TOWLE & CO

The sold positions read like a catalog of the riskiest 2024-2025 small-cap trades: Anywhere Real Estate, Cushman & Wakefield, Lyft, AutoNation, Sonic Automotive, Ally Financial, Alaska Air, Metallus, Sanmina, and Titan International all left the portfolio. Those exits alone accounted for roughly $120M in proceeds, explaining most of the AUM decline. Within positions that remained, the cuts were just as aggressive: Blooomin Brands fell 76%, Zumiez 39%, Bluelinx 37%, Leggett & Platt 37%, Alpha Metallurgical 37%, Ryerson 36%, Fox Factory 37%, and Healthcare Services Group 44%.

New capital was redeployed into noticeably more defensive and stable cash-flow businesses. The largest debut was Deluxe Corp's medium-term notes at $8.0M, providing fixed-income exposure. On the equity side, the advisor added Ingles Markets ($6.3M), a supermarket chain; Molina Healthcare ($3.7M) and Oscar Health ($3.2M) for government-sponsored health insurance; NOV Inc ($6.3M) and Stepan Co ($5.3M) for energy-industrial balance; Insperity ($4.9M) for business-services stability; Capitol Fed Financial ($3.4M) and Compass Inc ($4.6M) for regional-bank and real-estate brokerage exposure; and Arrow Electronics ($6.4M) for component distribution.