Weekly Performance
The GVR portfolio declined -2.62% on the week while the broader market moved sharply higher — VOO gained +1.46% and QQQ surged +3.28%, powered by a combination of Iran peace deal optimism and a post-Fed exhale as investors digested a rate hold that came in roughly as expected. GVR sat out the bulk of that rally, which is the honest summary of the week. The portfolio was in active housekeeping mode — trimming winners, closing out positions that no longer fit the equity book, and building a cash reserve — rather than positioned to chase a Nasdaq rip driven by mega-cap AI and semiconductor names.
On a year-to-date basis, GVR sits at +40.46%, versus +20.80% for QQQ and +9.52% for VOO. Despite back-to-back weeks of underperformance driven by the NOW and ONDS options positions, the portfolio's YTD lead remains substantial — a useful anchor when the week-to-week noise gets loud.
Equity Book: A Week of Housekeeping
There is a version of this week that looks, in hindsight, like a missed opportunity — the NOW and ONDS options positions have been sitting underwater while the Nasdaq ripped higher, and the instinct in a moment like that is to wonder why profits weren't locked in sooner when both contracts were deep in the green. That question is worth sitting with honestly. The NOW call in particular was a massive winner at its peak, and not taking more off the table during that run — when software was actually catching a bid — is a lesson that's being noted and internalized.
This week's activity on the equity side was partly a response to that tension. Rather than sitting on positions out of inertia or attachment, a meaningful round of profit-taking and pruning was executed across the book. MU, AXON, and GOOG were all closed for gains — names that had served their purpose and, in a market environment where software and growth equities are struggling to find consistent momentum, carrying them further felt like forcing it. Alongside those exits, a number of smaller positions that had drifted away from the criteria the equity book is built around — strong fundamentals, clear thesis, alignment with macro positioning — were closed out at small losses. Dead weight doesn't belong in the book regardless of what it's doing on a given week, and getting those cleared out was overdue.
The result is a leaner, more intentionally constructed equity book and a cash position that has grown to nearly $5,000 — the largest cash reserve in the portfolio's history. That is not a bearish statement. It is a patient one. The goal now is to wait for opportunities that genuinely meet the entry criteria rather than redeploying capital just to stay busy. New positions in FBIO, AVAH, and SPCH were initiated this week as setups that did clear that bar, and full rationale for each is documented in the Closed Trades section.
Options Book: Still Holding, Still Convicted
The NOW and ONDS positions remain open. That is the most important sentence in this section, because there was real pressure this week — internally and from looking at the PnL — to consider exiting. The thesis on both has not changed. ServiceNow's position in enterprise AI workflow automation is intact, the revenue base is contracted and recurring, and the October 2026 expiration provides enough runway for the stock to find its footing as software sentiment eventually turns. ONDS is a longer-duration bet on drone infrastructure and government program expansion — it needs momentum to return to the name, and that may take more time than initially hoped. Looking back through the prior few weeks, the right move in a brutal bear market environment for software was to be more aggressive about locking in gains when the contracts were working. That is a real lesson, not an excuse. But the answer to "I should have taken more profits at the top" is not "exit at the bottom." Both positions remain in the portfolio.
The cash being built up on the equity side also has a second function: it provides dry powder to add to one or both options positions at better prices if the technical setup confirms a bottom. No decision has been made there, and nothing will be forced. The process documented here has always been to wait for the right moment rather than trade for the sake of trading.
What Happened in Markets This Week
The dominant storyline of the week was the Iran peace deal, and its impact on markets was immediate and broad. On June 15th, the U.S. and Iran announced a preliminary framework agreement to end more than three months of conflict and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, with a formal memorandum of understanding electronically signed shortly after. The announcement triggered a sharp equity rally — the S&P 500 jumped roughly 1.9% on the news alone — while crude oil prices dropped nearly 5% as the risk premium that had been baked into energy markets for months began to unwind. The Strait of Hormuz, which had been effectively closed since the conflict escalated in late February, is the critical chokepoint for a significant portion of global oil exports, and its reopening carries profound implications for energy supply chains, inflation, and global growth. The deal itself is a 60-day ceasefire extension with a formal signing ceremony planned for June 19th in Geneva — critical issues including Iran's nuclear program and sanctions relief remain on the table for future negotiations, so the situation is not fully resolved. But markets trade on probability, and the probability of a durable de-escalation moved meaningfully higher this week.
The other major event was the June 17th FOMC meeting — the first chaired by new Fed Chair Kevin Warsh, who took over from Jerome Powell in May. The rate decision itself was a unanimous 12-0 hold at 3.50%–3.75%, exactly as markets expected. What wasn't expected was quite how hawkish the updated dot plot turned out to be. The median FOMC projection now points to rates ending 2026 at around 3.8% — meaning a hike, not a cut, is the committee's base case for the rest of the year. Prior projections from March had still penciled in a cut. That is a meaningful shift, and it reflects a Fed that is taking inflation seriously: CPI ran at 4.2% annually in May, the highest reading since April 2023, driven largely by energy price shocks from the Iran conflict. Warsh, in his post-meeting press conference, described inflation as a burden and signaled a data-dependent but cautious posture going forward. Markets sold off modestly in the final hour of Wednesday's session as the hawkish dot plot sank in, with the S&P 500 falling about 1% and two-year Treasury yields jumping 14 basis points. The message from the Fed is clear: cuts are off the table, and if inflation doesn't cooperate, a hike is coming. That backdrop — higher for longer, with a potential move higher — is not the environment in which software multiples re-expand easily, and it's a meaningful part of why the NOW and ONDS positions have struggled since the May peak.
Putting it all together: the peace deal removed a major source of macroeconomic uncertainty that had been suppressing risk appetite for months, and that was genuinely good news for equities broadly. But the Fed meeting served as a reminder that the other major headwind — stubborn inflation and a hawkish rate path — is not going away just because oil prices dipped. For software and growth equities specifically, a rate environment that is biased toward tightening rather than easing means the multiple expansion story remains a difficult one to tell. The next catalyst that could change that narrative is the inflation data itself — if the Strait reopening translates into meaningfully lower energy prices over the next several weeks, that could shift the calculus for the Fed. That is the scenario worth watching.