Six Investment Themes Shaping 2026

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As we enter 2026, several themes stand out.

While markets often focus on the most obvious beneficiaries of emerging trends, we are increasingly interested in the bottlenecks, enabling infrastructure and second-order effects that sit beneath the surface.

Some of the most compelling opportunities emerge where multiple forces intersect including demographics, geopolitics, technology, capital flows and industrial policy. These areas often remain underappreciated until investor attention and momentum eventually catch up.

The following themes represent areas where we expect to spend much of our time researching in 2026.

1. The Business of Ageing

The world is ageing rapidly.

Declining birth rates and rising life expectancy are transforming demographics across much of the developed world. Yet we believe ageing is no longer simply a healthcare story. It is becoming a consumer, technology and capital allocation story.

The emergence of GLP-1 therapies has demonstrated the scale of demand for health optimisation and preventative care. While much investor attention remains focused on obesity treatments, we are increasingly interested in the broader shift towards longevity, peptides, biomarkers and personalised healthcare. After all, GLP-1s themselves are just one example of how peptide-based therapies may reshape healthcare over the coming decades.

Consumers are increasingly spending money to optimise physical performance, preserve appearance, extend healthspan and proactively manage their health. This trend is creating opportunities across diagnostics, biomarkers, preventative healthcare, aesthetics, hormone therapies, longevity clinics and consumer health platforms.

We believe this theme remains in its early stages. While a number of public companies provide exposure today, much of the innovation across longevity, diagnostics, peptides and personalised healthcare is still occurring within private and emerging businesses.

Rather than focusing solely on breakthrough therapies, we are interested in the broader shift towards health optimisation, prevention and personalised care. The most attractive opportunities may not necessarily be the companies curing disease, but those helping consumers live healthier, more productive lives for longer.

Companies We Are Monitoring:

• AbbVie
• Abbott Laboratories
• Danaher
• Thermo Fisher Scientific
• Tenet Healthcare
• Cynosure Lutronic (private)

What we're watching: Whether healthcare spending increasingly shifts from treatment toward prevention, optimisation and longevity.

2. Energy Security Is National Security

For decades, energy was primarily viewed as an economic issue, but today, it is increasingly a national security issue.

The combination of AI datacentres, electrification, industrial reshoring and geopolitical tensions is placing unprecedented demands on power systems. Across many regions, electricity demand is accelerating faster than infrastructure can be built.

The emerging bottleneck is often not generation itself, but transmission capacity, grid reliability and power distribution infrastructure.

We believe investors may be underestimating the scale of investment required to modernise electrical grids and expand energy infrastructure over the coming decade.

As a result, some of the most attractive opportunities may lie within the picks-and-shovels suppliers enabling power generation and delivery.

Companies We Are Monitoring:

• GE Vernova
• Siemens Energy
• Honeywell
• Kazatomprom
• Cameco
• BWX Technologies
• Rolls Royce

What we're watching: Whether datacenter power demand begins to outpace grid expansion, creating new bottlenecks across electricity infrastructure.

3. AI Infrastructure & Electrification

The first phase of the AI cycle was dominated by foundation models. The current phase is focused on the enormous datacentre and infrastructure buildout required to support them.

We believe the next phase may be driven by technological advances deeper within the AI stack. As workloads grow, the industry is increasingly focused on improving performance, reducing power consumption and overcoming bottlenecks across compute, memory, networking and optical connectivity.

At the same time, inference is emerging as a critical area of focus. As AI applications move into everyday use, the challenge shifts from training increasingly powerful models to delivering intelligence efficiently and economically at scale.

We are therefore increasingly interested in the companies enabling the next generation of AI infrastructure rather than solely the companies building the models themselves.

Companies We Are Monitoring:

• NVIDIA
• ASML
• TSMC
• Macom Technologies
• Lumentum Holdings
• Nokia
• Intel
• Cloudflare

What we're watching: Whether the next wave of AI value creation shifts from model development and datacentre construction towards inference, efficiency and performance improvements across the AI stack. 

4. Re-Architecting Global Supply Chains

The shift towards more resilient supply chains is now well understood by investors. Governments and corporations alike are seeking to reduce dependence on single countries, suppliers and strategic chokepoints.

