The mid-year 2026 Vulcan AI Spine Model Portfolio

The mid-year 2026 Vulcan AI Spine Model Portfolio Update

Vulcan AI Spine is a 29-stock, 100% invested thematic model to be tracked six-to-nine months through Jan-Apr 2027, largest weight 5.6%, smallest 1.3%, weights used as primary risk control

Portfolio allocations are 41.0% Core AI, 28.5% Physical Buildout, 25.0% Power & Utilities, and 5.5% GE Vernova as the bridge, with individual weights summing exactly to 100%

Five backbone infrastructure names - NVDA, TSM, GOOGL, AVGO, ASML - comprise 25.1% of the portfolio and 61.2% of Core AI; NVDA interest coverage ~629x, TSM capex 33.5% of sales, ASML 41.5x forward PE

Cyclical or expectation-dependent Core AI positions are sized conservatively - MU at 6.4x forward earnings and 80.4% operating margin (3.8% weight), MRVL is -41.1% from its 52-week high, ANET FCF conversion 54.4%

Goldman baseline models $7.6tn AI capex 2026-31 - compute $5.1tn, data centers $2.1tn, power $0.358tn - portfolio intentionally overweights power and GEV to capture regulated, uncorrelated cashflows, construction backlog

Combining the refreshed Core AI, Physical Buildout, and Power and Utilities article lists into a single model portfolio. The Vulcan AI Spine Model Portfolio.

The Core AI refresh covered compute, foundries, memory, semiconductor equipment, networking, custom silicon, and cloud platforms. The Pipes, Power, and Cooling refresh covered the equipment and the labor that turn a data center plan into an operating building. The Power and Utilities refresh covered the generation, transmission, and regulated assets that keep that building energized. Read one at a time, they look like three thematic screens with some overlap.

Read together, they are three sections of the same bill of materials.

So this is the next step. I have combined the three refreshed Top 10 lists into a single Vulcan AI Spine model portfolio that we will track over the next six to nine months, roughly through January to April 2027. Fair warning before we start: I am going to spend more of this piece on why the weights look the way they do than on why the companies are good, because the company work already exists in the three predecessor articles and the construction work does not.

Let's get right to it.

Thirty slots become twenty-nine companies

The three lists contain 30 total positions and 29 unique companies.

The mid-year 2026 Vulcan AI Spine Model Portfolio Update

Thirty slots become twenty-nine companies

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