How we invest
Value investing, researched in the open.
Outpick is a research firm. We look for good businesses trading for less than they are worth, we underwrite them over years, and we publish the reasoning — including the positions that went against us.
Investing, not trading
We research what to own, not what to trade.
Buying a business and waiting for it to grow, and buying a chart pattern and selling it inside a day, are not the same activity at different speeds. They are different activities, with different skills, different risks, and very different success rates.
Everything we publish serves the first one. There are no entry and exit prices, no chart setups, no options overlays, and nothing you are meant to act on within the hour.
What that rules out
- Market timing and index forecasts
- Price-based entry and exit points
- Trade alerts you act on immediately
- Options, leverage, and short-term setups
- Personal advice — we are not a broker or adviser
Where this comes from
An old idea, run with modern tooling.
None of the thinking here is original, and we would be suspicious of a firm that claimed otherwise. The framework is value investing as Benjamin Graham set it out and Warren Buffett spent sixty years refining in public: buy a business you understand, pay less than it is worth, insist on a margin of safety, and let time rather than activity do the compounding.
Our favorite holding period is forever.
What is different is the tooling, not the philosophy. We can score 3,600 companies on the same criteria every two weeks and hold each one to the same standard, which is not something a person reading annual reports can do consistently. The machine narrows the field; the standard it narrows against is the old one.
We have no association with Mr. Buffett or Berkshire Hathaway, and nothing here is endorsed by them. We are describing an influence, which is a different thing from a credential.
The framework
Four things that do not change.
- 01Businesses
We buy businesses, not tickers
We buy businesses, not tickers
Every position starts with durable economics — margins that survive a bad year, cash flow that funds the business without the capital markets, a balance sheet that does not force a decision at the worst possible moment, and a competitive position that is hard to copy. A ticker is a claim on a business. If we cannot explain the business, we do not own the claim.
- 02Horizon
A long horizon, by default
A long horizon, by default
We underwrite a company over years. That is a research discipline before it is a holding period: a thesis that only works if the next quarter cooperates is not a thesis, it is a bet on a print. Owning a business for years also means most of what happens to the price in between is noise we are deliberately not reacting to.
- 03Evidence
Fundamentals, with the evidence attached
Fundamentals, with the evidence attached
We score roughly 3,600 US-listed companies on five fundamental factors — valuation, growth, profitability, momentum and estimate revisions — each measured against the company's own sector rather than the whole market. A cheap software company and a cheap miner are not the same claim, and scoring them on one scale would say they were.
- 04Guardrails
Conviction, with guardrails
Conviction, with guardrails
Concentration is where the return comes from and also where the ruin comes from. Position sizing, sector limits and drawdown rules are fixed in advance so that a single idea cannot undo years of research, and so that the decision to sell is made by a rule written on a calm day rather than by a person having a bad one.
In practice
One name every two weeks, and a note when it closes.
The universe is rescored on a fixed cadence rather than whenever something looks interesting, because a fixed cadence is what stops a research schedule from becoming a reaction to the news. One name clears the bar each cycle and gets a full written thesis: the business, the case, the figures behind it, the risks, and what would have to be true for us to be wrong.
Positions close when a rule says so — a guardrail is breached, or the case for owning the business stops holding. When that happens we publish an exit note covering what we owned, what changed, the specific rule that closed it, and what the round trip returned. The losing ones get the same treatment as the winners, which is the part of a public record that actually costs something.
Where we sit
Between the index and the alert service.
How Outpick compares to index funds and typical stock newsletters
What you own
- Index fund
- 500 companies, weighted by size
- Typical stock newsletter
- A list of alerts
- Outpick
- One researched business at a time
Why you own it
- Index fund
- No reason — it's in the index
- Typical stock newsletter
- Because the pick was sent
- Outpick
- A written thesis you can check
Track record
- Index fund
- The market, by definition
- Typical stock newsletter
- Selected highlights
- Outpick
- Live example portfolio, published in full
Risk disclosed
- Index fund
- Market risk
- Typical stock newsletter
- Rarely published
- Outpick
- Wins and losses both shown
What it costs
- Index fund
- A fraction of a percent
- Typical stock newsletter
- Tiers, upsells, sales calls
- Outpick
- One price. No upsells, no calls.
| Dimension | Index fund | Typical stock newsletter | Outpick |
|---|---|---|---|
| What you own | 500 companies, weighted by size | A list of alerts | One researched business at a time |
| Why you own it | No reason — it's in the index | Because the pick was sent | A written thesis you can check |
| Track record | The market, by definition | Selected highlights | Live example portfolio, published in full |
| Risk disclosed | Market risk | Rarely published | Wins and losses both shown |
| What it costs | A fraction of a percent | Tiers, upsells, sales calls | One price. No upsells, no calls. |
Index funds are a good default and we are not arguing otherwise — most people should own them. This is about the part of a portfolio where you want a reason behind every position.
Read us first
Judge the thinking before you pay for it.
The Market Note is free and always will be. One short read a week on what the model is scoring and how we read the cycle.
The Market Note
One short read, every Monday. Free.
What the model is seeing across ~3,600 US-listed stocks, which sectors are scoring, and what we make of it. Market commentary — the picks stay behind the membership.