AIA Newsletter June 2026 — Investment Implications of US Strategic Defeat in Middle East

Presidio doesn't hunt for oil — it buys wells that are already pumping from owners who run them poorly, then squeezes more cash out of them (it cut operating costs on acquired fields by 47% on average within a year). It locks in prices ahead of time ("hedging" — selling future production at today's prices so a crash doesn't hurt), and hands the predictable cash to shareholders as a dividend targeting about 13% a year, which management intends to grow.

Polomny calls this a "dripping roast" — a holding that steadily drips income while you wait, with a kicker: if the dividend grows, the share price should follow. The just-signed $83M Canyon Creek acquisition is the model in action (expected to lift the annual dividend from $1.35 to $1.50). Main risk: wells naturally deplete ~8% a year, so the company must keep finding good acquisitions just to stand still. He also owns the warrants — a leveraged side-bet on the same company that could multiply if things go well but can expire worthless.

A London-listed fund holding Uzbek companies — essentially the only easy way for outsiders to buy a slice of Uzbekistan. The country has compounded 6–7% growth for years and sits at the center of the re-emerging Central-Asian "Silk Road" trade routes, but its stock market is tiny and ignored. Polomny's bet is that as money starts flowing in, the market catches up to the economy. Frontier-market risk applies: thin trading, currency risk, and governance you have to take on faith.

Abacus buys life-insurance policies from people who no longer want them, paying more than the insurer's surrender offer and collecting the eventual payout — plus a growing asset-management arm around that niche. The market prices it as a fast-growth story, so a merely-good quarter (revenue a bit light, expenses up, guidance leaning on the second half) knocked the stock down.

Polomny's point: the underlying machine still works — very high margins, returns on capital in the high teens, more operating cash, raised guidance, buybacks — and at ~$9 you paid only ~9× this year's expected earnings for it. He stays bullish long-term; the market just hasn't given the growth credit yet.

A uranium developer whose Dasa mine in Niger still needs the big money (debt or a partner) to finish construction. While waiting, the company set up an "ATM" — permission to quietly sell new shares into the market for cash — which dilutes existing holders. Polomny holds it but is blunt: highly speculative, only for money you can afford to lose.

GMS rents out self-propelled jack-up barges — work platforms that stand on legs next to offshore oil, gas and wind installations so crews can maintain them. The Iran war disrupted four of its vessels in the Gulf last quarter (hence soft numbers), but all are back at work and management kept its full-year guidance. Polomny owns it for the broader offshore-services upcycle: more offshore work means tight vessel supply and rising day rates. "I remain patient."

Ivanhoe operates Kamoa-Kakula in the DRC, one of the world's biggest and highest-grade copper mines, plus a record-setting zinc mine (Kipushi) and a giant platinum-metals project (Platreef) ramping up. The headline Q1 loss was an accounting one-off — a $183M tax settlement — not operations: costs came in below guidance, and the new on-site smelter turns a waste by-product (sulphuric acid, which other miners must buy) into roughly a million dollars a day of extra income.

His stance is simple: copper is going higher, mines that produce for decades are the way to own that, and he'll buy more if an Iran resolution knocks commodity stocks down.

Liquidia sells YUTREPIA, an inhaled dry-powder drug for high blood pressure in the lungs (PAH/PH-ILD). Three quarters after launch it's already profitable — ~$130M of quarterly sales, ~$53M net income — and doctors report patients tolerate it better than the incumbent inhaled therapy, so it now leads the category's growth.

The overhang is a patent-court decision (the "327" ruling from Judge Andrews). If it isn't negative, Polomny expects the uncertainty discount to lift — a "re-rate" — and thinks clean legal title could even invite a takeover at much higher prices.

A small Argentina-focused gold miner whose new Calcatreu project just started up. It uses heap leaching — ore is piled up and a solution trickles through it for weeks, dissolving the gold before it's collected — so the first real production numbers arrive a couple of months after start-up (he expects a clear read by end of Q2). The press releases are thin because insiders own most of the company, but the regulatory filings read positively. He's bullish: real production starting, plus exploration "bluesky" — undrilled ground that could grow the story.

PetroTal pumps oil in the Peruvian Amazon and ships it out by river. The war-elevated oil price transformed its numbers: quarterly cash earnings up 90%, and full-year guidance nearly tripled (to $110–120M of EBITDA from $30–40M). Production itself is temporarily capped — the drilling rig doesn't start new wells until October and the field needs more water-disposal capacity — so this is mostly a price story for now. He holds "for the duration of the Gulf crisis."

This trust simply buys and stores physical uranium — owning units is owning the metal itself, without betting on any single miner's execution. Polomny's conviction got a demand exclamation point this month: India's high commissioner to Canada said India "would buy as much uranium as Cameco can produce" and wants to invest in Canadian mines directly. "Uranium is going much higher in my view."

Seabridge owns gold "in the ground" — including KSM in British Columbia, one of the world's largest undeveloped gold-copper projects — rather than operating mines. Two catalysts this month: shareholders approved spinning off the Courageous Lake project into a new TSX-listed company (existing holders get those shares free — value separated out, "a nice bonus"), and management appears close to landing the long-awaited partner to fund KSM's construction, which is the event the whole thesis waits on.

Tidewater runs the world's largest fleet of offshore support vessels — the ships that ferry crews, supplies and equipment to offshore rigs. The war cut both ways: higher insurance and crew costs in the Gulf, but utilization actually beat expectations, and a 22-vessel Brazilian acquisition closes this quarter. The bigger idea: Hormuz scared the world into diversifying oil supply away from the Persian Gulf, and most non-Gulf supply means offshore work. The offshore bull market was underway before the war; the war extends it. A long-term hold.

A Norwegian owner of harsh-environment offshore drilling rigs. One rig dropped its blowout preventer (the giant safety valve on the seabed) and paused work — but it's insured, including for the lost revenue, and a backup unit exists. To subscribers asking if the dip is an entry: he points out the CEO and CFO have been buying stock with their own money, and insiders "buy for one reason: because they think the price is going higher."