News about shares, stock market and technology

A decisive election result – check. Strong earnings reports – check. Does this pave the way for a Santa Claus rally (and continued momentum into 2025)? The market often carries an underlying optimism. Over time, things improve, and companies continue to create value. Yet, there is always something new to worry about. This month’s flavor of concern is less about the U.S. economy performing well and more about challenges closer to home. Government crises in both France and Germany — Europe’s largest economies.

September doesn't have the best reputation in the stock market almanac, typically being one of the weakest months of the year. The month also began with falling prices, but global stock markets gradually recovered and ended more or less unchanged. The funds performed largely in line with the overall market. After the earnings season concluded, the news flow was quieter, with some notable individual company events. If we exaggerate, a quiet September is a good September. Outside our core segments, we have seen several profit warnings, primarily in sectors exposed to the end consumer.

It may not have strictly been geopolitics that caused the sharp stock market decline in early August, but rather a general concern among market participants. Regardless, there was a sharp downward movement, accompanied by an equally sharp upward movement in the ‘fear index’, VIX. We saw no connection to fundamental factors such as economic development or corporate earnings. For the rest of the period, the market gradually regained lost ground.

The reporting period for the second quarter can be likened to a camel – it has two humps. Several companies released their reports in July, while an equally large group will report in August. It is likely that vacations impact this, and the timing of the reports depends on whether they can finalize the figures before or must wait until after.

Starting signals can vary greatly. For a sprinter, the sound travels to the ear, from which a signal to the brain activates a new signal to all muscles to start moving. Typically, this process takes less than half a second. For an average participant in the Vasaloppet, the world's biggest cross-country ski race, the starting signal is a distinctly different experience. Standing on the field, packed together with thousands of others, a distant muffled bang is heard.

These companies generally have near real-time insight into their business and can flag potential misses as soon as the quarter ends. The first quarter is also usually the least important of the year. We've seen only one pre-announced negative development for Q1, which was...

Artificial intelligence, currently the best example of software that impacts (or "eats") the world, also requires massive investments in hardware. AI is born, trained, and thrives in data centers, solid buildings filled with tangible items. Hardware has made a comeback.

Data, which is what all AI requires to be trained and become effective, has been called the New Oil. If one is to believe Sam Altman at OpenAI, it is rather computational power ("compute") that is today's most valuable raw material. If you will: sand (silicon) is the new oil.

After a couple of years of declines, especially for Nordic small and mid-sized companies, things had thawed considerably ahead of the reporting period. At the same time, the economy is a concern. How did the largest positions in TIN New Technology perform when the Q4 reports were examined?