Wallace R. Weitz & Company was started in 1983 with about $10 million under management. The firm, a registered investment adviser, now manages approximately $3 billion for The Weitz Funds, individuals, corporations, pension plans, foundations, and endowments. Our three portfolio managers are supported by six other investment professionals and approximately twenty operations and administrative personnel.

We seek understandable, well-managed, cash-generating businesses. We try to understand what a rational, informed buyer would pay for the whole business and to buy shares at a significant discount to that business value. We are most interested in the present value of the future free cash that the business will generate. We will look at companies of all sizes, and since we focus on economic (cash) earnings, some of our stocks may not appear “statistically cheap” based on GAAP accounting. However, since we insist on predictability and low price-to-business value, consultants usually agree with our self-characterization as “value” managers.

Portfolio managers and analysts do primary “bottoms up” research on individual companies. Our research process combines reading of company filings and industry publications with regular personal and telephone contacts with company managements. That process is also supplemented with Wall Street research. The focus is on business valuation, management competence, and long-term prospects, with virtually no attention to technical analysis, “earnings momentum,” or short-term trading.