Volatility Persists – Tech Sector Ranking Rises as Conglomerates and Retail Fall

March 10, 2022
WEEKLY SECTOR ROTATION
Brian T. Hannon, CFA
Volatility Persists – Tech Sector Ranking Rises as Conglomerates and Retail Fall
The earnings outlook across multiple sectors has been in flux, producing volatile estimate revisions.
As a result, the technology sector has reclaimed a top 5 spot in our attractiveness rankings. While
sharp deterioration in catalytic scores has resulted in the conglomerates sector’s drop in ranking.
Likewise, weakness in the fundamental outlook, as indicated by catalytic properties, has resulted in
the retail sector’s fall from the top 5 group. See Tables 5 & 6 where we highlight the most and least
attractive names selected from the top-ranked and bottom-ranked sectors, respectively.

Brian T. Hannon, CFA
Founder, Director of Quantitative Equity Research
Qubit Research, LLC
Brian Hannon began his career in the chemicals industry at the Dupont Company where he held
various positions in research & development, project management, and corporate finance. While in
R&D, he was awarded a patent for his role in the development of a reverse osmosis application for the
production of semiconductor devices (Patent# 4,879,043: Manufacture of High Purity Hydrogen
Peroxide by Using Reverse Osmosis”).
Brian made the transition to the investment management profession as a research analyst covering
chemicals industry stocks in 1992 at the DuPont Pension Fund. In 1995 he joined ASB Capital
Management where he developed the first version of the multi-factor model that Polaris is based on.
From 1997 to 2006, Brian produced an exceptional track record while serving as a senior portfolio
manager at Macquarie Investments (formerly Delaware Investment Management) on their institutional
large-cap value team. In 2006, Brian founded Qubit Investments, LLC to launch an equity market
neutral fund. He later became the Director of Equity Research at Sturdivant & Co. and then Quoin
Capital, LLC in 2013 and 2020, respectively, which was prior to assuming his current role at Qubit
Research, LLC. Brian holds a BS degree in chemical engineering and a BS in economics from
Carnegie-Mellon University and has been a CFA charter holder since 1991.
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