Should we chase storage now?

Yesterday, SanDisk surged another 11.8%. As of the US stock market close on April 13th, its year-to-date gain has exceeded 300%, making it one of the brightest stars in the first half of this year. Investors who bought SanDisk have indeed made a killing. Actually, I've been paying attention to Micron and the memory sector for a long time, about half a year or more, watching these two brothers charge ahead, but I never bought. On the other hand, NVIDIA and some of the Magnificent Seven haven't performed as brilliantly this year. With such a comparison, it's hard not to feel restless, even having the urge to immediately add positions in Micron and SanDisk. But after calming down and thinking it over, I finally decided to let it go, and not chase this money for now.

It's not about giving up, but I realized this is actually a recurring problem I'll face in the future: when a market theme is hot, but I have more faith in my own core strategy, should I chase it or not?

Actually, what I'm struggling with isn't whether to buy SanDisk or Micron at all, but:

Knowing full well the theme is strong, afraid of missing out if I don't get on board;
Once on board, feeling uneasy, always feeling it's not something I truly understand;
Holding assets I have more faith in, yet constantly being tempted by others' gains;
Finally realizing that what I really need to resolve isn't "whether to chase memory," but "whether to disrupt my own system for a hot theme."

When market volatility hit due to the Middle East war recently, I bought a fair amount of NVIDIA and Google. Later, during the rebound, although the gains weren't as explosive as SanDisk's, I still made a small profit. Actually, market downturns are the ultimate test of human nature. And it's only in those moments that you truly see clearly what you dare to buy.

Often, the companies you're truly willing to keep adding to during a decline are the ones you understand best and trust the most.

My feelings about NVIDIA have always been very clear:

When it falls, I'm willing to add, and the more I add, the more at ease I feel;
When it rises, what bothers me isn't "not making enough," but "not buying enough";
Facing negative news, my first thought isn't "this company is done," but rather: it most likely has the ability to recover.

This, in the end, is a conviction in holding. And I think one of the most valuable things in investing is precisely this.

My judgment on NVIDIA, or more broadly, on the US stock Magnificent Seven, essentially has three layers of logic.

The first layer is business quality.

The Magnificent Seven are essentially America's top-tier tech assets, possessing:

Extremely strong cash flow;
Extremely high talent density;
Extremely strong capital expenditure capability;
Extremely strong market niches and brands;
And, after problems arise, an extremely strong self-repair capability.

The second layer is risk perception.

In my view, once a small company has a problem, it's often not about "recovery," but about "falling behind directly."

The problems for the Magnificent Seven are usually:

Slowing growth;
Regulatory pressure;
A temporary slowdown in a certain business line;
Cyclical pullback;
Multiple compression.

But the problems for small companies are often:

Insufficient competitiveness;
Cash flow breaking;
Management mistakes;
One wrong strategic call, and it's hard to turn things around.

For example, we saw META's stock collapse with its metaverse push, but the company internally adjusted in time, and the stock price eventually recovered and kept hitting new highs. Google, facing AI potentially replacing search, saw its stock halved, but with Gemini, TPU, and Google Cloud as a second growth engine developing, its stock price doubled last year. Even though Microsoft is constantly used in the "software will be rewritten by AI" narrative, the market can hardly easily ignore its product capabilities, channel strength, and cash flow power.
As the old saying goes, a starved camel is still bigger than a horse. Big companies aren't that easy to kill.

This saying sounds a bit cliché, but behind it lies very realistic business logic. As the old saying goes, a starved camel is still bigger than a horse. For investors, this characteristic of "not easily falling behind" is itself a very important source of security.

And in investing, peace of mind is never a small thing. Because the system that truly makes money is often not the one with the "highest theoretical return," but the one "you can still execute during a drawdown."

The third layer is system fit.

Some people are naturally suited to digging for small caps, reversals, and rotating through sector themes, and they can indeed make that money. But others are more suited to focusing on the strongest assets and going deep repeatedly.

Investing, in the end, must match one's own circle of competence.

For me, the US stock Magnificent Seven are exactly that kind of asset: I'm willing to research them long-term, hold them long-term, and also keep buying when they fall. They might not be the top performers every single period, but they are strong enough, big enough, clear enough, and I understand them well enough.

So, back to the initial question: should I chase memory now?

My answer is: at least this time, no.

Not because memory is no good, nor because SanDisk and Micron have no opportunity, but because if this money is something I want to chase just because "others are surging too much, I'm afraid of missing out," then it wasn't a trade made according to my system from the very beginning.

People truly suited to making money long-term aren't necessarily those who participate in every hot theme, but those who know what money to make and what money they can let go.

For me, the core strategy is more important than hot themes, and the system is more important than temporary gains.

Since that's the case, then I'll stick to my core strategy.

As for memory, I missed this ride, so let it pass.