David Hay — Haymaker Daily: Has the Sun Already Set on American Market Exceptionalism? — the S&P is up ~12½% on a broad advance, yet the celebrity managers are all behind it and, per Minack, the US market has lagged MSCI ex-US since the start of 2025 — despite record tech inflows ($216bn annualized, per Hartnett/BofA); when those epic inflows turn to outflows the fully invested, AI-concentrated US index funds take the pressure, and the long-overdue rotation into international equities is already underway (Sep 2 2026)

A three-chart Daily built as a puzzle, not a polemic. The setup concedes the bull case in full: "the S&P 500 is up roughly 12 ½% this year on a total return basis. Moreover, this year's advance has been broader than in the past. The equally weighted S&P index is actually slightly ahead of that most respectable number" — i.e. this is not the narrow, few-stocks tape that is easy to dismiss. The first anomaly is the professionals: "despite this generally inclusive rally, a number of high-profile money managers have been materially lagging," and the point is the spread of the failure — "it is interesting that both growth- (Cathie Wood) and value-oriented investors (David Einhorn and Bill Ackman) are lagging," with "the late-in-life dog rescuer, Carl Icahn," said to have "a number of canines in his portfolio." (The table, from @AskLivermore and relayed by "our Kiwi friend Trader Ferg, a stock-picking legend in the making," has SPY +12.6% against GLRE +8.5%, ARKK +8.0%, BRK.B +1.6%, PSH −0.8%, IEP −9.4% and MSTR −19.0%.) The second anomaly is the index itself: "Gerard Minack, our great mate from Down Under, recently ran this interesting chart revealing that the U.S. market itself has been lagging overseas indexes since the start of 2025. As regular Haymaker readers know, we have been bullish on international markets in recent years." Why that is strange is stated rather than assumed — "considering the mammoth inflows into U.S. equities due to the AI boom/mania, and the related proliferation of trillion-dollar-plus market caps in the S&P, this is surprising" — because the money did arrive, and went where expected: "what isn't surprising is that tech has been the main destination for both on- and off-shore investors" (Michael Hartnett's BofA chart: tech-fund inflows on pace for a record $216bn in 2026 against a prior ceiling near $80bn). The inference is the whole note: "it's reasonable to assume that already underperforming U.S. shares will trail overseas markets to an even greater extent should — we'd argue, when — these epic inflows shift into outflows. This has the very real potential to place significant downward pressure on the fully invested U.S. index funds which are also highly concentrated in AI-related shares." And the positioning follows: "American investors remain dramatically underweight foreign markets. Few seem to realize the long-overdue rotation into international equities is well underway… we have a long list of what we believe are attractive overseas stocks populating our coverage universe."

One-line take: the allocation counterpart to the week's rates Dailies — where Sep-01 asked why the bond market broke its base rate, this one asks why the equity leadership has quietly broken its own, and answers with a flow argument rather than a valuation one. The construction is disciplined in a way that is easy to miss because the note is short. Hay gives away every point that favours the bulls first: the S&P is up "roughly 12 ½%," the advance is "broader than in the past," and — the hardest fact for a bear — "the equally weighted S&P index is actually slightly ahead," which pre-empts the standard "it's only seven stocks" rebuttal before it can be made. Only from that concession does he introduce the two anomalies. The first is that the professionals cannot keep up with a broad tape, and the diagnostic value is in who is failing: growth (ARKK) and deep value (GLRE, PSH) and the compounders (BRK.B) and the leveraged-beta proxy (MSTR) are all behind, which rules out "wrong style" as the explanation and points at something the index has that discretionary portfolios structurally cannot: concentration in the megacap AI complex. The table is properly caveated in its own footnote — these are share-price returns, not NAV returns, so discounts and premiums are doing part of the work (Pershing Square's NAV was −7.1% versus a −0.8% share return) — and Hay treats it as a sampling, "a small sampling of celebrity investors," rather than a study. The second anomaly is the one that carries the thesis: per Minack Advisors, MSCI US has been losing to MSCI All Country ex-US since the start of 2025. Hay then does the thing that separates this from a bearish talking point — he states plainly why that fact should not be true. The inflows were enormous, they were concentrated in exactly the shares that dominate the US index, and they produced "the proliferation of trillion-dollar-plus market caps." Hartnett's chart quantifies it: tech-fund inflows annualizing at $216bn in 2026, roughly three times any prior year on record. The US market underperformed anyway, while receiving the largest flow in the data. That is the whole argument, and it is a good one, because it isolates flow as the only support that could plausibly be holding the relative line — and flow is the least durable input there is. Hence the conditional, and the deliberate correction inside it: US shares will trail "to an even greater extent should — we'd argue, when — these epic inflows shift into outflows," with the damage landing on "the fully invested U.S. index funds," which by construction cannot raise cash and are "highly concentrated in AI-related shares." Note the asymmetry claim embedded there: the passive vehicle that absorbed the inflow is the same vehicle that must sell into the outflow. The close is positioning rather than prophecy — Americans "remain dramatically underweight foreign markets," the rotation is "well underway," and Haymaker has "a long list" of overseas names in its coverage universe. What is rowed: the seven vehicles printed in the relayed performance table are recorded at Neutral as cited data — Hay takes no view on any of them, and the managers themselves (Wood, Einhorn, Ackman, Icahn, Buffett, Saylor) are people, not securities. SPY is the exception and is rowed Negative, because the S&P index vehicle is the actual object of the argument's conclusion. No international vehicle or overseas stock is named — the "long list" is referenced but withheld — so none is inferred.