What interests us is not the reshoring story itself, but the practical challenges of replicating supply chains that have taken decades to build.

While manufacturing capacity can often be added relatively quickly, many critical industries remain dependent on highly concentrated ecosystems, specialised expertise and complex processing infrastructure. Rare earth refining, lithium processing, advanced semiconductor manufacturing and battery production are just a few examples where alternative supply chains may prove far more difficult to establish than headline announcements suggest.

Rather than a reversal of globalisation, we see the emergence of parallel supply chains built around geopolitical alignment, trade deals and strategic redundancy. This transition is likely to create opportunities for companies that can become trusted suppliers within allied industrial ecosystems.

The beneficiaries may not necessarily be the end manufacturers, but the companies providing critical processing capacity, specialised components, engineering expertise and strategic industrial capabilities that are difficult to replace.

Companies We Are Monitoring:

• LG Energy Solution
• Samsung SDI
• CATL

What we're watching: Whether governments continue supporting the emergence of alternative supply chains in strategic industries where capacity, expertise and processing capabilities remain heavily concentrated.

5. Defence Beyond Defence

Defence was one of the strongest thematic trades of 2025, with significant capital flowing into global aerospace and defence equities as investors responded to rising geopolitical tensions, growing military budgets and rearmament efforts across Europe and Asia. Defence-focused ETFs and sector funds experienced strong inflows as the theme moved firmly into the mainstream.

While traditional defence contractors remain important, we believe the more interesting opportunities may increasingly lie one layer deeper.

Recent conflicts have highlighted the growing importance of drones, autonomous systems, electronic warfare, satellite communications, intelligence platforms and precision-guided systems. More importantly, they have exposed the industrial bottlenecks and strategic capabilities required to support modern defence ecosystems.

Rather than focusing solely on prime contractors, we are increasingly interested in the companies supplying critical infrastructure, specialised components, shipbuilding capacity, sensors, communications systems and industrial capabilities that may become increasingly difficult to replicate in a more fragmented geopolitical environment.

We are also interested in adjacent industries that can increasingly position themselves as strategic national assets. In a world where governments are prioritising resilience, sovereignty and domestic industrial capacity, the line between industrial policy and defence policy may continue to blur.

Companies We Are Monitoring:

• Huntington Ingalls Industries
• HD Hyundai Heavy Industries
• Hanwha Ocean

What we're watching: Whether defence spending increasingly shifts towards strategic industrial capacity, autonomous systems, communications infrastructure and specialised capabilities that sit beyond traditional defence primes. 

6. The Era of Strategic Mega Projects 

The world is entering a period of large capital investment cycles.

Semiconductor fabs, AI datacentres, LNG export facilities, power infrastructure, shipyards and advanced manufacturing facilities increasingly require investments measured in tens of billions of dollars. Governments and corporations alike are deploying capital at a scale rarely seen outside major economic or geopolitical transitions.

The trend itself is well understood. What interests us more is the nature of the projects being funded.

Many of today's largest projects are no longer purely commercial in nature. They increasingly sit at the intersection of national security, energy security, technological competitiveness and industrial policy. As countries seek to secure critical supply chains, expand domestic manufacturing capacity and strengthen strategic infrastructure, investment is becoming increasingly concentrated in areas deemed nationally important.

Rather than focusing solely on the eventual operators of these assets, we are more interested in the companies that design, build and equip them. In particular, we are attracted to businesses with specialised capabilities, engineering expertise or strategic positions that are difficult to replicate and increasingly aligned with long-term national priorities.

The beneficiaries may not simply be construction companies, but the firms providing critical industrial capabilities, specialised equipment and infrastructure expertise that enable these projects to move forward.

Companies We Are Monitoring:

• Amrize
• Penta-Ocean Construction

What we're watching: Whether the next wave of infrastructure spending becomes increasingly concentrated in projects linked to energy security, advanced manufacturing, AI infrastructure and strategic industrial capacity.

Closing Thoughts

The common thread across these themes is that the world appears to be moving from an era defined by efficiency towards one increasingly shaped by resilience, security and strategic capacity.

As investors, we are less interested in the obvious beneficiaries and more interested in the infrastructure, bottlenecks and second-order effects that sit beneath these trends. These are the areas where we expect to spend much of our time researching in 2026.