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For years, FIS has been trending downwards, a slow leak of value that has seen a three-year annualized return of negative 5% and a five-year plunge of 14%. It’s a bit like watching a perfectly good golem slowly crumble into dust, isn’t it?² The source of this malaise? A rather ambitious acquisition of Worldpay back in 2019. Think of it as trying to graft a particularly thorny rose bush onto a sturdy oak tree. It looked good on the ledger, but the resulting hybrid was… unhappy.

The filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, dated as above, reveals a complete severing of ties. The fund, having once held this FMC as a portion of its holdings, now bears no trace of it. A diminution of $5.14 million, yes, but also a reckoning with a share price that had, over the past year, descended into a lamentable state. The arithmetic of loss is rarely simple; it is compounded by the opportunity cost of capital held hostage.

And get this – the stock was up 234% in the last year. Two hundred and thirty-four percent! People were actually excited about this company. And now? Now it’s just…less up. Which, fine, it’s a market. But it’s the principle of the thing!

The current enthusiasm for investment is, in part, a consequence of dwindling alternatives. Savings accounts offer a pittance, and the promise of genuine economic security feels increasingly distant. This creates a fertile ground for speculation, and the proliferation of platforms promising easy wealth. To enter this arena with even a small stake requires a degree of caution rarely observed.

Recently, however, the deferral has begun to fray. The absence of immediate, demonstrable engagement with the so-called ‘artificial intelligence’ – a phrase which itself feels like a bureaucratic evasion – has not gone unnoticed. It is as though Apple, rather than participating in the frenzy, has chosen to observe it from a distance, meticulously documenting the chaos as a detached anthropologist might. This restraint, while logically sound, has not been rewarded. The market, it seems, prefers enthusiasm, even if misplaced, to considered judgment. And the matter of production, tethered so inextricably to the geopolitical currents of a distant land, casts a long, unsettling shadow. The tariffs, though temporarily abated by assurances of investment in domestic production, remain a latent threat, a suspended judgment waiting to fall.

This, naturally, has caused a flutter amongst the financial birds. A jump, they call it. Four percent! As if a machine, proving it can navigate a thoroughfare without colliding with a fruit vendor, justifies such exuberance. It is as if the market, a creature of habit and easily distracted, believes these vehicles will suddenly begin churning out gold coins alongside passengers. The Robotaxi, you see, is not merely a mode of transport; it is a phantom, a promise whispered in the ears of investors, a justification for valuations that defy all reasonable accounting.

The filing reveals an addition of 360,223 shares, swelling Kaydan’s position to 415,493, valued at $24.9 million – a figure representing 7.2% of their reported AUM. One notes the rather delicate balance between active acquisition and market fluctuation; the quarter-end increase of $21.59 million is, of course, a blend of both. A perfectly respectable accumulation, though hardly the stuff of legend.

One is compelled to inquire into the currents which have steered this particular vessel so decidedly off course.

The acquisition, reported in a predictably dry SEC filing, elevates Century Aluminum to a commanding 48.39% of Glencore’s reported assets. A curious concentration, wouldn’t you agree? One recalls the cautionary tales of portfolios built on a single, glittering foundation. Still, one must admire the boldness, or perhaps the sheer lack of alternatives.