Period 12 Review: Quality Growth's Third Straight Win as CANSLIM Falls Below Both Benchmarks

Period 12 covers June 27 to July 4, 2026 — seven calendar days in which the factor rotation that hit technology names in Period 11 partly eased, while a handful of individual stock moves reshaped the leaderboard's edges more than any broad theme. Four screens were positive, three negative, and the spread between best and worst narrowed to 6.06 percentage points — Quality Growth at +3.38% and CANSLIM Rocket at −2.68% — down from Period 11's 9.00-point spread. The bigger story sits underneath the weekly numbers: two consecutive negative periods for CANSLIM have erased a lead that had held for ten straight periods.

The period's structural headline is CANSLIM's cumulative return falling below both benchmark indices for the first time in the journal. At +7.89% cumulative, CANSLIM now trails the S&P 500's +10.35% and the NASDAQ's +13.81% — having beaten the S&P 500 in every one of the first ten periods and only slipped below the NASDAQ in Period 11. Quality Growth, meanwhile, extended its own record: its +20.55% cumulative return keeps it as the only screen ahead of both benchmarks, and its +3.38% this period marks the first time any strategy in the journal has posted the best single-period result three periods running.

Period 12 Returns: A Narrower Spread, A Bigger Milestone

Quality Growth topped the table for a third consecutive period, though its +3.38% this time was its smallest winning margin of the streak. Piotroski F-Score turned in its best single-period result in the journal at +2.69%, a sharp reversal from Period 11's −1.08%. Lunch extended its positive run to a third straight period at +2.38%. Magic Formula returned to positive territory at +0.72% after Period 11's commodity-cluster losses. Burry Value and Schloss Dividend both turned mildly negative, and CANSLIM closed last for a second consecutive period.

Quality Growth's +3.38% came from a clean sweep of gains save one position, in a six-name portfolio at 16.67% equal weight. DAVE (Dave Inc.) led with +11.08%, from $348.71 to $387.36, contributing approximately +1.85 percentage points. FICO (Fair Isaac) added +7.44% (+1.24 points), and SEZL (Sezzle) nearly matched it at +7.43% from $170.56 to $183.24 (+1.24 points) — its fourth consecutive positive period. NBIX (Neurocrine Biosciences) gained +3.41% (+0.57 points) and CNX (CNX Resources) added a marginal +0.33% (+0.06 points). The only drag was AUPH (Aurinia Pharmaceuticals), which fell −9.40% from $17.23 to $15.61, subtracting approximately −1.57 points — the single largest position-level swing of any screen this period. All six positions were retained; the screen held 100% of its starting portfolio for a second straight period.

Piotroski's +2.69% is its best single-period result in twelve periods, well ahead of its previous high of +1.18% set in Period 3. GDYN (Grid Dynamics) surged +11.33%, from $5.47 to $6.09, contributing approximately +0.76 percentage points at the 6.67% weight. GLOB (Globant SA) added +8.26% (+0.55 points), WDH (Waterdrop Inc.) rebounded +8.11% (+0.54 points) after a rough Period 11, LUXE gained +7.07% (+0.47 points), MOMO (Hello Group) +4.82% (+0.32 points), and USNA (USANA Health Sciences) +3.91% (+0.26 points). These six names contributed roughly +2.90 combined points. Against them, SD (SandRidge Energy) fell −2.00% (−0.13 points) and ASC (ArcelorMittal South Africa) −1.72% (−0.11 points). Three positions — API, RLX (RLX Technology), and SSSS — exited at the sell fee, each subtracting the standard −0.10% (−0.007 points apiece). NSLR enters the screen for Period 13. Despite the strong week, Piotroski's cumulative return remains the lowest of the seven screens at −11.30%, though it has now recovered roughly 2.3 percentage points combined across the last two periods.

