My 3 Best Buys For 2026

Three stocks I have high conviction on for next year (and why)

I write this newsletter on December 23rd, 2025, before taking a little break for the Christmas/New Year’s holiday.

You may ask: why write a “cliche” newsletter with this title?

This is an exercise to get me thinking about my portfolio allocation for 2026. Allocation is just as important as stock analysis. That is why Nelnet has been such an important winner for me, having outperformed the market while being a 15%+ position since 2021. It doesn’t matter if you are right if it is a 0.5% position.

Calendar year returns are not necessarily what I am after in my personal portfolio, but performing one of these exercises every 12 months is a good practice, and it feels right to do this at the start of the new year. Additionally, I typically have a significant amount of excess savings at the beginning of every year due to the timing of tax payments as a sole proprietor/LLC owner.

For the three stocks below, I will outline why they are my top picks for 2026, provide an update on the current state of the businesses, and describe my trading plan for the year.

Here is my portfolio as of this writing on December 23rd: