Seamless Web of Deserved Trust
“The highest form which civilization can reach is a seamless web of deserved trust. Not much procedure, just totally reliable people correctly trusting one another.” – Charlie Munger
“The highest form which civilization can reach is a seamless web of deserved trust. Not much procedure, just totally reliable people correctly trusting one another.” – Charlie Munger
We embrace the value investment principles of Benjamin Graham, Warren Buffett, and Charles Munger, and today primarily focus on publicly traded companies in Asia, with an emphasis on China. We aim to achieve superior returns by being long-term owners of high quality companies with substantial “economic moat”, great growth potential, and run by trust-worthy people. Some of our holdings date back to our inception twenty years ago.
“In making investments, I have always believed that you must act with discipline whenever you see something you truly like. To explain this philosophy, Buffett/Munger likes to use a baseball analogy that I find particularly illuminating, though I myself am not at all a baseball expert. Ted Williams is the only baseball player who had a .400 single-season hitting record in the last seven decades. In the Science of Hitting, he explained his technique. He divided the strike zone into seventy-seven cells, each representing the size of a baseball. He would insist on swinging only at balls in his ‘best’ cells, even at the risk of striking out, because reaching for the ‘worst’ spots would seriously reduce his chances of success. As a securities investor, you can watch all sorts of business propositions in the form of security prices thrown at you all the time. For the most part, you don’t have to do a thing other than be amused. Once in a while, you will find a ‘fat pitch’ that is slow, straight, and right in the middle of your sweet spot. Then you swing hard. This way, no matter what natural ability you start with, you will substantially increase your hitting average. One common problem for investors is that they tend to swing too often. This is true for both individuals and for professional investors operating under institutional imperatives, one version of which drove me out of the conventional long/short hedge fund operation. However, the opposite problem is equally harmful to long-term results: You discover a ‘fat pitch’ but are unable to swing with the full weight of your capital.”
—Li Lu
(Poor Charlie’s Almanack, 3rd Edition 2009, Page 61)
Li Lu is the Founder and Chairman of Himalaya Capital, a value investing firm where he has been managing its principal fund since 1997. Born in China, Li Lu attended Columbia University where he received his BA, JD, and MBA simultaneously. He is a trustee of Columbia University and the California Institute of Technology. Among his various philanthropic pursuits, Li Lu co-founded and is Board Chair of The Asian American Foundation (TAAF), serving the 23 million Asian American and Pacific Islander community in their pursuit of belonging and prosperity, free from discrimination, slander and violence. He is the author of Civilization, Modernization, Value Investing and China and Moving the Mountain: My Life in China. Li Lu was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2020.
We tell the truth to the best of our knowledge. We tell what we know and more importantly what we don’t know.
We work hard to keep our promises so that our investors, co-workers, investee companies and business partners can depend on us.
We keep the highest standards of business ethics and professionalism.
We work hard and try our best to deliver the highest quality of work.
We safeguard confidential information and respect the privacy of our investors, co-workers, investee companies and business partners.
We are loyal to our investors, co-workers, investee companies and business partners. We operate in a seamless web of deserved trust.
1301 2nd Ave Suite 2100
Seattle, WA 98101 USA
1-206-707-0768
1-206-707-0770