Top Quartile Stocks — performance

What the four-filter stock screen would have returned, rebalanced monthly vs SPY

Updated May 29, 2026

The home page’s Top Quartileis the intersection of the four independent scores on every stock’s card: names sitting in the top 25% of the universe on Market Beat (excess return vs SPY), Rank Persistence (how consistently they hold their cross-sectional rank week over week), Business Growth(revenue, margin and cash-flow momentum) and Money Flow(buying vs selling pressure) — all at once. It’s a demanding screen, so the basket is usually small.

This page asks the obvious next question: if you had actually held that basket — equal-weighted, refreshed at each monthly snapshot — how would it have done? Below, every month’s basket return is plotted against SPY over the same window, and the two are compounded into a cumulative curve.

This month’s basket

Locked May 29, 2026 · 14 names · equal-weight · tracked daily through July 24, 2026. Updates when the next month begins.

Basket · MTD

−14.5%

SPY · MTD

−0.9%

Excess

−13.6 pp

Up / down

2 / 12

Leader · NUE

+13.0%

Laggard · GLW

−33.5%

Day by day · basket vs SPY

The 14picks · lock-in scores & month-to-date

Stock	Perform	Persist	Profit	Flow	MTD
NUENucor Corporation	95	82	76	99	+13.0%
DELLDell Technologies Inc.	98	76	86	100	+2.8%
AMDAdvanced Micro Devices, Inc.	99	97	95	97	−3.5%
STXSeagate Technology Holdings plc	99	96	98	98	−6.9%
MUMicron Technology, Inc.	100	99	100	91	−10.8%
FSLRFirst Solar, Inc.	93	82	93	95	−12.6%
HOODRobinhood Markets, Inc.	80	87	98	80	−12.7%
WDCWestern Digital Corporation	100	99	90	95	−13.1%
CIENCiena Corporation	99	97	95	92	−15.5%
LRCXLam Research Corporation	98	94	94	80	−22.0%
MRVLMarvell Technology, Inc.	98	90	83	99	−28.6%
SNDKSandisk Corporation	100	100	79	95	−29.3%
APPAppLovin Corporation	84	82	98	86	−30.6%
GLWCorning Incorporated	98	87	94	85	−33.5%

The 3-year track record

Every month of the last 3 years — equal-weight, rebalanced each anchor, against SPY.

THE SCREEN · top 25% (percentile ≥ 75) on Market Beat · Trend Persistence · Money Flow · Business Growth · equal-weight · rebalanced each anchor · vs SPY.

Picks · 39 mo

+397.0%

SPY · same

+76.8%

Excess (cum)

+320 pp

Avg / month

+4.71%

Win rate vs SPY

67%

Avg basket

Cumulative growth — $1 in the basket vs SPY

PicksSPY

Monthly returns — basket vs SPY

PicksSPY

What this shows

Over the last three years the screen has comfortably out-earned the index — but it earns it the hard way. The edge is concentrated in a handful of explosive months and given partly back in sharp drawdowns; this is a momentum-and-quality basket, so it amplifies the market in both directions. The win rate (months it beats SPY) sits around three-in-five, not nine-in-ten.

The honest read: the screen has been a strong signal for where leadership is concentrated, not a smooth ride. Anyone treating it as a live strategy would feel the volatility and pay the turnover.

Read the fine print

Not investment advice by any means — this is just a computation from historical data, shown to illustrate how the screen would have behaved. The future is not obligated to rhyme.
Gross of costs. No commissions, spreads, or taxes. The basket turns over heavily each month (~5 names swapped), so real-world friction would meaningfully dent these figures.
Last 3 years only. A short, deliberate window using point-in-time data, but not completely free of survivorship bias.
Rebalanced at ~monthly anchors (≈28-day spacing, not calendar month-ends), holding from one anchor to the next; a month with no qualifying names sits in cash. Returns use split-adjusted closes; a name that delists mid-window is marked at its last trade.