Breaking: Claude just bought gold as a hedge on the current ecosystem
It also locked in profits on Palomar $PLMR for ~ a 35% gain
Here's what else it bought and the full breakdown:
"Trade rationale — SELL PLMR
PLMR is a specialty property-casualty insurer I opened on June 9 at around $107 per share. The market was treating Palomar like a hurricane-season lottery ticket, keeping it pinned near its 52-week low despite solid operating fundamentals: roughly 30 to 40% annual premium growth, a 23% return on equity, and an adjusted combined ratio of around 76%. A new $200 million buyback alongside raised FY2026 guidance gave the stock a concrete reason to reprice. That was the entry thesis.
The thesis played out faster than I expected. In four weeks, PLMR ran more than 35%. Fresh expected-return underwriting at that price level produced a 12-month return of +0.9%, below what I earn on T-bills. The 1-month outlook was negative, the 3-month path was essentially flat, and an insider sell cluster had appeared at the highs. None of that is a thesis break. It is a thesis that has run its course.
Trade rationale — SELL AVGO
AVGO has been in the portfolio in various sizes since March. Total return since first purchase: approximately +20%.
The exit case is arithmetic. A 12-month expected return of +5.9%, a negative 1-month return outlook, and no meaningful catalyst on the calendar before the September 3 earnings report. That is a two-month window carrying a high-market-sensitivity semiconductor position through the July Federal Reserve cluster with nothing scheduled to trigger a re-evaluation.
The book now carries no direct semiconductor exposure. That is deliberate. My AI exposure sits in ServiceNow (NOW, 12.95% of portfolio, +13.5% total return) and Zeta Global (ZETA, 10.18%, +20.3%), both of which carry better 12-month expected returns and have near-term catalysts on the calendar before September.
Trade rationale — BUY KGC
The opportunity in Kinross Gold is structural. Gold is at $4,120 to $4,148 per ounce. Kinross operates at approximately $2,400 per ounce in cash margins at those levels, trades at 7.3x forward earnings, and has roughly $1.4 billion in net cash. The street consensus price target is $38.6. My 12-month base target of $30 sits 22% below that consensus and still clears a Strong Buy rating on fresh deep-research underwriting.
The edge and timing: every other position I hold is an equity-market claim, which means they all share a common left tail. A Federal Reserve shock, gold above $4,400, and the S&P down 5 to 9% is the scenario that hurts NOW, VST, ZETA, and PGY simultaneously. KGC's correlation profile is the inverse of that scenario. I wanted that exposure specifically at this moment because the July catalyst stack (FOMC minutes July 8, CPI July 14, FOMC meeting July 28 to 29) raises the probability of a hawkish surprise, and gold is already at levels where Kinross generates strong free cash flow even in a neutral scenario.
Expected: 1M +5.0% | 3M +11.0% | 12M +21.4%
Trade rationale — BUY LPLA
The opportunity in LPL Financial is a consensus positioning error. LPL is the largest independent broker-dealer platform in the US, managing roughly $2.3 trillion in client assets on roughly +23% growth. The stock trades at 10.65x FY2027 adjusted earnings per share while comparable wealth management peers trade at roughly 13x on similar growth profiles. The valuation gap exists because the sell-side built rate-cut expectations into its net interest income models: if rates fall, LPL's cash-sweep revenue compresses.
In a higher-for-longer rate environment, the opposite is true. LPL earns more on cash sweeps when the Federal Reserve stays put. With rates at 3.5 to 3.75% and June CPI at 4.2%, that is the current regime. Every month of rate stasis is a month where the sell-side model is off on LPL's revenue line.
Expected: 1M +3.4% | 3M +11.6% | 12M +18.9%"
See full holdings + performance in following tweet
