How the journal works
Journal policy.
This page explains how I run Small Caps. Big Bags. in plain English. It is my own investment journal: I publish what I own, what I change and the thinking behind it. The aim is to keep a proper record and make myself accountable — not to tell anyone else what to buy.
Last updated
A record I can’t rewrite later.
Investment memory is selective. The winners stay sharp. Bad entries, broken theses and stocks sold too early have a habit of becoming less clear with time.
Writing everything down fixes that. I can go back and see what I believed when I bought, what I expected to happen, what would make me change my mind and whether I actually followed my own process.
Making the portfolio public adds another layer of accountability. It turns out the fear of looking stupid in public can be a surprisingly useful risk-management tool.
Dated snapshots, not a live feed.
The portfolio page is a snapshot taken at the date shown. It is normally updated monthly rather than every time I buy, add, trim or sell.
Articles reflect what I knew and thought when they were published. Positions can change between updates, sometimes quickly, so an old article should never be treated as a current view or a signal to follow.
I do not want to quietly tidy up the past whenever a thesis changes. The useful bit is being able to see the original thinking and compare it with what happened next.
The upside. The risks. What could go wrong.
I write in the first person because these are my own decisions. I try to explain why a stock interests me, what I think the market may be missing, the catalyst I am looking for and the evidence that would prove me wrong.
The business comes first. Charts then help me think about timing, liquidity, risk and whether the market might be starting to change its mind.
If I change my view, I will say so. There is not much point keeping an investment journal if only the good calls survive.
I may own the stocks I write about.
Often I will. That is part of the point of the journal: it records what I am doing with my own money and why.
I may buy, add, trim or sell a stock after an article has been published. Where it is relevant, I will state whether I hold the stock at the time of writing.
A holding is not an endorsement and it is not a signal for anyone else to follow. My position size, time horizon and appetite for risk may be completely different from yours.
The numbers need context.
The performance shown on the site relates to my own concentrated portfolio. The published record began on 13 May 2025, so it still covers a relatively short period.
The results so far have been unusual and are not typical. A small number of stocks can have a very large effect on a concentrated portfolio — in both directions. Past performance is not a reliable guide to what happens next.
I publish the figures because accountability matters, not because I expect anyone else to achieve the same result. The latest holdings, benchmark and calculation notes are shown on the portfolio page.
Correct the facts. Keep the record.
If I find a factual mistake, I will correct it. Where the change is material, I will make the update clear rather than quietly changing the meaning of the original piece.
A change of opinion is different from a correction. Markets move, companies change and new information arrives. When my view changes, the better answer is to explain why — not pretend I held the new view all along.
Please do your own work.
This site records my process; it cannot do the thinking for you. Small-cap and AIM stocks can be volatile, illiquid and capable of losing most or all of their value.
Nothing here is personal investment advice. Do your own research, make sure any decision suits your own circumstances and speak to an appropriately authorised professional where you need advice.