2024 got off to a weak start for my portfolio. It started with AEHR’s earnings release at the beginning of January. Fortunately, I had sold the majority of my Aehr shares since their previous earnings release and it was a small remaining position. Tesla also slid in January, and The Trade Desk was down a bit. But on the bright side, today’s (Feb 2nd) gains recouped about half of January’s decline.
I sold the last of my Aehr, and also decided to sell my small Celsius stake, and I initiated four new try out positions in new companies that I’ve been watching for a while and finally dipped my toe in.
So I started out January in the red:
-9.7% YTD Jan
As of the end of today, February 2nd, I’m back to about -4.9% YTD.
My portfolio is still very concentrated, although it is seven positions, three of those make up the majority.
This was my allocation at the end of the year 12/31/23
36.6% (TTD) The Trade Desk
36.0% (MDB) MongoDB
22.2% (TSLA) Tesla
3.3% (CELH) Celsius
1.8% (AEHR) Aehr Test Sys
and this is what it looks like at the end of January 2024:
38.0% (MDB) MongoDB
36.9% (TTD) The Trade Desk
20.1% (TSLA) Tesla
1.6% (RELY) Remitly Global
1.5% (IOT) Samsara
1.2% (ELF) elf Beauty
0.8% (NU) Nu Holdings
So no changes at the top, but I’ve reallocated what was invested in AEHR and CELH to the four new starter positions. I did add some new funds that were primarily put into TSLA in late January as the shares got cheaper, which is why the Tesla allocation didn’t drop as much as the share price did last month.
Fortunately, I had sold much of my Aehr after their previous earnings release when many of you, wiser than myself, sold out entirely. I still look back at when the CFO was retiring after many years with the company, last year, right when we were anticipating the company stepping up to some new hyper growth phase, and it always nagged at my thinking “why would this guy be leaving the company now, of all times, if the company is truly about to take off”. and I should have listened to that voice in my head and stayed out of the company completely.
Celsius, I’ve never been that comfortable with as an investment. The company is great and firing on all cylinders, but I just can’t get my head around how much future growth is already baked into today’s prices and what expectations come along with it. At some point, the current growth rates are going to fall off when the impact of the new pepsi distribution laps into the prior year comp and I worry about how the market will react when/if there is a sudden falloff in the growth rate. There is a very real chance that they continue to exceed everyone’s expectations and the share price continues to rise for a long time. I just don’t feel confident enough to bet on that, so I felt better to sell and shift those funds into other companies that I’m gaining more confidence in.
My two top holdings at the beginning of 2024 (TTD and MDB) have been two of my top three holdings pretty consistently for the past four years.
It is a very concentrated portfolio which I don’t generally recommend, but as of right now I don’t have many other companies that I have a high level of confidence in to allocate investment funds towards.
Here is the year to date performance of each of my current holdings. Excluded are any companies I have already sold out of in 2023 (e.g. AEHR and CELH). Also note that the companies that I didn’t own at the beginning of the year (RELY, IOT, ELF, NU), this only shows the performance since I purchased them:
| Dec 31 2023^ | Jan 31 2024 | YTD Gain | |
|---|---|---|---|
| TTD | 71.96 | 68.43 | -4.9% |
| MDB | 408.85 | 400.52 | -2.0% |
| TSLA | 248.48 | 187.29 | -24.6% |
| RELY^ | 18.18^ | 17.14 | -5.7% |
| IOT^ | 33.06^ | 31.40 | -5.0% |
| ELF^ | 154.82^ | 159.53 | 3.0% |
| NU^ | 9.00^ | 8.61 | -4.3% |
^ Because I didn’t own RELY, IOT, ELF, NU until this year, the “December 31st” numbers above are not their 12/31/23 prices, but the stock price of my initial, most significant purchases.
Most of the shares I hold in TTD and MDB were purchased in 2018 and 2019 at much lower costs. The largest portion of my Trade Desk shares were purchased in January 2019 for $11.39 and are up +501%, while most of my MongoDB shares were purchased in July 2018 for $57.39 and are up +598% now.
The Trade Desk (TTD) (earnings upcoming on Feb 15th)
I still feel that TTD has a long runway of growth ahead and are in great hands with CEO Jeff Green. Each of the big streaming platforms (Disney+, Netflix, , even Amazon Prime!) have been adding ad-supported tiers over the past year or so.
I admittedly feel nervous about the short term and what the next few quarters will hold for the Trade Desk. I could see disappointing earnings and guidance scaring investors…but I do think there is some of that already baked into the share price so if they at least meet expectations, think the shares will hold up alright, but we shall see. I don’t think right now, at this price, is the right time for me to trim the position, but I’ll be listening to the upcoming earnings call and considering my position again later this month.
Looking at the YoY growth rates by quarter over the last few years:
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4
2020 33% -13% 32% 48%
2021 37% 101% 39% 24%
2022 43% 35% 31% 24%
2023 21% 23% 24% 18%(q4 guide)
And sequential growth (note that Q1 is typically going to be negative sequential growth given the seasonally strong holiday quarter in Q4)
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4
2020 -26% -13% 55% 48%
2021 -31% 27% 8% 31%
2022 -20% 20% 5% 24%
2023 -22% 21% 6% 18%(q4 guide)
MongoDB (MDB)
There hasn’t been much news on Mongo recently, but this is the company I own that I’m the most cautiously optimistic about their upcoming earnings, given some of the strong reports from other tech companies. Unfortunately, they are not a calendar year end, so we’ll have to wait another month before we hear from them.
MDB YoY growth
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4
2020 46% 39% 38% 38%
2021 39% 44% 50% 56%
2022 57% 53% 47% 36%
2023 29% 40% 25% 20%(q4 guide)
And MDB sequential growth
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4
2020 6% 6% 9% 13%
2021 6% 9% 14% 17%
2022 7% 6% 10% 8%
2023 2% 15% -1% 4%(q4 guide)
I know it’s been a couple weeks but I’m still digesting Tesla’s report and haven’t gotten to listen to the call yet, so I don’t have much to comment on them this month, but I’ll be catchup on them over the next week. Regardless, that is a holding that I really anticipate holding tight for several years and allowing it to play out while doing my best to ignore the ebbs and flows and possibly adding to the position opportunistically.
That’s it for this month. Thanks so much as always to Saul especially, and to everyone else that posts and contributes to making this board so special.
-mekong
