Hello All,
To jump straight into it, thus far, it’s been a quieter week at the headline index level, with economic data mostly absent alongside the general summer lull in volatility. However, today the Treasury announced a doubling of buybacks, which provided quite the bid to risk assets, particularly metals, crypto, & commodities but as for the indices, the Russell was the best performer on the day, naturally being the biggest beneficiary of lower rates, yet on the week, the Dow is the best performing index, although is essentially flat overall, whilst the Nasdaq is the worst performer, down just under 200bps following the recent pause in the AI trade after its rebound off the late July deleveraging lows.
For anyone who wants to follow an actively managed portfolio in real time:
I’ve joined Plutus as the cleanest, day-to-day way to track an actively managed portfolio in real time. It’s a live dashboard that’s broader, more diversified, actively managed by me, & updated continuously.
The Eliant Flagship is published on RunPlutus.
Once your Plutus account is approved, you’ll have the option to allocate right away. If you do, it’s straightforward: create an account, link your brokerage (Available only for IBKR at this time), & select the Eliant Flagship (or any of the baskets I’ve built). Your money stays in your account, and trades, position changes, and rebalances are replicated automatically so there’s nothing manual to manage. The idea is to make it easier to access an actively managed portfolio run by me without the overhead of traditional fund structures or high minimums, whilst you keep full custody of your assets & I stay focused on research, positioning, and portfolio construction.
Earlier in 2024, we launched a series titled Educational Pieces, covering a wide range of topics, many of which were suggested directly by you all (4-Part Series).
For those who may have missed the first installment, it covered topics including:
General background / knowledge on all option strategies
In-depth talk on risk / reversals & how to go about expressing / utilizing them
Options Structuring
When to used naked calls / puts vs. spreads
Choosing expiration dates
Identifying key pivots / supports / resistance zones
General briefing on stock gaps
What to look for in regards to fundamentals
Implementing fundamental / macro / technicals into a trade
Hedging
Creating risk/reward setups
Taking profits / managing losses
Overall Process
Book recommendations
A link to the original Educational Piece can be found here .
Given the positive feedback and how useful many of you found the first installment, we followed up with Educational Piece: Part Deux earlier in 2025 & for those who may have missed, a link to the piece can be found here & we then went on to release Educational Piece: Part Trois which can be found here.
And finally, the most recent installment, Educational Piece: Part Quatre, can be found here.
‘Risk management is the silent prerequisite for compounding & true wealth is built not by chasing the highest returns but by ensuring the survival necessary to realize them.’
Before we jump into the recap, looking at the week thus far, after the recent but brief rebound in both the Growth and Momentum factors, selling has resumed following a few disappointing datapoints across the broader AI trade (Anthropic ARR and OpenAI growth) & instead, we've seen a rotation back toward Value-oriented factors and generally Lower-volatility areas of the market.
And in regard to the specific factors and or ‘baskets’ we’ve built on Plutus, here are the best performers year-to-date:
1. Industrial and Auto Analog Recovery
3. AI Full-Stack Infrastructure
4. Mission Critical Security Stack
Whereas on the flip side, the worst performing baskets year-to-date have been:
Moving along, with the indices paring some of their recent gains, mostly in reference to the Nasdaq, we’ve seen the % of stocks above the 20D come off their highs as it briefly approached ‘overbought’ territory but has since worked its way back into ‘neutral’ territory.
And similar can be said on a broader timeframe too as in the medium-term, the % of stocks above the 50D has fallen back toward 56%, which is essentially just giving off a ‘neutral’ reading rather than signaling overbought & oversold conditions.
And following the slight ‘wobble’ and or paring back of gains, mostly in relation to the Nasdaq, the Fear-Greed Index has since nearly fallen back into ‘Neutral’ territory, although it still sits just barely within ‘Greed’ territory for now.
Historical context of the Fear-Greed Index overlaid with the S&P:
