portfolio holdings -
25+ positions with a long tail of 1-2% positions (made up of high conviction, scaling down and scaling up plays):
SHOP - 10%
MU - 6.5%
DDOG - 6%
IREN - 5.5%
PSTG - 5.5%
PLTR - 5%
NET - 5.%
NVDA - 4.5%
SNOW - 4%
MELI - 4%
CRWD - 3%
ALAB - 3%
NBIS - 3%
SOFI - 3%
RBRK - 2.5%
ZS - 2.5%
APP - 2.5%
HOOD - 2%
IOT - 1.5%
TTD - 1.5%
UPST - 1.5%
MNDY - 1.5%
GLBE - 1.5%
RDDT - 1.5%
CRWV - 1.5%
ELVA - 1.5%
S - 1%
SE - 1%
AXON - 1%
TEM - 1%
GTLB - 1%
EOSE - 1%
PGY - 1%
HIVE - 1%
BMNR - 0.5%
TOST - 0.5%
BILL - 0.5%
CRDO - 0.5%
Bright spots in the portfolio include: Micron, Nvidia & Electrovaya which are closest (within 15%) to their YTD highs.
Watch list includes…
Fluence, Bloom, Figure, Sigma, Lumentum, Rocket Lab, TransMedics, Lightspeed, 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.
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