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I work in tech and started trading casually last year. Like any good regard, I immediately subscribed to every investing newsletter I could find on Substack. 23 paid subscriptions. $9,600/year, including Michael Burry's.
The problem? I can't actually read them all. And I have no idea which ones are worth the money.
So I did what any engineer would do — I wrote codes to find out.
**What I Built**
A pipeline that:
\- Crawls every article from 23 paid Substack authors (1,782 articles over the past year)
\- Uses Gemini AI to extract **high-conviction stock picks only** — not casual mentions, but tickers the author actually analyzed in depth
\- Tracks returns at 1d, 7d, 15d, 30d, and 60d after publication
\- Calculates alpha vs sector benchmarks (SOXX for semis, IGV for SaaS, XLF for financial services etc)
\- Dedupes: if the same author calls the same ticker multiple times within 14 days, it only counts once (first mention wins). Different authors calling the same ticker are tracked independently
Total dataset: **3,519 high-conviction calls** tracked over 1 year.
**The Results**
30-Day Absolute Return Leaderboard (Long Calls)
|**Rank**|**Author**|**Calls**|**30d Avg Return**|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|||||
|1|Global Tech Research|50|\+14.9%|
|2|Paulo Macro|21|\+9.5%|
|3|Collyer Bridge|89|\+8.7%|
|4|Doomberg|79|\+7.8%|
|5|SemiAnalysis|80|\+7.5%|
|6|Altay Capital|15|\+7.2%|
|7|The Overshoot|24|\+7.1%|
|8|The Setup Factory|285|\+6.7%|
|9|Fabricated Knowledge|50|\+5.8%|
|10|Macro Charts|72|\+3.6%|
30-Day Alpha vs Benchmark (Long Calls)
|**Rank**|**Author**|**Calls**|**30d Avg Alpha**|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|||||
|1|Global Tech Research|50|\+9.4%|
|2|Paulo Macro|21|\+6.8%|
|3|Altay Capital|15|\+5.2%|
|4|Collyer Bridge|89|\+4.8%|
|5|The Setup Factory|285|\+4.3%|
|6|Doomberg|79|\+3.8%|
|7|SemiAnalysis|80|\+3.4%|
|8|Lord Fed|86|\+3.1%|
|9|The Overshoot|24|\+1.8%|
|10|Shrubstack|100|\+1.5%|
30-Day Win Rate (Long Calls)
|**Rank**|**Author**|**Calls**|**Win Rate**|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|||||
|1|Paulo Macro|21|85%|
|2|Altay Capital|15|85%|
|3|Global Tech Research|50|81%|
|4|The Overshoot|24|79%|
|5|Doomberg|79|72%|
**But 30 Days Isn't the Whole Story**
30d is a reasonable window for swing traders, but some of these authors are deep value investors with 6-12 month theses. Here's what the 60-day numbers look like — the rankings shift significantly:
60-Day Absolute Return Top 10 (Long Calls)
|**Rank**|**Author**|**Calls**|**60d Avg Return**|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|||||
|1|Global Tech Research|50|\+26.7%|
|2|SemiAnalysis|80|\+16.7%|
|3|Fabricated Knowledge|50|\+14.2%|
|4|Altay Capital|15|\+13.7%|
|5|Doomberg|79|\+12.6%|
|6|Paulo Macro|21|\+12.1%|
|7|Macro Charts|72|\+11.1%|
|8|The Setup Factory|285|\+10.8%|
|9|The Overshoot|24|\+9.6%|
|10|TicToc Trading|180|\+8.9%|
Notable shifts: Fabricated Knowledge jumps from #9 (30d: +5.8%) to #3 (60d: +14.2%). Altay Capital goes from +7.2% to +13.7%. Deep value theses need time to play out. Conversely, Collyer Bridge drops out of the top 10 at 60d — their edge is more short-term.
Take these numbers for what they are: one time horizon among many. A 60d or even 90d window would tell a different story for buy-and-hold investors. This is for information, not gospel.
**And at the bottom...**
Michael J Burry: 24 long calls, 30d avg return +0.1%, 60d avg return **-11.1%**, 30d alpha **-2.7%** (60d alpha: **-11.4%**). Then again, The Big Short took 2 years to play out — maybe his thesis just needs more time than our 60-day window can capture.
**Methodology Caveats (Please Challenge This)**
I want to be upfront about limitations:
1. **AI extraction isn't perfect.** Gemini parses articles and extracts ticker calls. To reduce noise, we only count high conviction — where the author dedicates multiple paragraphs, specific data, or explicit price targets. Passing mentions are filtered out.
2. **We validated this.** Spot-checked extraction accuracy against manual reads, and cross-verified with alternative model outputs (codex / claude). It's not 100%, but it's consistent.
3. **Survivorship bias matters.** We only track tickers with available price data. Delisted stocks, non-US tickers without yfinance data, and typos get counted as No Data and excluded from return calculations.
4. **This is a bull market.** Many of these authors are long-biased. Absolute returns look good partly because the market went up. The alpha column adjusts for this using sector-specific ETF benchmarks.
5. **The full dataset is available.** All 3,519 calls, every author, every ticker, every return at every horizon. You can audit everything. I will put up the link later.
**What I Learned**
* **The expensive ones aren't always the best.** Some of the top performers cost 80−360/year.Some1,000+ newsletters are mid-table.
* **Volume ≠ quality.** Authors with 300+ calls often have mediocre win rates. The ones with 15-80 highly targeted calls tend to outperform.
* **Shorts are hard.** Almost every author has worse short performance than long. The few exceptions (Global Tech Research shorts: -20.5% at 60d) are impressive outliers.
* **Michael Burry's Substack picks haven't worked yet** — but his most famous trade took 2 years, so the jury's still out.
**Total Cost Breakdown**
$9,599/year across 23 newsletters. Here's every single one:
|**Author**|**Annual Fee**|**Author**|**Annual Fee**|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|||||
|James Bulltard|$1,099|Paulo Macro|$360|
|Lord Fed|\~$1,000|Collyer Bridge|$350|
|10x Research|$948|The Overshoot|$330|
|Eliant Capital|$760|Doomberg|$300|
|TMT Breakout|$589|TicToc Trading|$290|
|SemiAnalysis|$500|Global Tech Research|$100|
|Shrubstack|$500|Earnings Edge|$100|
|The Setup Factory|$450|Altay Capital|$80|
|Best Anchor Stocks|$449|Quality Stocks|$70|
|Michael J Burry|$439|Winter Gems|$50|
|Fabricated Knowledge|$400|Swiss Transparent Portfolio|\~$40|
|Macro Charts|$400|**Total**|**\~$9,599**|
If I could only keep 5 based on this data: Global Tech Research (100),PauloMacro(360), Doomberg (300),SemiAnalysis(500), The Setup Factory (450).That′s1,710/year — 82% cheaper and probably better returns.
Shoutout to every author on this list. Even the bottom-ranked ones taught me more about markets than any YouTube video. This isn't meant to trash anyone — just data.
Full methodology + data / charts: [https://x.com/pyhrroll/status/2027374283669066045?s=20](https://x.com/pyhrroll/status/2027374283669066045?s=20)
Happy to answer questions. Roast my methodology. Tell me I'm wrong. That's how this gets better.
*Positions: long several names mentioned by top authors. Not financial advice, obviously.*