1. Stocks & names mentioned

Six of the seven rows come from a third-party performance table the post reproduces (@AskLivermore, relayed by Trader Ferg) and are recorded as cited data at Neutral — Hay expresses no view on any of them. Only SPY carries an argued stance. The managers named in the prose (Cathie Wood, David Einhorn, Bill Ackman, Carl Icahn) and the analysts cited (Gerard Minack of Minack Advisors, Michael Hartnett of BofA) are people, not securities. The "long list of… attractive overseas stocks" in Haymaker's coverage universe is referenced but not enumerated, so no international name is inferred.

2. Key points

Ticker	Name	Research	View	What he said	At
GLRE	Greenlight Capital Re	QT · SA · STK · FA	Neutral	Cited as data — David Einhorn's publicly traded vehicle in the relayed manager-performance table, not a stock call. Shown at +8.5% YTD 2026 versus SPY's +12.6%, i.e. −4.1% against the index as of Aug 28, 2026. Its role in the argument is to establish that the shortfall spans styles: "it is interesting that both growth- (Cathie Wood) and value-oriented investors (David Einhorn and Bill Ackman) are lagging." The table is explicitly "a small sampling of celebrity investors" relayed "to Team Haymaker by our Kiwi friend Trader Ferg," sourced to @AskLivermore, and its own footnote warns that these are share-price returns which "may differ from stock price returns due to discounts/premiums." No view, valuation or recommendation is offered on the shares.	read ↗
ARKK	ARK Innovation ETF	QT · SA · STK	Neutral	Cited as data — Cathie Wood's vehicle in the relayed table, the growth-side data point. +8.0% YTD 2026, −4.6% versus SPY as of Aug 28, 2026. It is paired deliberately with the value managers to make the note's first point — that the underperformance is style-agnostic, so it cannot be explained away as growth being out of favour or value being out of favour. That in turn is what points the argument at index concentration in the megacap AI complex as the thing discretionary portfolios could not match. No stance on the fund is taken.	read ↗
BRK.B	Berkshire Hathaway	QT · SA · STK · FA	Neutral	Cited as data — Warren Buffett's vehicle in the relayed table. +1.6% YTD 2026, −11.0% versus SPY as of Aug 28, 2026 — the compounder line in a list assembled to show that no discretionary style kept pace with a broad index. Not named in Hay's prose (which singles out Wood, Einhorn, Ackman and Icahn); it appears only in the table image. No view is offered — Hay's own prior Berkshire reference in the archive is the unrelated Jun-19 note on its Macy's stake.	read ↗
PSH	Pershing Square Holdings (Euronext Amsterdam)	STK	Neutral	Cited as data — Bill Ackman's listed vehicle in the relayed table, the second value-side data point. −0.8% YTD 2026, −13.4% versus SPY as of Aug 28, 2026. The table's own footnote supplies the caveat that matters most here: "Pershing Square NAV return was −7.1% as of Aug 18 per official weekly report," i.e. the closed-end discount moved in the opposite direction to the portfolio, so the quoted share return understates the underlying loss. Listed on Euronext Amsterdam, not a US exchange. No stance is taken.	read ↗
IEP	Icahn Enterprises LP	QT · SA · STK · FA	Neutral	Cited as data — Carl Icahn's vehicle in the relayed table, and the one Hay jokes about. −9.4% YTD 2026, −22.0% versus SPY as of Aug 28, 2026: "additionally, the late-in-life dog rescuer, Carl Icahn, apparently has a number of canines in his portfolio." The quip is aimed at the holdings inside the vehicle rather than at IEP units as an instrument, and no valuation, target or recommendation follows it — so it is rowed Neutral rather than Negative.	read ↗
MSTR	MicroStrategy (Strategy)	QT · SA · STK · FA	Neutral	Cited as data — Michael Saylor's vehicle, the worst line in the relayed table. −19.0% YTD 2026, −31.6% versus SPY as of Aug 28, 2026. Like BRK.B it appears in the table image only and is not mentioned in Hay's prose; its function is to extend the range of the sample to the levered-proxy end, reinforcing that the whole spectrum of celebrated approaches trailed a broad index year. No view on the shares, on the strategy, or on Bitcoin is expressed in this note.	read ↗
SPY	SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust	QT · SA · STK	Negative	The object of the note's conclusion — the US index vehicle Hay expects to keep losing to overseas markets and to absorb the damage when flows reverse. The bull case is conceded first and in full: "the S&P 500 is up roughly 12 ½% this year on a total return basis," the advance is "broader than in the past," and "the equally weighted S&P index is actually slightly ahead" — which removes the narrow-breadth objection rather than relying on it. The bear case is then built from relative performance and flows, not valuation. Per Gerard Minack, "the U.S. market itself has been lagging overseas indexes since the start of 2025," and that is called out as anomalous given the support it received — "considering the mammoth inflows into U.S. equities due to the AI boom/mania, and the related proliferation of trillion-dollar-plus market caps in the S&P, this is surprising," with Michael Hartnett's BofA chart putting 2026 tech-fund inflows on pace for a record ~$216bn. The conclusion is a flow asymmetry: "already underperforming U.S. shares will trail overseas markets to an even greater extent should — we'd argue, when — these epic inflows shift into outflows. This has the very real potential to place significant downward pressure on the fully invested U.S. index funds which are also highly concentrated in AI-related shares." SPY is also the table's own benchmark line, at +12.6% YTD. No price target or timing is given — the claim is directional and relative to international equities.	read ↗

