2025: new ideas and positioning

Much to be thankful for and excitement for what lies ahead

Disclaimer

LWS Financial Research is NOT a financial advisory service, nor is its author qualified to offer such services.

All content on this website and publications, as well as all communications from the author, are for educational and entertainment purposes only and under no circumstances, express or implied, should be considered financial, legal, or any other type of advice. Each individual should carry out their own analysis and make their own investment decisions.

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2024 in retrospective

What a year! Unlike 2023, aside from a brief scare in August and September due to market drops caused by the currency panic in Japan, everything has been smooth sailing. This is particularly remarkable and validates our portfolio approach and investment philosophy. Despite commodities, as an asset class, performing very poorly—and given their significant weight in our model portfolio—our strong performance is even more commendable. Year-to-date (YTD) returns stand at 26.62%, adding to last year’s 33.29%.

The initial objectives, which I maintain year after year, were to achieve positive, double-digit returns (check) and to outperform any benchmark index. On this last point, we fell short, with the Nasdaq delivering a spectacular performance that was 3.15% higher than ours. The closed operations in the model portfolio during the year (current price being the closing price of the transaction) are as follows:

Of course, not everything has been a success—not by a long shot. I've made many mistakes, like Seplat, where the final terms of the acquisition were far from what I expected, and surely many more will come in the future, as this is part of the process, especially with cyclical companies. What’s important in these cases is to always learn, improve, and manage risk so that these significant drops don’t overshadow the overall results or disrupt the portfolio’s compounding process.

While the companies on this list might suggest we only deal with cyclical or commodity-related industries, nothing could be further from the truth. Our approach is value investing, and we simply aim to adapt at any given moment to the themes we expect to yield the greatest returns. In addition to the positions in the model portfolio, we share many other ideas through our publication on Discord (as you’ll see below, EVERYTHING is shared in real-time and with full transparency), which have performed exceptionally well, such as:

• HFG: Shared on 05/27 at €5.86/share and strongly increased in June at €4.5/share. On 09/01, we published the investment analysis on this same blog, and today it trades at €12.28/share, yielding a 110% return since we shared the purchase on Discord.

• K2A.PREF: A very low-risk idea on preferred shares of a REIT, whose asset sales eliminated any solvency risk. We initiated a position on 07/24 at 147 SEK and sold on 10/02 at 196.5 SEK, yielding a 33% return in 3 months with very low risk.

  

• GMS: An auxiliary company in the offshore drilling industry that we have been buying and trading since 2023. We bought it at 4.7p/share, sold half when it doubled four months later, and today it trades at 16p/share—a 4x in 1.5 years.

  

  

• BTCC.B: As we’ll see below, one of our ideas for 2024 was to capitalize on the influx of capital into the crypto ecosystem this year, viewing it as a classic exercise in supply and demand. In the model portfolio, we decided to play it conservatively with Coinbase (a 2x return since purchase), but Mr. Timbits, one of the most prominent members of our community, shared the idea of buying calls on one of the existing BTC ETFs. We bought them a year ago, and they’ve yielded a 6x return since then.

  

• CORZ: Another crypto-related idea we decided to play was a mining company with significant potential in the AI space. Initially, we approached it as an implicit volatility play with options (yielding >10% monthly with a very compelling underlying), but many community members invested traditionally. We first bought it at $3.94/share in February, and today it trades at $14.04/share.

  

The returns on investment ideas shared in LWS Financial Research have far exceeded those of the model portfolio, which is not designed to maximize returns or serve as any form of recommendation. Instead, it aims to illustrate how, with a more moderate risk profile and a philosophy rooted in value investing and macro analysis, a retail investor can outperform the indices consistently. Last year, we published an article (which I’ll link here for free) outlining our main ideas for 2024, which were as follows:

• Metallurgical Coal: This was our biggest bet heading into 2024, but the global economic weakness (particularly in China) surprised negatively, reducing the underlying commodity's price by over 40%. In light of this shift, we decided to reduce exposure, selling HCC 0.00%↑ with a +1% return for the year (+68% since last year) and BTU 0.00%↑ with a -2% return. We still hold exposure to one company in the sector, but this idea has not performed well in 2024.

• Rate Cuts and QE: The idea materialized perfectly, but we ultimately decided not to include any company to play it.

• Oil Tankers: Our original thesis was that OPEC+ would increase oil export volumes in H2 2024, with a limited fleet, which would particularly benefit the VLCC segment. We played this with DHT 0.00%↑ and $OET, achieving solid returns on both (+19% and +37%). However, when it became clear that oil market balances left no room for increased Saudi production, we closed our positions.

• American Natural Gas: The theory of stagnating growth in American shale and normalized winter temperatures is playing out, though more slowly than expected, as the new LNG export capacity has not yet come online. We ultimately decided not to play this idea.

• Crypto: In the model portfolio, we played this with $COIN, but we also tracked ideas like BTCC.B, ETHH.B, and BTC miners like $CORZ or $IREN. It performed as we expected, and we have been gradually reducing risk and exposure.

As we can see, not all ideas have worked as expected, but active management and diligent monitoring have allowed us to capitalize on them to a significant extent.

Evolution of this publication

This second year of premium subscription has been one of significant growth, both in the quality and variety of content as well as in the publication's reach. It concludes with a 78% retention rate (notable considering two price increases), very positive feedback, and a 5% monthly growth rate, far exceeding my best expectations at the outset. The newsletter has reached the 44th position globally in the finance category. Thank you!

While I’m thrilled with these milestones, my goal is not growth for growth’s sake but the development of a greater project: we have built the go-to community in the Spanish-speaking world through the LWS Financial Research Discord. It features an extremely high level of expertise and the top specialists in the topics we cover (commodities, maritime transport, options…), creating a default hub for keeping up to date on all developments, news, and new market ideas—all within an unbeatable atmosphere.

With these solid foundations in place, the plan is to continue improving the quality and variety of our informational offering. At your request, we now host a monthly live session to delve deeper into new investment ideas, portfolio movements, and answer all questions that arise. We’ve also streamlined the number of positions and ideas in the portfolio. In 2025, we’ll update all previously published investment ideas and continue to deliver top-quality insights and value.

I aim to combine this ambitious goal of being the leading investment community with offering the most attractive pricing, ensuring the value-to-price ratio is unmatched. Remember, tomorrow is the last dayto take advantage of our holiday discount:

• 20% lifetime discount on our premium membership, locking the price forever at just €400/year or €40/month.

Main investment themes for 2025

This year, as we have just seen, has been, once again, spectacular, but the demands are not reduced for the future. On the contrary, the ambition is greater for the new year, where the initial objectives remain the same, as could not be otherwise:

• Positive, double-digit returns.

• To outperform all the benchmark indices.

The investment themes we are going to play have changed significantly with respect to those of 2023, and we have even closed almost all our positions in oil, which was my most important idea just 12 months ago. The macroeconomic environment is always changing, and internal sector dynamics are equally dynamic, so our job is to read the current situation well and adapt to the changes. We will now review the main investment ideas that I see as interesting for this year: