ValueAligned Partners

We hold businesses, and our results rarely match the index by design. Inside our portfolio this year, the spread is wide. Advanced Micro Devices is up one hundred and seventy-one percent. Accenture is down fifty-three. Both sit in the same account and both belong there. Plenty of advisors only show you their trophies. You deserve the whole shelf. A position like AMD that triples forces a decision. We trim it. We use the proceeds to buy businesses the market has left behind, like S&P Global. A lower price on a durable business is a different event from a lower price on a fragile one. We manage how much of your money rides on any single outcome. No forecast required. Just the plan applied.

I had a client last week who wanted to dump every software stock he owned. The screen was red and the instinct was to run.

We slowed down and did the actual work instead.

Here is what is going on. Last week semiconductors rose almost 9% while software fell more than 5%, same index, opposite directions. Chip makers like KLA and Intel are being bought because AI demand is real and you can see it in the order books. Software that charges per user, per month is getting repriced because an AI agent can now do some of that work.

The way I think about it comes from George Gilder. AI is a prosthetic. It extends a human expert the way a backhoe extends an arm. One expert can do the work of ten. The expert does not disappear.

So the question for every holding is simple. Does this business extend a real expert? Or is it just the routine layer between a customer and an answer? The first kind keeps compounding. The second is under pressure.

We went through his holdings one at a time. That is the job. Not reacting to a red screen.