The concession — the bull case is granted in full, first

"The S&P 500 is up roughly 12 ½% this year on a total return basis" — the number is called "most respectable," not dismissed.
Breadth is conceded too, and it is the concession that costs the most: "this year's advance has been broader than in the past. The equally weighted S&P index is actually slightly ahead of that most respectable number."
That pre-empts the usual bearish shortcut. A rally the equal-weight index is winning cannot be waved away as seven stocks, so the argument that follows has to be made on other grounds — and is.

Anomaly one — the professionals cannot keep up with a broad tape

"Despite this generally inclusive rally, a number of high-profile money managers have been materially lagging the S&P" — the framing is the puzzle, since a broader market is normally the environment stock-pickers do best in.
The diagnostic is the spread across styles, stated explicitly: "it is interesting that both growth- (Cathie Wood) and value-oriented investors (David Einhorn and Bill Ackman) are lagging."
The one editorial line in the section is a joke at Icahn's expense: "the late-in-life dog rescuer, Carl Icahn, apparently has a number of canines in his portfolio."
Provenance and humility are both supplied: it is "a small sampling of celebrity investors," relayed "by our Kiwi friend Trader Ferg, a stock-picking legend in the making, in our view," and sourced to @AskLivermore.

The table itself — and the caveat inside it

As of Aug 28, 2026: SPY +12.6% · GLRE +8.5% (−4.1%) · ARKK +8.0% (−4.6%) · BRK.B +1.6% (−11.0%) · PSH −0.8% (−13.4%) · IEP −9.4% (−22.0%) · MSTR −19.0% (−31.6%).
The footnote flags the measurement problem rather than hiding it: these are publicly traded stock/unit prices, and "fund NAV returns may differ from stock price returns due to discounts/premiums."
The worked example runs the other way for Ackman — "Pershing Square NAV return was −7.1% as of Aug 18" against a −0.8% share return, so the discount narrowed while the portfolio lost money.
Read carefully, the table is evidence about listed vehicles, not a clean league table of investment skill — which is why every row here is rowed as cited data.

Anomaly two — the US index has been losing to the world since early 2025

"Gerard Minack, our great mate from Down Under, recently ran this interesting chart revealing that the U.S. market itself has been lagging overseas indexes since the start of 2025."
The chart (Minack Advisors, MSCI data) plots MSCI US against MSCI All Country ex-US in total-return terms, marks the ChatGPT release in early 2023, peaks in early 2025 and has rolled over since — so the relative top is dated to roughly the moment the AI trade became consensus.
The house position is restated as long-standing, not newly minted: "as regular Haymaker readers know, we have been bullish on international markets in recent years."

Why that is surprising — the flow that should have prevented it

"Considering the mammoth inflows into U.S. equities due to the AI boom/mania, and the related proliferation of trillion-dollar-plus market caps in the S&P, this is surprising."
This is the note's best analytical move: the fact that weakens the thesis is stated as a genuine surprise instead of being suppressed. The US underperformed while receiving the largest inflow in the data.
The destination is exactly where expected: "what isn't surprising is that tech has been the main destination for both on- and off-shore investors."
Michael Hartnett's BofA chart sizes it — annual cumulative tech-fund flows since 2015, with 2026 annualizing at $216bn against a prior ceiling around $80bn. Roughly three times any previous year.

