The negotiations between Iran and America have stalled again, and the US stock market is once again behaving like a hormonal teenager on a roller coaster with an annual pass.

Not even the most dedicated amusement park visitor can compete with the number of wild swings we’ve seen lately.

The positive side? You eventually get so used to these violent swings that you barely flinch when the portfolio drops like a freight train with no brakes.

Today, not even a nice 0.81% strengthening of the SEK could save us.

My portfolio is currently redder than Rudolph’s nose on Christmas Eve.

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Predicting share price movements is difficult enough as it is. Anyone who claims otherwise is either a genius, a liar, or has been extremely lucky for a suspiciously long time.

But if you really want to make it extra spicy, just add currency fluctuations as an additional variable. Because why make life simple when you can make it complicated?

The larger the portfolio gets, the more the exchange rate decides to play its little games. Suddenly a nice gain in USD can turn into a disappointing result in SEK. I’ve experienced this several times. Stocks doing their job, while the krona is actively working against me. Classic.

On several occasions the SEK/USD volatility has been so wild that I’ve actually waited… or completely chickened out on certain acquisitions. Some were done later. Others were never completed.

Because apparently my risk tolerance has limits — and those limits are heavily influenced by how much the currency feels like messing with me on any given day.

I know I should be better at this by now. But here I am — still letting exchange rates stress me out like a true amateur.

Some people fear the stock market. Me? I fear the currency market more.

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On January 12, 2026, I made a major shift in my largest occupational pension.

After nearly a decade as a 100% small-cap investor in Sweden and Europe, I sold everything and redirected the capital into American tech giants.

So far, it has been a very good decision. The portfolio is up approximately 13.7% since the reallocation.

Yesterday, both Dagens Industri and Privata Affärer wrote that billions in the small-cap segment of the premium pension are at risk and that certain funds may see significant outflows.

We don’t know exactly which funds they are referring to — but I’m very grateful that I got out ahead of the curve.

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One of our biggest holdings, MAIN (Main Street Capital), has taken a hit this year — down roughly 15-17% year-to-date.

Does it scare us? Not really.

MAIN is a Business Development Company (BDC) that primarily lends to small and medium-sized American companies. These businesses are highly sensitive to the economic cycle, and MAIN has always moved in clear cycles.

Right now we’re in a weak phase: high interest rates, increased loan losses, and general concern in the private credit market. MAIN reported weak Q1 numbers in early May and missed estimates, which didn’t help.

This is classic cyclical behavior for MAIN. Strong periods come when the economy is booming and rates are low. Weak periods hit when rates are high and credit risks rise — exactly where we are now.

Importantly, it’s not just MAIN. The entire BDC sector is under pressure. This is an environmental issue, not a company-specific disaster.

So for now, we keep calm and carry on.

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I’ve been thinking about the next phase of this AI madness.

We’re no longer just talking about chatbots and pretty pictures. AI is flooding into the financial system through gigantic IPOs and venture capital. That money is then used to build even better AI tools, which in turn attract even more money.

It’s a beautiful, terrifying self-reinforcing loop.

Finance AI has one massive advantage that no human investor or bank can match: superhuman data processing and predictive power. My meticulously maintained Google Sheet is suddenly looking very… analog.

So yes — I’m slowly realizing that my meticulously crafted Google Sheet, which I’ve spent years perfecting and color-coding, might soon be reduced to a cute little digital diary. A relic from the time when humans still believed they could outsmart the machines.

The endgame is becoming clearer: the largest and most powerful capital allocators on Earth won’t be humans anymore. They’ll be AI systems optimizing returns at a scale we can barely comprehend.

And here I am, still moving cells around like it matters.

The age of purely human finance may be ending faster than most of us want to admit.

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For most of my life, buying software meant just that — you bought it.

You paid once, owned the license, and that was it. Microsoft Office 2010 is the perfect example. No monthly fees, no nagging pop-ups, no “pay us forever or lose access.”

I’ve always preferred that model.

Another example is Minecraft. We bought it for our son when he was four. He loved that game with all his heart — until one day, at age twelve, in a moment of naive trust, he gave his best friend the login details. The friend immediately changed the account to his own name.

Heartbreak on two fronts: losing both his beloved Minecraft world and his best friend. We offered to subscribe, but the damage was done. He hasn’t touched the game since.

That story perfectly sums up how I’ve felt about SaaS (Software as a Service). I’ve disliked it on principle. I want to buy my software, not rent it indefinitely.

But as they say… it is what it is.

The world has moved on, and fighting it is pointless. So instead of raging against the machine, I’ve decided to join it — on my own terms.

