Offshore

hat others are paying for similar companies and assets: <picturehttps://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc6d122b7-edac-4918-b5a1-a2b…

ting in companies across the life cycle, it behooves you to become comfortable with different pricing ratios, since no one pricing multiple will work on all firms.

Investing across the Life Cycle

In my class (and book) on investment philosophies, I start by noting that every investment philosophy is rooted in a belief about markets making (and correcting) mistakes, and that there is no one best philosophy for all investors. I use the investment process, starting with asset allocation, moving to stock/asset selection and ending with execution to show the range of views that investors bring to the game:

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Market timing, whether it be based on charts/technical indicators or fundamentals, is primarily focused on the asset allocation phase of investing, with cheaper (based upon your market timing measures) asset classes being over weighted and more expensive asset classes being under weighted. Within the stock selection phase, there are a whole host of investment philosophies, often holding contradictory views of market behavior. Among stock traders, for instance, there are those who believe that markets learn slowly (and go with momentum) and those who believe that markets over react (and bet on reversals). On the investing side, you have the classic divide between value and growth investors, both claiming the high ground. I view the differences between these two groups through the prism of a financial balance sheet:

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Value investors believe that the best investment bargains are in mature companies, where assets in place (investments already made) are being underpriced by the market, whereas growth investors build their investment theses around the idea that it is growth assets where markets make mistakes. Finally, there are market players who try to make money from market frictions, by locking in market mispricing (with pure or near arbitrage).

Drawing on the earlier discussion of value versus price, you can classify market players into investors (who value companies, and try to buy them at a lower price, while hoping that the gap closes) and traders (who make them money on the pricing game, buying at a low price and selling at a higher one). While investors and traders are part of the market in every company, you are likely to see the balance between the two groups shift as companies move through the life cycle:

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Early in the life cycle, it is undeniable that traders dominate, and for investors in these companies, even if they are right in their value assessments, winning will require much longer time h[...]

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