Bill Smead

Author Archive

  • Sep 25, 2024
    [...] Our solution to these circumstances is running a concentrated portfolio of stocks that could be attractive to investors for reasons separate from the movement of the stock...
  • Sep 11, 2024
    We learned a long time ago that we wanted to know what smart professional investors were doing. It’s always better to know who is smart rather than being smart yourself. Therefore,...
  • Sep 4, 2024
    [...] Our large-cap value strategy is not the "same as it ever was," but it looks very attractive relative to the stock-picking disciplines we compete against. We own a portfolio...
  • Aug 7, 2024
    One of the very popular technology companies in recent years has been CrowdStrike, Inc. It provides cybersecurity to numerous major technology companies including the top Artificial...
  • Jul 24, 2024
    In a recent The Wall Street Journal article, Jason Zweig correctly pointed out that 85% of active stock-picking funds and ETFs had underperformed their benchmark. In many ways, his...
  • Jul 3, 2024
    We are contrarians and oddly crave the moments when history, psychology and mathematics get defied in the U.S. stock market. We believe this is one of those points in time. [...]
  • Jun 12, 2024
    We have gained a number of new investors and get regular vetting interest from investors who need to understand the roots of our stock-picking discipline. Our stock-picking...
  • May 30, 2024
    [...] What Bill called “everyone thinking alike” we call a well-known fact. A well-known fact is a body of economic information that is not only known by all market participants...
  • May 22, 2024
    Back in 1993, a brilliant satirist by the name of Ivan Reitman produced a movie called "Dave." It was the story of a life-threatening stroke besetting the President of the United...
  • May 8, 2024
  • May 1, 2024
    We’ve recently been making the case that the current circumstances in the stock market are most like the late 1960s and 1970s. Euphoric enthusiasm for the most aggressive stocks...
  • Mar 20, 2024
    [...] The U.S. Federal Government has set a net zero carbon goal by 2050. Tremendous resources have been applied with borrowed money to fund these goals and subsidize money-losing...
  • Feb 14, 2024
    In studies, 90% of drivers think they are above average. We believe that 100% of the people who pick stocks for a living think they will be above average. Is being above average a...
  • Jan 24, 2024
    Warren Buffett regularly reminds his shareholders that interest rates are a gravitational pull to stock prices. History shows that the movement of stock prices and interest rates...
  • Jan 10, 2024
    A friend of our stock picking discipline reminded us of a very important force in the stock market. It was called the 70/20/10 rule, and it was promoted by Roger Edelman, Richard...