Welcome to The Monthly Compound — my personal recap of what happened in the world of money and investing from the last month, and most importantly, what I am doing about it.

📈 Equities: Global markets ended June with a split personality. The longer-term trend stayed strong, but the month itself was more volatile, with investors balancing AI optimism, oil-price shocks, and interest-rate uncertainty. Global equities still finished Q2 strongly.

🇺🇸 US shares: US markets bounced late in the month, but June still ended as the first losing month after two strong months. AI stocks remained the main driver, but also the main source of nerves, as investors questioned valuations.

🇬🇧 UK shares: The FTSE 100 quietly kept grinding higher, helped by financials, defence names, and relief as Middle East tensions eased. The UK market also benefited from being less exposed to the expensive AI trade.

🌏 Asia: Asia was mixed. AI and semiconductor-linked markets remained exciting but choppy, while China continued to struggle with weak demand and slowing growth concerns. The MSCI Asia Pacific ex-Japan index fell in June despite a strong quarter overall.

🏦 Interest rates: Central banks stayed cautious. The US Federal Reserve held rates at 3.5%–3.75%, while the Bank of England held UK Bank Rate at 3.75%. Notably, two Bank of England members wanted a rate rise, showing inflation concerns have not disappeared.

📉 Inflation: Inflation remained a key concern, but the official data available in June was still for May. UK CPI was 2.8% in the 12 months to May 2026, unchanged from April. US CPI was 4.2% in the 12 months to May 2026, with energy doing a lot of the damage. The actual June inflation figures had not yet been released by month-end. UK June CPI is due 22 July 2026, and US June CPI is due 14 July 2026.

🤖 Theme of the month: AI: still powerful, but no longer unquestioned. Investors still love the long-term AI story, especially chips and infrastructure, but June showed that even the best themes can wobble when expectations get too stretched.

June proved to be another positive month for investors, with most major global stock markets moving higher. My own portfolio followed suit, continuing its upward trend. Although markets experienced some volatility following tensions between Iran, Israel and the United States, sentiment improved towards the end of the month as a ceasefire reduced fears of a prolonged disruption to global energy supplies.

📈 Equities: The foundation of my portfolio. This month, I invested around 29% of my available investment capital into low-cost index funds, giving me ownership of thousands of companies across the world.

💷 Short-term Money Market Funds: My safety net and source of opportunistic capital. This month, 52% of my available investment capital went into short-term money market funds, giving me flexibility to invest should attractive opportunities arise.

🍷 Fine Wine: My alternative investment allocation. This month, around 19% of my investment capital went towards continuing to build my fine wine portfolio.

₿ Bitcoin: A small, higher-risk allocation. This month I invested around 1% of my available investment capital into Bitcoin, while ensuring it remains a controlled percentage of my overall portfolio.

💹 Growth: During June, my total personal portfolio increased by 1.9% compared with May, supported by continued contributions and resilient global markets.

Thoughts: I'm still very bullish on global equities and will continue investing consistently. At the same time, I'm deliberately building a cash reserve within my General Investment Account using short-term money market funds. This gives me dry powder to deploy if markets experience a meaningful correction.

I'm also continuing to build my fine wine portfolio, which now represents 3.4% of my overall wealth against my long-term target allocation of 5%. Bordeaux, Tuscany and Champagne remain in something of a bear market, creating opportunities to acquire exceptional wines at attractive prices.

Bitcoin had a difficult month, but I continued making my regular contribution. Given its volatility, I have no intention of allowing it to exceed 2% of my total portfolio.

Overall, nothing has changed. My strategy remains simple: keep investing regularly, stay globally diversified, hold enough liquidity to take advantage of opportunities, and allow time and compounding to do the heavy lifting.

Probably the most dramatic chart of the month.

Reuters reported that US-traded chipmakers lost about $1.3 trillion in market value, with the SOX index down 10.3%, NVIDIA down about 6%, Micron down 13%, Marvell down 17%, AMD down almost 11%, and Broadcom down 7.9%.

The main drivers:

Good news was no longer good enough. Broadcom’s AI-chip demand disappointed versus expectations, and that rattled confidence across the whole AI hardware trade.

The trade had become crowded. Lots of investors were effectively buying every dip in AI/semiconductors. When that stopped working, selling accelerated quickly.

Valuations were fragile. When shares are already expensive, even a small wobble in the growth story can cause a big re-pricing.

Higher-rate fears made it worse. Stronger jobs data raised worries that interest rates could stay higher, which hits long-duration growth stocks harder.

Source: Reuters.

Every day I browse social media and read about other people's investing journeys. Time and time again, I see the same mistake being made: a lack of diversification.

This month's Chart of the Month is a classic example of what can happen when hype takes over. Investors become convinced that a handful of fashionable, expensive growth stocks can only keep rising, and many end up concentrating almost their entire portfolio in just a few names.

When sentiment changes, the losses are brutal.

I've seen countless portfolios down by double-digit percentages over the past month because they were heavily concentrated in a small number of AI and technology stocks. By contrast, my own portfolio finished 1.9% higher than May.

There is no secret formula.

I don't try to predict the next winning stock. I simply own thousands of companies across the world through low-cost, globally diversified index funds. Some markets will disappoint, others will outperform—but together they help smooth the journey and reduce the risk that one poor investment decision derails years of progress.

Diversification won't maximise returns every month. But it can stop one bad decision from becoming a financial disaster.

The Compounder
Long-term investing made simple.

The Compounder is for financial education and commentary only. I am not authorised or regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and I do not provide financial advice, investment advice, or personal recommendations. Nothing published here should be taken as a recommendation to buy, sell, hold or switch any investment, fund, pension, ISA, crypto asset or financial product. Always do your own research and consider speaking to an FCA-authorised financial adviser if you are unsure.