Lunch's +2.38% was its best period since Period 1's +6.23%, built on broad gains rather than one or two standout names. PATH (UiPath) led at +11.21%, from $10.53 to $11.71, contributing approximately +0.56 percentage points at the 5% weight. PLMR (Palomar Holdings) added +10.83% (+0.54 points), extending its Period 11 momentum. PDD gained +7.63% (+0.38 points), HRMY (Harmony Biosciences) +5.05% (+0.25 points), SKWD (Skyward Specialty Insurance) +3.77% (+0.19 points), and PLGO +3.31% (+0.17 points). Twelve of the screen's twenty positions closed positive. Against them, BZ (Kanzhun) fell −2.18% (−0.11 points), AEM (Agnico Eagle) −2.14% (−0.11 points), and CVE (Cenovus Energy) −0.64% (−0.03 points). Four positions — DLO, FRSH, TDW, and TFPM — exited at the sell fee, narrowing the screen from 20 to 16 positions after last period's expansion.

Magic Formula's +0.72% reversed the commodity-cluster losses that defined Period 11, this time with metals and shipping turning positive together instead of falling together. OGC (OceanaGold) rose +5.03%, from $24.85 to $26.10, contributing approximately +0.39 percentage points at the 7.69% weight. CALM (Cal-Maine Foods) added +4.51% (+0.35 points), IAG (Iamgold) +4.35% (+0.33 points), GPOR (Gulfport Energy) +3.68% (+0.28 points), INSW (International Seaways) +3.63% (+0.28 points), and CGAU (Centerra Gold) +2.41% (+0.19 points) — six of thirteen positions, spanning gold miners and tanker shipping, moving together in the opposite direction from Period 11. Against them, DDS (Dillard's) fell −5.32% (−0.41 points), reversing its Period 11 gain, DHT (DHT Holdings) −2.66% (−0.20 points), BVN (Buenaventura) −2.30% (−0.18 points), BSM (Black Stone Minerals) −2.20% (−0.17 points), and FHI (Federated Hermes) −1.62% (−0.12 points). HMY and ORLA, added just one period earlier, both exited at the sell fee, narrowing the screen from 13 to 11 positions.

Schloss Dividend's −0.94% was driven by weakness concentrated in steel and agricultural inputs. TX (Ternium) fell −6.05%, from $44.44 to $41.75, subtracting approximately −0.55 percentage points at the 9.09% weight. MOS (Mosaic) declined −5.59% (−0.51 points), THO (Thor Industries) gave back −2.84% (−0.26 points) after Period 11's +8.79% gain, ATHM (Autohome) −2.05% (−0.19 points), and GGB (Gerdau) −1.93% (−0.18 points). Against these, VSNT (Visionary Education Technology) gained +5.01% (+0.46 points), PLGO added +3.31% (+0.30 points), and JOYY +0.90% (+0.08 points). WDS, the Australian LNG company added in Period 11, exited at the sell fee after a single period held; LEN (Lennar Corporation) enters for Period 13, restoring homebuilder exposure that Period 11's ESNT/MTH/RDN exits had removed.

Burry Value's −0.14% was the period's most misleading number: a broad majority of positions closed positive, but a single collapse erased nearly all of it. Twenty-six of the screen's 41 positions were positive, led by IPAR (Inter Parfums) at +10.58%, from $107.97 to $119.39 (+0.26 points at the 2.44% weight), with AIZ, HL, HRMY, SEIC, DOCS, RMD, and CALM all gaining more than 4.5%. Against this strength, MLI (Mueller Industries) collapsed −55.93%, from $128.20 to $56.50, subtracting approximately −1.37 percentage points on its own — more than offsetting the combined contribution of the screen's ten best-performing positions. AUPH also fell −9.40% (−0.23 points), and SSD, TOL, and PHM each declined more than 2.8%. APPF and BMI exited at the sell fee, narrowing the screen from 41 to 39 positions.

CANSLIM beat the S&P 500 in cumulative terms for ten consecutive periods. Two negative weeks were enough to erase that lead entirely — the screen now trails both of the journal's benchmarks for the first time since it began.

