Blind Squirrel Macro’s ‘Start The Week’ note is the weekly review of the BUSHY™ beta portfolio and updates on our ‘Acorn’ trades - anything from single stock ideas and thematic baskets to FX / Credit / Commodity ideas.
BUSHY™ Review and Acorn Update
Another decent week for the beta portfolio. Most asset sleeves were positive and (partially crystalized) gains in the hedge book drove solid outperformance versus the Vanguard benchmark and the S&P 500.
BUSHY™ is keeping pace with US equities year-to-date with very limited exposure to the central AI trade outside of general equity index length within the CTA sleeve. The portfolio is running at 8.43% weekly annualized volatility, a Sharpe ratio of 1.51 and Sortino ratio of 3.09.
The portfolio has clawed back the bulk of its September drawdown but matching 2025 total returns will require some heavy lifting in Q4. I do not plan on taking any excessive risks to achieve that end. Risk management is front of mind. It feels like steam is coming out of the AI trade and I am not convinced that that trade can unwind without collateral damage in other risk assets.
A quick reminder that the BUSHY™ portfolio is available via a single click on the Plutus platform - full details in my July launch note linked below.
Let’s dig into the numbers and last week’s portfolio changes…
