To coincide with International Women’s Day on Sunday 8 March 2026, ASX Investor Update asked five leading female fund managers to discuss their top investment theme for 2026.
The managers could choose any theme across any asset or market. Each independently chose AI or a related area, such as electricity generation.
Their focus on AI reinforces the profound effect this technology could have on the global economy, society, financial markets and investing.
The fund managers were also asked to consider the main risk associated with their chosen theme, to give investors a sense of what could go wrong. A recurring concern for the fund managers is insufficient returns from AI to justify the amount of capital being invested in it.
Through their asset-management firms, the fund managers featured in this article manage capital on a pro-bono basis for the Future Generation Women fund. Launched in December 2024, Future Generation Women is Australia’s first philanthropic women’s investment fund.
The Future Generation Women fund donates an amount equal to 1% of the fund’s average monthly net assets to non-profit organisations that advance economic equality and opportunity for women and their children in Australia.
Since their inception in 2014, Future Generation companies, which include the Future Generation Women fund, have provided $100 million in social investment for Australian not-for-profit organisations.
This article should not be viewed a recommendation to invest in the Future Generation Women fund or in AI-related companies or funds. Investors should do their own research or talk to a licensed financial adviser before acting on themes in this article.
Here are the views of the five fund managers:
1. Katie Hudson
Head of Australian Equities Research, Portfolio Manager of Small Cap Equities, Yarra Capital Management.
Key takeout: Indiscriminate selling in growth and technology stocks due to AI fears might create investment opportunities this year.
A key investment trend in Australia and offshore equity markets so far in 2026 has been the indiscriminate selling of technology and other growth stocks. Many companies that sell AI-related products and services, or have some adjacency to AI, have been caught in the broad-based sell-off. That share price weakness is one development being watched in 2026, particularly where valuations have moved sharply.
At Yarra, we have been developing a framework to assess the potential impact of AI-driven disruption. While it is unclear who the ultimate winners from AI will be, investors can form a view on which companies are likely to be more exposed and potentially lose from AI. Our focus is on distinguishing between genuine AI risk and market perception or hype.
Katie Hudson, Yarra Capital Management
In Yarra’s view, the key is differentiating between tech companies that provide mission-critical software deeply embedded within client operations, and those that act primarily as third-party information intermediaries between firms and individuals. The latter may face significant disruption, as their services could be more readily replicated by AI.
By contrast, companies that provide mission-critical software are likely to be harder to displace, yet their valuations may fall too far given the current uncertainty surrounding AI.
The main risk to this theme is the speed at which tech and other growth companies can adapt to AI-driven change. Investors must be confident they are backing management teams who are sufficiently fleet-footed to mitigate AI-related risks and capitalise on emerging opportunities, rather than those who assume the threat from AI will not materially affect their business models.
2. Julia Weng
Portfolio Manager, Paradice Investment Management
Key takeout: Look for companies that can use AI to differentiate their business model and leapfrog competitors.
I’m excited about the shift from AI promise to proof. The AI trade in 2026 is no longer about who owns the chips or 'AI exposure' – it’s about who can prove productivity. We’re past impressive demos and pilot programs.
As AI moves out of capital expenditure and into operations, we are looking for tangible evidence of AI monetisation or revenue defensibility, changes to headcount and R&D direction. In our opinion, this is fertile ground for genuine business model and earnings differentiation. There might potentially be wide-ranging opportunities, from oversold tech companies to 'boring' industrial companies who can harness these AI advances to leapfrog competitors.
Julia Weng, Paradice Investment Management
On the other hand, many companies remain fully priced, and the gap between the AI narrative and numbers could be painful. Equity markets have largely priced in steady economic growth, stable margins and an AI-driven uplift, leaving little room for earnings disappointment.
Cost pressures have eased, but we are not out of the woods on materials and services inflation at a time when consumer demand remains patchy. Not everyone will get to be an AI winner and anchoring expectations to historical company valuation multiples can be a trap.
3. Armina Rosenberg
Co-founder, Portfolio Manager, Minotaur Capital
Key takeout: Companies that provide infrastructure for AI, such as computer memory, could benefit in 2026.