The choice fell on ServiceNow (NOW).

If you can’t beat them… you might as well invest in them.

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We’ve put the absolute most focus on our private investments over the years, which has come at the expense of properly reviewing our work pensions.

Now that our private portfolio is more up to date, we’ve finally started looking at these as well. We’ve been dealing with them in order of size and maturity, leaving me with just one small remaining policy — just over 90,000 SEK.

Today I logged in to review the holdings and possibly make some changes. Instead, I found myself staring at something completely unexpected.

Apparently, in 1995, at the tender age of 25, I took out a traditional pension insurance with SEB Trygg Liv. I managed to pay in just over 30,000 SEK before I wised up and switched to a different solution less than three years later.

That 30,000 SEK has now, after 30 years, grown by roughly 200%.

A banker at SEB tried to tell me that SEB Trygg Liv has delivered “over 10% return since 2015.” Given that the Swedish stock market has done around 11% per year in the same period, I found that statement… optimistic. But I chose not to argue with her. An individual banker shouldn’t have to take the blame for my 25-year-old self’s terrible financial decisions.

This whole episode just confirms my long-standing thesis:

No one will ever care about your money as much as you do. — Liza Dewlar

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Even after almost ten years of investing, I still haven’t quite gotten used to how far we’ve come.

Some single days this year, the value of our portfolios has moved up or down by as much as our entire dividend income for 2017. The numbers are getting ridiculous.

I still don’t see our investments as money. To me they’re more like little workers — some days they do a great job, other days they disappoint. Their main purpose is to push the bars higher in my Google Sheets. The competitive part of me is very grateful, but she is never, ever satisfied.

In previous years I mostly focused on the spreadsheet itself and didn’t watch daily performance that closely. A pure dividend portfolio felt more stable and didn’t require constant attention.

But now that the Google Sheet is finally complete, I suddenly have more time — and because we’ve shifted from 100% dividend investing to including growth stocks, I feel a much stronger need to follow the portfolios in real time.

On red days, it’s an advantage not to see the numbers as money — just fluctuating bars. The same strangely applies to the black days.

I’m not sure if that makes me emotionally detached or just slightly broken. Probably both.

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The French luxury giant LVMH, whose portfolio includes icons like Louis Vuitton, Dior (Parfums Christian Dior), Celine, Fendi, Tiffany & Co., Bulgari, Hublot, Moët & Chandon, Dom Pérignon and many more, has announced it is selling the Marc Jacobs brand.

After a sharp rise in popularity in the early 2000s, Marc Jacobs has struggled to maintain momentum in recent years. Now, LVMH is divesting the fashion house to the American brand management company WHP Global, in partnership with G-III Apparel Group.

The deal, valued at approximately $850 million ($425 million each from the two buyers), is expected to close before the end of 2026. Marc Jacobs will continue as Creative Director.

This move comes as the luxury sector — particularly the mid- and entry-level segments — has faced weaker demand globally. LVMH wants to sharpen its focus on its strongest “power brands” such as Louis Vuitton, Dior, Celine and Fendi — a level Marc Jacobs never quite reached within the group.

With over 70 brands in its portfolio, LVMH has been quietly cleaning house. The company has already sold Off-White and its stake in Stella McCartney in recent years. Under Bernard Arnault’s leadership, the strategy is clear: sell non-core assets and reinvest the proceeds into the businesses that drive the strongest growth and margins.

It’s a classic “trim the portfolio” move in challenging economic times — and very typical LVMH. They don’t sell what works perfectly.

Personal reflection
Personally, I believe this could give Marc Jacobs a fresh chance to strengthen its position in the mid-range luxury segment under new owners who actually know how to run licensing and operations.

That said… not a single Marc Jacobs bag has ever made it into my own “bag portfolio,” which currently consists of Chanel, Dior, Louis Vuitton, Prada and Bottega Veneta. These so-called “investments” were all made long before I discovered the stock market.

Had I put the same money into LVMH shares instead, they would probably have tripled by now. Instead, the bags have quietly halved in value in my wardrobe. Classic. At least I have excellent taste… and an expensive lesson in opportunity cost.

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I sold a portion of UNH to buy more CVX because I was convinced that now America would finally start the beginning of the end of the conflict with Iran.

I was so sure CVX would skyrocket on the news.

Oh, how wrong I was. Again.

Instead of the big move I hoped for, it’s been pretty much status quo.

So my grand swing trade experiment has quietly turned into… just another dividend stock in the portfolio.

Don’t follow me for fast-deal insights, folks.
I’m clearly better at buying and holding than timing the market.

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