The inference — what happens when the flow turns

"Accordingly, it's reasonable to assume that already underperforming U.S. shares will trail overseas markets to an even greater extent should — we'd argue, when — these epic inflows shift into outflows."
The mid-sentence correction of "should" to "when" is the forecast, and it is the only unconditional claim in the note.
The transmission is mechanical, not sentimental: "significant downward pressure on the fully invested U.S. index funds which are also highly concentrated in AI-related shares" — a passive vehicle holds no cash buffer, so redemptions force sales of the most-owned names.
The implied asymmetry: the same vehicles that were the destination of the record inflow are the ones with no discretion when it reverses.

The positioning — and what is withheld

"Reflecting this intense crowding into domestic tech, American investors remain dramatically underweight foreign markets."
The rotation is described as already in progress rather than forecast: "few seem to realize the long-overdue rotation into international equities is well underway."
The call to action points at the coverage universe without naming it here: "Haymaker readers should be aware we have a long list of what we believe are attractive overseas stocks populating our coverage universe."
Connects to the standing international bias visible across the archive (Japan, Korea, emerging markets, China) — but no vehicle or overseas company is named in this post, so none is added on its account.

Housekeeping

Three images accompany the post: the @AskLivermore manager table (transcribed in the saved article text), the Minack Advisors relative-performance chart, and the BofA/Hartnett tech-flows chart (both charts noted as placeholders).
Dating slip in the original: the prose says managers "have been materially lagging the S&P in 2025," but the table it introduces is headed "How Are the Legends Doing in 2026?" and is dated Aug 28, 2026. Read as a typo for 2026; the text is kept verbatim.
Signed "The Haymaker Team."

3. In plain English

SPY — SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust Negative

SPY is the fund that simply owns the S&P 500 — buy it and you own America's 500 largest listed companies in proportion to their size. Because the biggest companies are now the AI-related technology giants, a very large share of the fund is concentrated in a handful of names, whether the buyer intended that or not.

Hay begins by giving the fund its due, and this matters because it is the opposite of what a bearish note usually does. The S&P is up about 12½% this year including dividends. More importantly, the gain has not come only from the giants: the "equally weighted" version of the index — which holds the same 500 companies but in equal amounts, so a small company counts as much as a huge one — is actually doing slightly better. That kills the standard complaint that the market is being propped up by a few stocks. On the surface, this is a healthy, broad advance.

Then he lays out two things that don't fit. The first: professional investors who are famous for beating the market have all fallen behind it this year — the growth specialist, the value specialists, the great compounder, the activist. When every style fails at once, the explanation isn't that one style was out of favour; it's that the index has something none of them could hold enough of. That something is the enormous, concentrated position in AI-related megacaps.

The second doesn't fit at all, and Hay says so openly. Since the start of 2025, the US market has actually been losing to markets outside the US. He calls this surprising, because it should not have happened: money has been pouring into US equities on the back of the AI boom, and specifically into technology funds, which this year are on pace to take in roughly $216 billion — around three times any prior year on record. A market receiving the largest inflow ever recorded should be leading, not trailing.

His conclusion follows from that gap. If the US is already underperforming while being flooded with money, then the money is the only thing holding the line — and money flows reverse. He is deliberate about how confident he is: US shares will lag international markets by even more "should — we'd argue, when — these epic inflows shift into outflows." He changes "if" to "when" mid-sentence, and that is the forecast.

The part worth understanding is why he singles out index funds for the damage. An active manager holding cash can meet withdrawals without selling. An index fund cannot — it is always fully invested by design, so when investors pull money out, it must sell shares in exact proportion to what it owns. And what it owns most of is the AI complex that everyone else also owns most of. So the vehicle that absorbed the record inflow becomes a forced seller of the most crowded stocks in the market, which is the mechanism that turns an ordinary outflow into an outsized decline.

The other side of the trade is the one he actually wants readers to act on: Americans hold very little outside the US, the shift toward international stocks has already quietly started, and Haymaker keeps a list of overseas names it likes. He does not name any of them in this note.

Written Haymaker Daily — no video and no timestamps; the "read ↗" links open the source post. Six of the seven rows are performance data points from a third-party table the post reproduces (@AskLivermore, relayed by Trader Ferg), recorded at Neutral with no view attached; only SPY carries an argued stance. Summary derived from the paid Haymaker Daily (text in transcript.txt) for personal study. The Minack Advisors and BofA charts referenced in the original are described rather than reproduced. Not investment advice. © Haymaker / David Hay for source material.