Despite the headlines, we’re still relatively early in the shift from 'AI excitement' to 'AI deployment at scale'. 2026 should see the AI infrastructure layer continue to deepen beyond headline GPUs (Graphics Processing Units) into memory, networking, data-centre capacity, power, cooling and enabling services.
As AI models become more capable and cheaper to run, more companies will embed AI into their everyday workflows, which could keep demand for computing storage elevated.
Armina Rosenberg, Minotaur Capital
But the bigger story is that AI is colliding with physical limits: electricity availability, grid connection timelines, water usage, and community/social-licence issues around data centres. Nowhere is this more apparent than computer memory. In Minotaur’s opinion, memory is emerging as one of the clearest beneficiaries of the AI boom. Large-scale AI models require dramatically higher memory bandwidth and capacity (compared to traditional computing).
The key risk I’m watching is the capital expenditure (capex)-to-revenue conversion question. Hyperscalers (firms that use technology to grow rapidly) are spending enormous sums to stay competitive in AI. The bull case is that this capex enables new products and revenue pools; the bear case is a 'prisoner’s dilemma' where everyone must spend, but returns are competed away (benefits flow to customers via lower prices, or to suppliers via pricing power).
If the market loses confidence that AI capex will translate into durable earnings growth, we might see a sharp re-pricing across a number of names in the space, even if the technology keeps improving. In Minotaur’s view, evidence of revenue acceleration from AI needs to be seen in the earnings season quarters of 2026 to keep the bears at bay.
4. Jun Bei Liu
Co-founder and Lead Portfolio Manager, Ten Cap
Key takeout: The real opportunity in AI this year could be in companies that embed AI into their operations, creating an AI ‘efficiency dividend’.
We believe 2026 could be the year when AI moves from promise to measurable productivity. We are shifting from the 'AI infrastructure build-out' phase - chips, data centres and capex - into the 'AI efficiency dividend' phase. The real opportunity may no longer be just in the AI enablers, but in the industries that embed AI into operations and lift margins.
Banking is an example. AI could transform credit assessment, fraud detection, compliance, customer service and risk modelling. This could reduce bank cost-to-income ratios and improve their risk-adjusted returns. Over time, that might translate into structurally higher profitability.
Jun Bei Liu, Ten Cap
The same could apply across healthcare, logistics, retail and professional services. AI is automating repetitive workflows, enhancing decision-making and compressing labour intensity. Companies that successfully integrate AI into core processes could expand profit margins even in a slower growth environment.
In Ten Cap’s view, this cycle is different. We are not relying purely on expansion of company valuation multiples — we are seeing genuine earnings leverage.
For investors, 2026 is about identifying businesses with real AI implementation, not just AI narratives. The winners will be those with data advantages, scale, and management teams capable of execution. AI is no longer thematic. It is operational. And operational change can potentially drive sustainable earnings growth.
5. Chanel Stuart-Findlay
Portfolio Manager and Research Analyst, Plato Investment Management
Key takeout: The global electricity sector could potentially benefit this year from growth in AI, data centres and higher industrial activity.
One theme gathering momentum into 2026 is the global electrification cycle and the grid build-out required to support it.
For years, electricity demand across developed markets barely moved. That is beginning to change. While AI and data centres play a role, they are only part of the shift. Increased industrial activity, electric vehicles, air conditioning and the move away from gas are all adding electricity load. At the same time, renewables are set to supply most incremental generation this decade, changing how power systems operate.
As electricity takes a larger share of the energy mix, grids must expand and modernise to manage a more complex mix of generation, storage and demand.
Chanel Stuart-Findlay, Plato Investment Management
The International Energy Agency estimates that meeting forecast demand through 2030 will require annual grid investment to rise by roughly 50%, pointing to a multi-year capital cycle across energy infrastructure.
In Plato’s view, the opportunity lies less in owning energy-generation assets and more in identifying financially strong companies supplying the equipment, technology and services that enable this build-out.
The main risk is that demand expectations prove too optimistic. If electrification progresses more slowly, or projects are delayed by policy and regulation, returns could disappoint.
A broader market risk is the re-emergence of inflation. Should policy settings turn more expansionary and economies are allowed to run ‘hot’, bond yields could rise again, putting pressure on equity valuations globally.
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