Since I whined about performance on 08/25/20, I’ve had a pleasant bout of outperformance.
In early September I had nearly hedged out all of my long exposure. I ended September with a 4.75% return, compared with -3.92% for the Standard & Poor 500.
While I am happy I stuck to my guns, I think the episode taught me I’m generally too optimistic to not be long. I covered a lot of my shorts throughout September and as of 10/27/20, I’m back to 60% long. While I’m still very concerned with stocks generally here, there are some great values out there.
Also, it’s very hard for me not to participate in upside if I’m wrong for a while. I have a long time horizon and I’m unfortunately inherently optimistic.
Here are my top sixteen stock positions (Accounting for 44% of the portfolio):
| Spotify Technology SA | 8.34% |
| Microsoft Corporation | 5.01% |
| Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Class B | 4.86% |
| PNC Financial Services Group Inc | 2.87% |
| Facebook, Inc. Common Stock | 2.74% |
| Royal Dutch Shell plc ADR Class A | 2.37% |
| American Express Company | 2.36% |
| Activision Blizzard, Inc. | 2.35% |
| Alphabet Inc Class C | 2.22% |
| Volkswagen A G ADR | 2.20% |
| Electronic Arts Inc. | 1.57% |
| Amgen, Inc. | 1.54% |
| Bayerische Motoren Werke ADR | 1.46% |
| Teradyne, Inc. | 1.45% |
| Twitter Inc | 1.42% |
| BASF SE | 1.34% |