CANSLIM's −2.68% is its second consecutive negative period, following Period 11's −3.64%, as the semiconductor and technology cluster that reversed two periods ago has not yet stabilized. MU (Micron Technology) led the decline at −13.84%, from $1,132.33 to $975.56, subtracting approximately −0.77 percentage points at the 5.56% weight — a full reversal of the +13.61%/+15.52% run that built CANSLIM's early lead in Periods 9 and 10, after a nearly flat −0.15% in Period 11 that looked at the time like a pause rather than a turn. STRL (Sterling Infrastructure) fell −12.92% (−0.72 points), SMCI (Super Micro Computer) −11.13% (−0.62 points), GLW (Corning) −10.97% (−0.61 points) — giving back all of its Period 11 gain and more — LRCX (Lam Research) −7.30% (−0.41 points), FIX (Comfort Systems USA) −6.09% (−0.34 points), FN (Fabrinet) −4.80% (−0.27 points), MPWR (Monolithic Power Systems) −1.92% (−0.11 points), AVGO (Broadcom) −1.25% (−0.07 points), and CLS (Celestica) −0.39% (−0.02 points). Ten of eighteen positions were negative, subtracting a combined approximately −3.93 points. Against these, LUXE gained +7.07% (+0.39 points), HALO (Halozyme Therapeutics) +5.99% (+0.33 points), PODD (Insulet) +3.94% (+0.22 points), DRD (DRDGold) +2.53% (+0.14 points), NVDA +1.19% (+0.07 points), AGI (Alamos Gold) +0.83% (+0.05 points), LLY (Eli Lilly) +0.48% (+0.03 points), and TSM (Taiwan Semiconductor) +0.42% (+0.02 points) — eight positive positions contributing roughly +1.25 combined points, insufficient against the technology cluster's losses. CANSLIM held all 18 positions with zero turnover for a second consecutive period; the screen's design gave it no mechanism to reduce exposure to the names now driving its decline.

Retention: Three Screens Reshuffle, Two Hold Firm

Period 12 produced sizable exits across three screens while two screens held perfectly. Piotroski shed three positions at the sell fee (API, RLX, SSSS) while adding one (NSLR), narrowing from 15 to 13. Lunch, which had expanded to 20 positions with zero exits in Period 11, gave back four positions this period (DLO, FRSH, TDW, TFPM) without adding replacements, contracting to 16. Magic Formula lost the two names it had just added in Period 11 — HMY and ORLA both exited at the sell fee after a single period of exposure — narrowing to 11 positions. CANSLIM and Quality Growth both held 100% of their starting positions for a second consecutive period.

The rank order flipped almost end to end. Schloss Dividend went from the least stable screen in Period 11 (75.0%) to solidly mid-table this period (90.9%), while Lunch went from perfect retention (100%) to the bottom half (80.0%) as its Period 11 expansion partly unwound. CANSLIM and Quality Growth are now the only two screens with back-to-back 100% retention, a sign that the names driving both their gains and their losses are staying in place rather than being screened out.

Cumulative Scoreboard: CANSLIM Falls Below Both Benchmarks

Quality Growth's +3.38% extended its cumulative return from +16.60% to +20.55%, keeping its lead over both benchmarks and over the rest of the field. The more consequential move happened at the other end of the table: CANSLIM's −2.68% pulled its cumulative return down from +10.86% to +7.89%, which now sits below the S&P 500's +10.35% and the NASDAQ's +13.81%. CANSLIM's cumulative alpha versus the S&P 500 — positive in every period through Period 11, most recently +2.42 points — inverted to −2.46 points this period, and its alpha versus the NASDAQ widened from −0.60 to −5.92 points.

The mid-table gap widened this period. Burry Value at +2.74% and Schloss Dividend at +2.03% are now separated by 71 basis points, up from Period 11's 11-point near-tie, and both remain roughly 7.5 to 8.3 points behind the S&P 500. Lunch improved to −2.72% from Period 11's −4.98%, its best cumulative mark since Period 5. Magic Formula's −9.32% and Piotroski's −11.30% remain the bottom two, though both improved from Period 11's −9.96% and −13.63% respectively — Piotroski's two-period recovery of roughly 2.3 points is its strongest stretch yet.

Against benchmarks, Quality Growth's cumulative alpha widened to +10.20 percentage points versus the S&P 500 and +6.74 points versus the NASDAQ — up from +8.16 and +5.14 at the close of Period 11 — the only screen with positive alpha against either. Every other strategy's alpha remains negative and, apart from CANSLIM's late reversal, largely unchanged in direction: Burry Value at −7.61/−11.07 points, Schloss at −8.32/−11.78, Lunch at −13.07/−16.53, Magic Formula at −19.67/−23.13, and Piotroski at −21.65/−25.11 points versus the S&P 500 and NASDAQ respectively.

