Buy and hold, hopefully forever…
Terry Smith is arguably the most successful British fund manager of the last ten years. Although the current bear market may well have more twists and turns to come, so far his straightforward philosophy (buy good companies, don’t overpay, do nothing) is proving that it works in tough times, as well as the good ones. […]
I have just finished reading a well-written biography of Jesse Livermore (‘Boy Plunger: The Man Who Sold America Short in 1929’ by Tom Rubython) and am now more comfortable than ever in my avoidance of anything even remotely related to speculation. I am not sure I can think of any other case where a man with so […]
There was an an interesting post by Total Return Investor a few months ago in which he had a go at cloning Neil Woodford’s portfolio with US-based companies. That started me thinking about whether British investors could do something similar to create their own mini-Berkshire Hathaway. Obviously valuation is always key when buying shares and I am not suggesting that […]
Tom Russo uses the phrase ‘capacity to suffer’ a lot. I had heard him talking of this before, but was reminded when I saw him being interviewed here (via MarketFolly). He doesn’t expect this unduly from investors in his funds (fortunately for them), but from his investee companies–the phrase refers to the preparedness of a company to […]
Waitress: Would you like a drink with that? FI: Yes please, can I have a Coke? Waitress: I’m sorry Sir, but I’m afraid we only have Pepsi. FI: Oh OK then, I’ll take a Pepsi. When I think of Pepsi I think of No. 2, Michael Jackson, and the Pepsi Challenge. One of those is […]
Terry Smith is a man who uses words like a sniper uses bullets and, if you want to read something worthwhile, then his latest report is worth investigating. Of course, nothing beats the original and so any (fortunate) Fundsmith investors (or prospective investors) should obviously go straight here and look for the “Short Form Report For Period Ended […]
As Sylvester Stallone knows, if you find something that works then keep doing it. In the case of his Rocky franchise, this meant that every plot went as follows: 1. Throwing down of gauntlet by unpleasant rival 2. Token picking-up of gauntlet by sluggish Rocky 3. Motivating incident 4. Turbo-charged training session 5. Victory. In […]
Fundsmith, the fund manager run by Terry Smith, has launched a new investment trust conveniently named (for cheap punsters) Fundsmith Emerging Equities Trust (FEET). Hope springs eternal in the fund management industry and, despite the lack of any emerging markets track record, the trust is currently selling at a premium of 8%. Until this point Fundsmith has […]
The Lindsell Train Investment Trust (LTI) has just released its Anuual Report for the year to March 2014 (available from their website here). The NAV increased by a healthy 13.1%, which brings the total return for the last five years to 133.8%. March 2009 was approximately the time that markets began to turn after the Financial Panic […]