Travel & Experiences
The experiences-over-goods consumer: booking platforms, hotels, cruise lines, airlines, casinos, dining out, and mobility. High-beta discretionary — the first thing cut in a real slowdown.
The S&P 500 retail complex across formats: big-box scale, off-price treasure hunt, dollar stores, grocery and convenience, home improvement, auto, marketplaces, and e-commerce. Tracks the health and the shape of the US consumer wallet.
Follow the theme against the wider market.
Series before each basket's creation date are a backtest of the membership as of creation; live tracking starts at creation.
| Return | 1 day | 5 days | 20 days | 60 days | MTD | YTD | 1 year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basket | -0.1% | +3.7% | +5.7% | +6.1% | +7.0% | +6.4% | +8.8% |
| vs S&P 500 | +1.0% | +5.7% | +5.6% | +2.3% | +6.7% | -5.3% | -5.7% |
1y · 2025-10-16 – 2026-10-16 · 252 / 252 sessions
Basket total returns · Annualized using 252 trading sessions · 0% risk-free rate and downside target. As of 2026-10-16 · close.
Sharpe: average daily simple return divided by its sample standard deviation, multiplied by √252. The risk-free rate is assumed to be 0%; this is not a cash-adjusted ratio.
Sortino: average daily simple return divided by downside deviation, multiplied by √252. Downside deviation is the square root of the average squared shortfall below 0%, counting all sessions, including zeros for gains.
Historical volatility: √(252 × average squared daily log return), matching the Vol page’s realized-volatility convention. This differs from the sample standard deviation used in Sharpe.
Each period requires complete history and at least 5 sessions. MTD and YTD follow the calendar; 1y is 252 sessions. Missing data or an undefined ratio displays — with a reason. Short periods can produce unstable ratios; intraday snapshots include a partial session. History before this basket’s creation is backtested. If a new basket has no stored daily return series yet, estimates from its rounded published chart levels are marked ≈.
Current members and the reasoning behind each inclusion. Returns are for individual holdings.
| Why it’s included | Added | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TJXTJX Companies | Off-price wins in both trade-down and inventory gluts | +1.9% | +6.2% | +15.8% | -3.2% | 2026-06-11 |
| CASYCasey's General Stores, Inc. | Convenience stores — fuel plus prepared food | +2.3% | +6.6% | +15.3% | +25.0% | 2026-06-11 |
| WSMWilliams-Sonoma | Home-furnishings retail | -0.4% | +3.8% | +11.9% | +42.0% | 2026-06-11 |
| WMTWalmart | Scale + grocery share + ad/marketplace optionality | +0.8% | +6.7% | +11.3% | +7.3% | 2026-06-11 |
| DLTRDollar Tree | Dollar-store turnaround case | -0.2% | +4.7% | +10.9% | +0.9% | 2026-06-11 |
| COSTCostco | Membership model; trade-down beneficiary | +1.1% | +4.5% | +10.5% | +15.2% | 2026-06-11 |
| DGDollar General | Rural dollar-store consumer | +0.4% | +5.6% | +10.3% | +3.1% | 2026-06-11 |
| ULTAUlta Beauty | Beauty category resilience | -2.7% | +4.0% | +9.6% | -2.0% | 2026-06-11 |
| AZOAutoZone | Auto parts #2 | +2.0% | +6.2% | +9.3% | -8.0% | 2026-06-11 |
| EBAY | Marketplace e-commerce | -2.1% | +7.2% | +7.5% | +39.4% | 2026-06-11 |
| KRKroger | Largest pure grocer | +1.5% | +3.2% | +6.0% | +3.6% | 2026-06-11 |
| ORLYO'Reilly Auto Parts | Auto parts: aging car parc annuity | +0.9% | +3.3% | +5.4% | -2.1% | 2026-06-11 |
| GPCGenuine Parts Company | Auto-parts distribution (NAPA) | +0.3% | +5.5% | +4.6% | +12.0% | 2026-06-11 |
| ROSTRoss Stores | Off-price #2 | +0.9% | +6.5% | +4.5% | +32.3% | 2026-06-11 |
| HDHome Depot (The) | Home improvement / housing-linked spend | +0.5% | +6.5% | +3.2% | -8.1% | 2026-06-11 |
| TSCOTractor Supply | Rural lifestyle retail | -0.6% | -1.6% | +2.9% | -32.4% | 2026-06-11 |
| LOWLowe's | Same complex, more DIY-skewed | +0.9% | +6.1% | +2.5% | -16.9% | 2026-06-11 |
| BBYBest Buy | Consumer electronics replacement cycle | -1.6% | +6.5% | -0.2% | +43.9% | 2026-06-11 |
| LULULululemon Athletica | Premium athleisure discretionary | -2.0% | +2.8% | -1.0% | -53.3% | 2026-06-11 |
| AMZNAmazon | E-commerce share of wallet | -1.9% | -4.7% | -1.5% | +8.3% | 2026-06-11 |
| TGTTarget Corporation | Discretionary-mix barometer | -1.5% | +0.4% | -2.5% | +62.2% | 2026-06-11 |
| CVNACarvana Co. | Online used-car retail | -2.9% | -7.7% | -9.6% | -30.3% | 2026-06-11 |
Equal-weighted; monthly rebalance, buy-and-hold between rebalances; dated membership changes reset the target weights.
Tracked since 2026-06-11. Membership decisions are documented below.
Read the methodology →Basket returns include dividends. “vs S&P 500” compares the basket’s compounded growth with the benchmark’s. Green means positive; red means negative.
Cross-checked against XRT. Daily return correlation: 0.83 across 1707 sessions. equal-weighted across all-cap retail, mostly names below the index
FW 3000 pass: added DKS, BJ, OLLI, FIVE, SFM, ANF, URBN — names outside the S&P 500 but inside our broad universe; they count only in the FW 3000 version of this basket. Effective-dated to creation so the broad backtest covers the full set. The S&P 500 basket is unchanged.
Widening pass: added grocery (KR), convenience (CASY), marketplaces (EBAY), auto e-commerce and parts distribution (CVNA, GPC), and furnishings (WSM). Reference pinned to XRT — equal-weighted like the basket. New members are effective-dated to basket creation so the backtest and the reference correlation cover the widened set (the basket was one day old, with no meaningful live history to restate).
Initial composition: 16 names across formats.