Value Investing Philosophy

Sound and simple

We believe the beauty of our value investing philosophy is revealed in its simplicity and proven long-term record. Following Heartland's 10 Principles of Value Investing,™ our established process of selecting companies, is a method that we believe works. The Heartland Value Fund has out-performed it's benchmark for almost a quarter of a century.

Building wealth takes time

We understand that many people want to see a quick response to their investment dollars. However, this may be unrealistic. We ask potential investors have at least three years or more as their investment time horizon.

Actively managed funds

Our Fund managers find companies with strong financial and management profiles that have been overlooked and undervalued by the market and show signs of significant appreciation potential. Our goal is to buy fundamentally sound businesses at a fraction of what we believe is their true worth.

Balancing rewards and risk

We pay equal attention to the rewards and the risks of investing. When we consider a security, we don't simply ask, "How much can it go up?," we also ask, "How much can it go down?"

This may seem like common sense, but you'd be surprised how infrequently this happens. For index funds, there is generally no independent opportunity to evaluate the risk of a security. If it is in the index, it is in your portfolio, regardless of its risk or valuation.

Contrarian investing

Some investors follow the crowd and make investments based on market sentiments. A contrarian believes this behavior among investors can lead to mispricings in securities' markets that can be exploited to create wealth. Our goal is to exploit market sentiment, either positive or negative, and use it as an attractive entry point when a stock valuation is depressed or an exit point when a company's fundamentals do not support a lofty valuation.

A bottom up approach - why it works

The bottom-up investor starts with the business itself. We feel that starting with the merits of a company helps us isolate the value, regardless of market conditions.

Although we may not be able to control a stock's price in the short term, we believe great companies are recognizable and can build wealth for patient investors. That's why we encourage shareholders to be long-term investors.