About ThemeRadar
ThemeRadar is where geopolitics meets capital markets.
A publication tracking how politics reshape global investment themes.
ThemeRadar is a thematic investment intelligence publication built for self-directed investors who want to understand not just what the world's biggest investment themes are, but why they are moving. We track the structural shifts shaping themes like Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain and Crypto, Cybersecurity, and Nuclear Energy, and connect those to the companies, segments, and policies that matter.
The problem we solve
Thematic investment is mainstream, but thematic intelligence is not.
Thematic ETF assets have surged from less than $50 billion in 2018 to over $800 billion today. But buying an AI or Blockchain ETF is the easy part. The harder questions are how politics is shaping the theme, whether its fundamentals are improving or deteriorating, and which stocks offer genuine exposure. These are rarely answered well, and never in one place. ThemeRadar was started to close that gap.
Political context is missing.
Themes don't sit still. Politics can accelerate or stall them, from AI regulation to crypto licensing, cyber mandates to nuclear approvals. Adoption can take a decade longer than the market is pricing in, or come a decade sooner. ThemeRadar tracks the geopolitical, regulatory, and structural pressure points that are shaping each theme.
The fundamentals are obscured by narrative.
A compelling theme isn't always an investable one. Hype can drive valuations away from fundamentals, cyclical upswings can look structural, and some themes are real but a decade too early. ThemeRadar distinguishes structural drivers from narrative momentum, and tracks where each theme sits in its cycle.
ETF labels don't guarantee real exposure.
An 'AI' company might earn 5% of its revenue from AI and 95% from something else, and even when revenue exposure is real, profits often shift to pick-and-shovel suppliers further down the chain. ThemeRadar measures revenue exposure stock by stock, and analyses where value is captured across each theme.
How it works
Four analytical angles. Deep thematic insight.
Thematic analysis requires more than data. It requires a structure for seeing how themes evolve, which value chain stages are accelerating, and what's driving each one. ThemeRadar is built on a proprietary theme classification standard, TRACS, that provides exactly that. What institutional research does with GICS at the sector level, ThemeRadar does with TRACS at the theme and value chain level. Four analytical layers run on top: geopolitical and regulatory intelligence, quantitative factor analysis, and value chain dynamics.
The TRACS classification standard
The ThemeRadar Asset Classification Standard (TRACS) organises the thematic investment universe into a consistent structure. It maps companies to themes by revenue, to the value chain stages they sit in, and to the specific growth drivers shaping each of those stages.
Geopolitical and regulatory intelligence
Every weekly snapshot starts here. A continuous intelligence pipeline tracks political, regulatory, and policy developments across major jurisdictions, classifying each one against TRACS, and tagged by direction, magnitude, policy lifecycle stage, and the themes and value chain stages affected. The result is a causal chain from political event to thematic investment implication.
Quantitative factor analysis
A 51-factor scoring engine measures companies on value, momentum, earnings revisions, and more. Each company is also classified into one of four financial archetypes, from pre-revenue to mature cash-generative, with archetype-specific factor menus, so comparisons hold across companies at the same stage. This is the quantitative spine of every monthly deep-dive.
Value chain dynamics
Themes have internal structure. The same theme can have some segments strengthening and others stalling. ThemeRadar tracks every value chain stage within every theme, month after month, scoring direction and strength using the same factor framework that runs at company level. The result is a view of which themes are accelerating, which are fading, and, within each one, which value chain stages are doing the work.
The team
Built by a small team with complementary, hard-won expertise.
Ellie
Co-Founder & Head of Quantitative Research
Ellie leads ThemeRadar's quantitative work. With a background in management consulting at Bain working on banking and insurance clients, and undergraduate degrees in finance and IT, she brings institutional analytical rigour to the publication's methodology. At ThemeRadar she designs and builds the factor model, scoring engine, and data pipelines: the quantitative spine that turns geopolitical intelligence into investable insight.
Lily
Co-Founder & Head of Geopolitical Intelligence
Lily leads ThemeRadar's geopolitical and regulatory intelligence operation. With a background in Politics, Philosophy, and IT, and instincts sharpened by international field reporting, she designs and builds the pipeline that monitors, classifies, and scores political and regulatory developments across multiple jurisdictions against the ThemeRadar taxonomy.