During the quarter we liquidated our positions in Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK). Over the past several years, Verisk has gone outside its core competency of serving the Insurance Industry, in an effort to drive continued revenue and earnings growth. Although the Company has executed well in the insurance vertical, we are less impressed with the execution of their acquisitions in the energy, health care, and financial verticals. Those verticals still represent a minority of their profitability (they exited health care in 2016); however, we think the returns to date have not justified the balance sheet risk the Company has taken and would prefer management return capital to shareholders, rather than growing for growth’s sake. We reinvested proceeds into better opportunities that were presented during the brief bouts of heightened volatility.
From David Rolfe (Trades, Portfolio)'s Wedgewood Partners first quarter 2018 shareholder letter.
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