Day 18: My AI Screened 9 Stocks and Said No to All of Them. Here’s the Score. (July 2026)

I am not a licensed financial advisor. This is a documented public experiment, not investment advice. Every trade, every hold, and every dollar amount is logged and publicly verifiable. See the pre-registration post for the full rules of this experiment.

This is Day 18 of the Investing Smarter Test — a 12-month experiment where I gave an AI $1,000 in a real Robinhood account and let it trade on its own. The only question I’m trying to answer: can an AI beat the simplest thing a person could do with $1,000, which is drop it in an S&P 500 index fund and walk away?

The semiconductor sector has been rattled. TSMC — one of the most important chipmakers on the planet — reported record earnings last week, beat on every metric, and the stock still fell. Investors sold it anyway because of rising costs and margin concerns. The whole chip sector shed over a trillion dollars in just a few weeks. That’s the kind of noise that makes people feel like they need to do something. This morning, the AI looked at nine stocks, made a decision, and it chose nothing. Here’s where things stand.

Quick plain-English note, in case you’re newer to this: when I say the S&P 500 (ticker SPY), I just mean a single investment that holds a slice of America’s 500 biggest companies all at once — Apple, Microsoft, your bank, the company that makes your toothpaste. You buy one thing and you instantly own a little piece of all of them. That’s the “boring index fund” everyone keeps telling you to buy — and it’s the yardstick the AI has to beat. Learn that one term and you’re already ahead of most people.

What This Does NOT Prove

Before I show you the scoreboard, a word about what you’re looking at.

This is one account. One run. One AI. Twelve months. A $1,000 account doesn’t have enough room to truly blow up — and it doesn’t have enough room to meaningfully beat the market either. Statistics require sample sizes. One experiment is a story, not a proof.

If the AI is up right now, that doesn’t prove AI investing works. If it’s down, that doesn’t prove it can’t. What it does prove is whether this specific AI, following this specific strategy, beat or lost to the simplest available alternative — a plain index fund — over this particular stretch of time.

I’m publishing every day, win or lose. If the AI blows up, you’ll see it here. That’s the point.

The Investing Smarter Test Scoreboard — Day 18 (July 20, 2026)

The S&P 500 benchmark: $1,000 invested in SPY on June 22, 2026, dividends reinvested, no fees. The honest comparison is always “what would $1,000 in an index fund have done?”

One more plain-English term, since it’s in the table: max drawdown just means the biggest drop from a high point to a low point along the way — the worst dip you’d have had to sit through. A small max drawdown means a smoother, less stomach-churning ride; a big one means it fell hard at some point before recovering. It’s a simple way to measure not just how much you made, but how bumpy the road was to get there.

The AI is essentially tied with the S&P 500 index fund — $0.11 ahead after 18 days. Worth a caution while it’s fun: this is a tiny account over a short stretch, and a lead this small can just as easily be luck as anything else — so I wouldn’t read too much into it yet, in either direction.

If This Were $10,000 Instead of $1,000

I started this with $1,000 because that’s a real, relatable amount and it’s what I was willing to hand an AI. But a lot of you are thinking about more than that — so here’s the same result scaled up. Same trades, same percentages, just 10× the starting money:

The point of showing both isn’t “look what the AI could have made you.” It’s the gap. At $1,000 the AI is ahead of the boring index fund by $0.11; scaled to $10,000 that same gap is $1.09 — same story, bigger numbers. Whether it’s $1,000 or $10,000 or $100,000, the question is identical: did the clever thing beat the boring index fund? — and notice the boring index fund’s number scales just as cleanly without anyone having to watch it every day. (This is illustrative scaling of an already-tiny sample — not a projection, not a promise. Past performance is not future performance.)

Why the AI Held — And Why That’s the Whole Point

Here’s the thing nobody tells you about investing: most of the skill is in not doing things.

The semiconductor sector has been a war zone lately. TSMC reported a record quarter, beat earnings estimates, and the stock still fell — because investors are spooked by a massive capex raise and margin pressure from new overseas fabs. The whole chip sector shed over a trillion dollars in a matter of weeks. A human staring at that all day feels the itch to do something — panic-sell, or swoop in on a “discount,” or chase the names that are still going up. That itch is what empties retirement accounts.

The AI felt none of it. This morning it reviewed 18 candidates, deep-researched 9 of them, and decided to hold. Here’s the reasoning it logged:

FUNNEL HONESTY: discovery surfaced an 18-name slate, rejected 4 outright on liquidity. Nine finalists were deep-researched (WELL, ABBV, TSM, DUK, TRIP, OCUL, BIDU, DIS, MFG); I personally evaluated all nine and PASS on every one for a new buy today. The pattern: the two clean momentum names (WELL, ABBV) are extended right AT their 52-week highs into earnings 7 and 11 days out — buying the exact top ahead of a binary FFO/EPS print is not a setup, it is a coin-flip, and WELL is ~38.7x P/FFO. The value/mean-reversion names are downtrends, not confirmed reversals: BIDU (below 50d/200d, China-ADR overhang), DIS (near 52-week low, knife-catch), OCUL (downtrending pre-earnings dilution-prone biotech). TSM is the only candidate with NO near-term earnings landmine (next print ~Oct 15) and real quality (record Q2, EPS beat), but it is a mean-reversion dip into an ACTIVE semiconductor de-rating (sector shed ~$1.3-1.4T in early July) driven by a genuine capex raise ($60-64B) and a Q3 margin guide ~70bps light — a falling knife in a re-pricing sector is not a fence-clearing entry. MFG carries an unverified probe plus earnings in 10 days. DUK/TRIP both print earnings inside the hold window with limited edge. ASSUMPTION CHALLENGED: “a quality name down 16% is a buy” — tested against TSM’s tape and it fails: the decline has a real fundamental driver (capex/margins) and live sector beta, so “oversold” is not automatically “buyable.” Net: nothing clears the fence with a clean risk/reward better than the interest-earning cash I already hold, so no new buy. Holdings reviewed: XBI — up ~3.5% vs entry, trend thesis still confirmed, kill criteria not triggered, HOLD. VWO — down ~5.1% vs entry, well above the proposed kill level, HOLD.

