2018 Performance

Let’s just say what a year... I ended the year down 4.11%, which stinks. It’s my first losing year in recent memory. I was tracking well for the first 3 quarters and then the bottom fell out in Q4. Overall I generated a slight gain from my arb plays with decent gains from Juno Therapeutics, Bioverativ and AveXis. On the other hand I got a bit sloppy with NXP Semiconductors, Rent-A-Center, iKang Healthcare Group and CA Technologies, which pretty much negated the positive returns from the successful arb positions. Even though I was able to beat the S&P 500 (negative return of 6.2%), a loss is still a loss.

I did take a nice beating in one of my larger long positions in Constellation Brands. Ever since Constellation Brands took a majority stake in Canopy Growth, the stock has headed in a downward trajectory. Constellation Brands ended the year down ~ 27%. Other big losers include Apple (down ~ 8.50%) and Alibaba (down ~ 26.7%). What saved my portfolio were positions in MasterCard (up ~ 22.2% and Visa up ~14.8%). Visa now makes up my largest portfolio holding surpassing Constellation Brands.

Looking at 2019, I’ll continue to keep a healthy cash position and pretty much maintain my long positions as is. I currently have one arb play and that is Tesaro, which could close in ~ 2 weeks. Other than that… I’ll be on the sidelines looking for high probability arb plays.

Hope everyone have a Healthy and Prosperous New Year!

2018 Performance = -4.11% with the running monthly returns as follows:

January +2.80%
February +2.82%
March -0.03%
April +2.10%
May +6.25%
June -1.51%
July +1.53%

August +5.1%

September -0.60%

October -8.78%

November -3.00%

December -9.50%

Annual performance for the past seven years is as follows:

2012 +61%
2013 +44.61%
2014 +29.47%
2015 +33.48%
2016 +14.61%
2017 +42.12%

2018 -4.11%