We are pleased to bring you the 42nd edition of Graham & Doddsville. This student-led investment publication of Columbia Business School (CBS) is co-sponsored by the Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing and the Columbia Student Investment Management Association (CSIMA). In this issue, we were lucky to be joined by three entrepreneurial investors who all started their own funds.
We first interviewed Brian Bares, founder of Bares Capital Management. We discussed Mr. Bares's early interest in investing, experience with launching and running his own fund, understanding of institutional allocation, and his first-principles based approach to fundamental analysis. Mr. Bares lays out his process, which focuses heavily on business and management quality. Brian is also the author of "The Small-Cap Advantage", published in 2011.
Next, we interviewed Sean Stannard-Stockton, CIO and cofounder of Ensemble Capital Management. Mr. Stannard-Stockton walks through Ensemble's Venn diagram for investing, which focuses on the overlap between management, competitive moats, and "forecastability". Sean also shares case studies of successful (Mastercard) and unsuccessful investments (Time Warner), with interesting learnings in both cases.
Lastly, we interviewed Dan Rasmussen, founder of Verdad Advisers. We discussed Mr. Rasmussen's early investing influences, approach to small-cap value investing, and contrarian thoughts on the value of fundamental forecasting. Our conversation about "Superforecasting", narrative shifts, and current market trends is a fun and timely read.
We continue to bring you stock pitches from current CBS students. In this issue, we feature the winners of the 14th Annual Pershing Square Challenge. 1st place winners Paul Chandler ('21), Jack Devine ('21), and David Kilgariff ('21) share their buy thesis on Dolby (DLB, Financial), presenting a compelling case based on DLB's underappreciated transformation. 2nd place winners Bill Henry ('22), Tom Moore ('22), and Dickson Pau ('22) present their buy thesis on Angi (ANGI, Financial) and walk through ANGI's improving economics as it transitions towards pre -priced transactions.
Lastly, you can find more interviews on the Value Investing with Legends podcast, hosted by Professor Tano Santos. Professor Santos has recently conducted interviews with guests including Anne-Sophie d'Andlau, Florian Schuhbauer and Klaus Roehrig, Elizabeth Lilly, and Anna Nikolayevsky ('98).
We thank our interviewees for contributing their time and insights not only to us, but to the whole investing community.
-G&Dsville Editors
Continue reading the issue here.
