To The Moon

The 13F holdings of the first quarter of 23 have been continuously disclosed recently. As the US stock market is in a volatile situation this year, the choices made by these funds are also the focus of the market.

However, different fund managers have very different focuses. Let's take a look at some "unexpected" moves.

The boldest move

Big short Michael Burry - building positions in small and medium-sized banks, increasing holdings in Chinese stocks.

He is the prototype of big shorts. In Q1 this year, Michael deleted all his Twitter posts except for one word "Sell", and then quietly watched as the stock market hit new highs. Therefore, no matter what year it is, shorting is quite difficult. Making big money through shorting is a low probability event.

This time his Scion Fund cleared out last year's positions that appeared due to America's recovery including $Black Knight Inc(BKI)$ , $Wolverine World Wide(WWW)$ , $MGM Resorts International(MGM)$ and $Qurate Retail-A(QRTEA)$ etc., which can be easily understood since they were worried about recession.

Then he turned around and bought regional banks such as $First Republic Bank(FRC)$ , $Western Alliance(WAL)$ and $PacWest(PACW)$ which are all on an upward trend.

Indeed men who know how to short have great courage.

The most realistic

Bridgewater Associates - avoiding consumption while embracing technology.

Bridgewater Associates' latest portfolio adjustment basically reflects Q1 sentiment across hedge funds industry; temporarily selling consumer stocks to avoid risks posed by high core inflation rates with Fed showing no signs of stopping its interest rate hikes while investing more into AI-related companies that are currently hot in the market.

They reduced their holdings in $Procter & Gamble(PG)$ ， $Pepsi(PEP)$ ， $Coca-Cola(KO)$ ，and $Wal-Mart(WMT)$ among other consumer stocks while increasing their investments into tech companies like $Alphabet(GOOG)$ and $Meta Platforms, Inc.(META)$ etc..

To be honest，the companies they reduced their holdings on still perform well within consumer industries but full-time strategies naturally come with their own considerations so we will wait patiently for further developments。

In addition, Bridgewater Associates still increased their holdings in $SPDR Gold Shares(GLD)$ and $iShares Core MSCI Emerging Markets ETF(IEMG)$ while also increasing their investments into Chinese assets but reduced their holdings on $Pinduoduo Inc.(PDD)$ probably due to its poor performance.

Indeed they are realistic men.

The most knowledgeable

$Berkshire Hathaway(BRK.A)$ clearing out TSMC and regional banks.

Buffett has always disliked dabbling in unfamiliar fields or taking unclear risks. For example, he cleared out $Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing(TSM)$ . The companies he increased his holdings on such as $Apple(AAPL)$ ， $Occidental(OXY)$ ，and $HP Inc(HPQ)$ etc., are all familiar to him.

Obviously, clearing out regional banks like $U.S. Bancorp(USB)$ and $Bank of New York Mellon(BK)$ is consistent with what he said before; that he does not have a good outlook for small banks.

One of the positions they built was $Capital One(COF)$ which can be regarded as an attempt for now.

The most decisive

Soros Fund - emptying EV stocks

Soros Fund Management was one of the major investors in electric vehicle companies including Rivian Automotive Inc.(RIVN) which had been highly sought after prior to going public.

However, after the latest Q1 disclosure of their portfolio holdings shocked the market when they heavily cut back on EV stocks by emptying $Tesla Motors(TSLA)$ , $NIO Inc.(NIO)$ ,and $General Motors(GM)$ along with reducing multiple tech stock positions including $Alphabet(GOOG)$ 。

Their new additions were $Wal-Mart(WMT)$ ， $Netflix(NFLX)$ ，and $JD.com(JD)$ except $Netflix(NFLX)$ whose performance remained average during Q2。

In fact,Soros Fund Management suffered losses last year and this time around emptied EV stocks at low levels so it seems that even old man Soros doesn't want to continue playing with these emerging concepts anymore.