After almost twenty years of occupation, NATO and its allies withdrew from Afghanistan. It is a historically important security event and will have a lasting impact around the world. The monthly report concludes with a more in-depth analysis of how the events in August 2021 may affect the global security picture.
It was a strong month for the Global Security Fund, which was up 1.25 percent and 1.10 percent for the share classes R and S, respectively. It is the positive price development for the cyber security companies that continues to have the greatest impact on the fund's development. worst performing company.
The cybersecurity company Fortinet continues to perform. After the strong report of July, the price development continues up with a series of upgraded analyzes. The company operating in the niche network segment has seen a marked increase in corporate orders where the company reports a rising investment rate. The company is up 123.24 percent for the year and was up 16.24 percent for the month with a contribution of 0.93 percent.
The cybersecurity company Crowdstrike, which was last year's best performing holding, has now broken out to the top after a price consolidation. The company is considered the best in its class and benefits from the investment trend in protection against cybercrime. The company reported better than expected in August and continues to show good conditions for growth. The company's sales growth was 69.7 percent from the previous year. The Crowdstrike share rose 11.27 percent during the month with a contribution of 0.77 percent.
Another cyber security company with a focus on networks is Palo Alto Networks. The company continues to show strong growth and benefits from the same investment trend as Fortinet, where companies invest heavily to protect theirs against cybercrime. The investment trend in the corporate orders segment continues to be strong. The share was up 16.07 percent for the month with a contribution of 0.44 percent.
Microsoft has had a fantastically good year where growth in cloud services continues. The world is becoming increasingly digital and corporate infrastructure is in most cases with Microsoft, Amazon or Google. Microsoft was up 6.35 percent for the month with a contribution of 0.28 percent.
Cyber security and antivirus company NortonLifeLock announced in August that they will acquire Avast, a competing company. NortonLifeLock, formerly Symantec, has been working on its corporate identity for a long time, but with this latest deal seems to have focused on its long niche area - antivirus and VPN. The company was up 7.46 percent for the month with a contribution of 0.26 percent.
A reminder that there are companies whose share price can fall back in the cyber security sector is seen with the losers of the months. The cybersecurity company FireEye is now undergoing a restructuring where the company's product division will be sold to an investment consortium while Mandiant Solutions, FireEyes Software as a Service platform, will continue as FireEye, albeit under a new name, Mandiant Solutions. The restructuring is attractive in the long term, even if there is uncertainty in the short term. FireEye was down 9.48 percent for the month with a contribution of 0.30 percent.
In the cyber security segment, there are a number of consulting companies that work primarily with it
US state. These companies performed poorly in August with Mantech, Leidos, Booz Allen and CACI all down 9.13 percent, 7.47 percent, 4.21 percent and 3.2 percent.
It was a tragic end to a long occupation where many have lost their lives. When the United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001, the goal was to crack down on Al Qaeda, which is believed to be responsible for the September 11 terrorist attack. That they stayed so long may be due to the fact that the goal was changed or that they failed to crack Al Quaida. Maybe the explanation is somewhere in between. What is clear is that US action as the leading nation in NATO has diminished significantly. To deaf ears, the American president acted as someone who is far out in the depths without a map. What NATO and its alliances have contributed for 20 years was to provide opportunities for people who otherwise would never have had it, and there are many fantastic examples of this.
As a result of the poorly managed transactions, there are many risk factors that can increase the security threat. There has been too little time to examine all the people who were evacuated and there are many occasions where soldiers for the Taliban or other high-risk citizens have been swept away in the evacuation. NATO's strength is in the alliance, but if the largest member can dictate terms without responsibility, the other members will probably review how the alliance can function more democratically and not engage in conflicts on the other side of the world. There has been some criticism of NATO from some of the more powerful countries and it may be that the recent actions of the United States are driving European members to form a more concentrated defense in Europe, which would also benefit Europe. Countries that previously saw the United States as a protection against conflict from China, among others, must review their strategy. While Sweden and many other countries have cut ties with Afghanistan in the form of subsidies, Russia and China want a good relationship with the Taliban. There are plenty of natural resources that can replace the funding that Afghanistan loses in the form of subsidies. The risk of extremism growing is high and it can be stated that the security situation is worse today than it was in 2001.