A note on reading that: the AI will always write a confident explanation. Confident reasoning is not the same as correct reasoning. I’m logging it exactly as written so we can look back later and see whether it was right — or whether it just sounded right.

What holding means for the strategy:

This is a buy-and-hold experiment. Most days should be hold days. The AI is not supposed to be trading constantly — constant trading generates fees and taxes, which is one of the ways active strategies underperform indexes over time. So today’s hold is the expected behavior, not a cop-out. The two existing positions (XBI and VWO) stay put. Cash earns interest in the meantime.

What You Should Actually Do With $1,000

I get this question every time I write about investing experiments: “Should I do what the AI is doing?”

Here’s my honest answer: probably not.

If you have $1,000 to invest and you don’t know what to do with it, the research is clear. Put it in a low-cost S&P 500 index fund — something like VOO or FSKAX. Set it up as automatic monthly contributions if you can. Don’t check it daily.

Where to actually do it. For each service I’m showing you two links: a referral link (we both get a small bonus or free money if you sign up through it) and a plain direct link (I get nothing). Your choice, never required. I explain my full policy on referral links on my editorial independence page.

• Vanguard — the low-cost gold standard. Buy VOO directly; ~0.03%/yr. Best if you want the cheapest DIY option. No referral program → one link only: vanguard.com.
• Betterment — robo-advisor that auto-builds and rebalances an index portfolio (~0.25%/yr). → referral link (we both get a bonus) or plain link (I get nothing).
• Acorns — rounds up spare change and invests it; best for building the habit. → referral link ($5 for you after you invest) or plain link (I get nothing).
• Robinhood — the commission-free broker this experiment itself runs on; fine for buying VOO/SPY and leaving it alone. → referral link (free fractional share, $5–$200 value, for both of us) or plain link (I get nothing).

That’s it. That’s the boring, reliable thing. The entire point of this experiment is to find out whether a sophisticated AI can actually beat that boring, reliable thing — and after 18 days, here’s exactly where it stands: the AI is $0.11 ahead of the index fund, in a race that’s essentially tied.

Before I gave the AI a dollar, I laid out the whole case for why this is a genuinely hard thing to do — the pre-registration post I wrote before it started. I made my reasoning public on day zero so nobody could accuse me of writing the ending afterward. Whether the AI proves me right or surprises me, you’ll see it happen in real time — that’s the fun of it.

Transparency: The Full Log Is Public

Every trade this AI has made or declined to make — plus its logged reasoning — is publicly documented. The entire series is archived in the Investing and Savings category, and each post links to the one before it. If you want to read the complete day-by-day record, start with the pre-registration post and follow the chain. Yesterday’s entry is Day 17.

That’s the deal I made with readers before this experiment started, and I’m keeping it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How is the S&P 500 benchmark calculated?
A: I recorded the price of SPY (the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust) on June 22, 2026, the same day the AI account started. The benchmark tracks what $1,000 invested in SPY that day — with dividends reinvested and no fees — would be worth today. It’s the simplest honest comparison: what would doing nothing have gotten you?

Q: Can I follow along or copy the AI’s trades?
A: You can follow along — every trade and hold decision is documented in this series. I’d encourage you NOT to copy the trades, though. This is one $1,000 experiment, not a recommendation — a single concentrated account isn’t a sound way for anyone to invest their own money, no matter how it ends up doing. The better move is the boring one above: a low-cost index fund, left alone. Follow the experiment for the story; don’t follow it as a strategy.

Q: If the AI isn’t trading, is anything actually happening?
A: Yes, but slowly. A buy-and-hold strategy means most days are hold days by design. The AI is monitoring for specific conditions that would justify a new trade — today it reviewed 18 candidates and found none that cleared its bar. In the meantime, whatever the account holds (currently XBI and VWO, plus cash) is rising or falling with the market. That’s the nature of this kind of strategy — and one of the ways it differs from active trading, which generates more costs than most people realize.

Coming Up

Every weekday morning I post what the AI decided and where the scoreboard stands. The boring truth is most days the answer will be “it held, and holding was right.” Come watch whether the clever machine can actually beat the index fund you could set up in ten minutes and forget. Browse the full series here so you don’t miss the day the experiment proves its point — in either direction.

Steve Rhode is not a licensed financial advisor. The Investing Smarter Test is a documented public experiment, not investment advice. All trades and decisions are logged publicly. Do not make financial decisions based on this experiment. For guidance on your own money, see all your debt relief and financial options.

Steve Rhode The Get Out of Debt Guy | Consumer Debt Expert

Consumer debt expert & investigative writer. Personal bankruptcy survivor (1990). Washington Post award-winning author. Exposing debt scams since 1994.

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