Overlap: Eight Stocks as the Burry–Lunch Pair Count Holds

The July 4 snapshot shows eight stocks in two or more screens, down from nine at the June 27 snapshot. The change came from a single departure: TDW (Tidewater), which had briefly formed a new Burry–Lunch overlap pair in Period 11, dropped off the shared list when Lunch exited the position at the sell fee this period — TDW remains held solely within Burry Value now. No new overlap pairs formed.

Burry Value continues to anchor five of the eight overlap stocks — AEM, CPRX, FSM, and HRMY all sit in both Burry and Lunch, alongside TDW's now-dissolved pair. This period the shared names had mixed effects: CALM's +4.51% helped both Burry and Magic Formula simultaneously, AUPH's −9.40% dragged both Burry and Quality Growth, and LUXE's +7.07% lifted both Piotroski and CANSLIM. AEM's −2.14% subtracted from both Burry and Lunch. These shared positions mean the screens are not as independent as their differing overall returns suggest — a handful of names move several strategies' results at once, in both directions.

What Period 12 Tells You

MU's −13.84% in Period 12 completes a full reversal of the run that helped build CANSLIM's early lead. Micron surged +13.61% in Period 9 and +15.52% in Period 10, then went essentially flat at −0.15% in Period 11 — which read at the time like the rally pausing rather than reversing. Instead it was the calm before the drop: MU fell −13.84% this period, from $1,132.33 to $975.56, subtracting approximately −0.77 percentage points at CANSLIM's 5.56% equal weight. The stock now sits barely above where it started Period 9 at $981.61 — three periods of sharp volatility that, combined, delivered close to nothing. CANSLIM's design holds positions through momentum without a mechanism to lock in gains, which is precisely why it captured the full up-move in Periods 9–10 and is now capturing the full down-move as well.

CANSLIM's cumulative alpha against the S&P 500 turned negative for the first time in the journal. Through Period 11, CANSLIM had beaten the S&P 500 in cumulative terms every single period, most recently by +2.42 percentage points. This period's −2.68% return, stacked on Period 11's −3.64%, pulled its cumulative alpha to −2.46 points versus the S&P 500 and −5.92 points versus the NASDAQ. CANSLIM now trails both benchmarks simultaneously — a position it never occupied in its first ten periods — driven by the same cluster of semiconductor and technology names (AVGO, MPWR, CLS, FN, LRCX, GLW, SMCI, STRL, MU) across both negative periods. Two consecutive down weeks turned a comfortable lead into a deficit against both benchmarks in the span of fourteen days.

A single position wiped out most of Burry Value's broad-based gains this period. Twenty-six of the screen's 41 positions closed positive, led by IPAR's +10.58% (+0.26 points at the 2.44% weight) and gains across AIZ, HL, HRMY, SEIC, DOCS, RMD, and CALM, each above +4.5%. Against this broad strength, MLI (Mueller Industries) collapsed −55.93%, from $128.20 to $56.50, subtracting approximately −1.37 percentage points on its own — more than offsetting the combined contribution of the screen's ten best-performing positions. The result was a net −0.14% for the period despite a clear majority of positions finishing positive. A 41-position equal-weight screen is built to dilute single-stock risk, and it did — the loss was contained to roughly a percentage point and a half rather than the full −55.93% — but it also shows that diversification limits, rather than eliminates, the impact of one severe drawdown.

Quality Growth's third consecutive best-screen finish came with its only losing position weighing more than any single winner. AUPH fell −9.40%, from $17.23 to $15.61, subtracting approximately −1.57 percentage points at the screen's 16.67% weight — the single largest position-level drag of any screen this period, in either direction. It was nearly matched by DAVE's +11.08% contribution (+1.85 points) and closely trailed by FICO and SEZL's near-identical +7.44%/+7.43% gains (+1.24 points apiece). In a six-position portfolio, every stock carries enough weight to swing the period result by more than a point in either direction. That structure is what let DAVE, FICO, and SEZL combine for the best screen result in the journal for a third straight period; it's the same structure that makes AUPH's decline the costliest single position anywhere in this week's results.