Commentary and Research Papers
2025
2025
The energy sector has traditionally been a challenging sector to buy and hold due to its unpredictable/vicious cyclicality. Forward earnings projections have generally been considered less predictable than those for other sectors due to volatile commodity prices, a lack of fiscal discipline among producers (and the investors who fund them), OPEC’s attempts at price manipulation, and environmental concerns. These factors contribute to a very challenging sector for institutional investors.
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2025
2025
The post-election investor excitement for the prospect of pro-growth, pro-business policies from the new Trump Administration ebbed in February, in light of growing uncertainties related to the President’s threat of tariffs, worries over stubborn inflation and a possible slowdown in economic activity.
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2025
2025
On a relative basis, the SCV portfolio rebounded nicely in February after declining on the DeepSeek news in late January. We’ve spoken in the past about how the SCV portfolio tends to underperform in lower quality or momentum driven markets due to its value bias but typically performs well in down markets.
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2025
2025
The Small Capitalization Value Portfolio (SCV) was doing well through the first 24 days of the month until the DeepSeek news rattled the markets on 1/25/2025. We have exposure to the AI/energy space through our longstanding holdings in BWX Technologies, Argan, Vicor, and, more recently, through our November purchase of Solaris Energy Infrastructure. These stocks performed well over the past few months and had grown into larger positions in the portfolio.
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2025
2025
Stocks were volatile in January, responding to numerous market-moving developments but ultimately closing in positive territory. After a weak December, stocks initially rose in the first week of January on optimism about President-elect Trump’s pro-business policies. They then fell mid-month after stronger than expected economic data, as well as the potentially inflationary impact of President Trump’s policies, led some to wonder whether the Fed’s anticipated two rate cuts would come to fruition in 2025. The bond market also sold off, with the 10-year US Treasury yield reaching 4.79%, its highest yield since October 2023. But a subsequently favorable Consumer Price Index inflation reading, which showed a decelerating trend, surprised the market, leading to a rebound in bond prices and a strong rally in US equites. By January 24th, the S&P 500 index had risen to 2025’s first all-time high.
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2025
2025
Small capitalization value stocks could be well positioned for outperformance in the coming years. We believe active management can be a prudent and effective approach to these companies. We believe an active, long-term investment approach, focusing on sector diversification, intrinsic value (earnings and cash flow), and qualitative metrics (such as high-quality management teams) is the most effective way to exploit the opportunities that the small capitalization indices and passive ETFs may not capture. We employ this philosophy and approach in the Pinnacle Small Capitalization Value Portfolio (SCV).
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