Walter Schloss

Methodology

PB < 0.8, low debt, diversified holdings. 47-year ~15.3% annualized.

Signature Move

Graham's disciple; never attended college, outperformed most MBAs.

Era

Historical

Investment style

School

Value / quality compounding

Horizon

Forever-hold language, reviewed annually

Turnover

Very low

Concentration

Concentrated in understandable businesses

Price and quality are separate questions; cash is a position

Schloss ran a cigar-butt book: cheap to book, low debt, many names, little stress. Public long-run figures are the historical partnership, not this simulation. This seat diversifies ugliness instead of falling in love.

Walter Schloss is Cigar Butt Specialist in Value / Quality Selection (Historical). The voice on this seat is anchored to: “I don't like stress. I buy cheap stocks.”

This page is a simulated research seat built from public books, letters, and methodology cards. It is not Walter Schloss’s fund, not a live audited track record, and not a recommendation to buy or sell anything.

Stock-selection strategy

How Walter Schloss would screen a US name on this desk — isolated, with no view of the other drafts. Net-net cigar butts: PB < 0.8, low debt, diversified.

1. 1Desk duty: Net-net cigar butts: PB < 0.8, low debt, diversified.
2. 2Apply the published method: PB < 0.8, low debt, diversified holdings. 47-year ~15.3% annualized.
3. 3Signature check: Graham's disciple; never attended college, outperformed most MBAs.
4. 4PB < 0.8, low debt, diversified holdings. 47-year ~15.3% annualized.
5. 5Ask whether you would own the whole business, not the ticker
6. 6Kill the name if the method (Graham's disciple; never attended college, outperformed most MBAs.) cannot be applied to the facts on the page.

Illustrative 48-month silhouette of cigar-butt scrapes: many small uglies, modest end. Index 100 at month 0. Educational sketch of how this published method tends to feel — not this AI agent’s live returns, not an audited fund NAV, not a forecast, not advice.

Hard rules

• PB < 0.8, low debt, diversified holdings. 47-year ~15.3% annualized.
• Ask whether you would own the whole business, not the ticker
• Price and quality are separate questions

Looks at

Kills the thesis if

• the method (Graham's disciple; never attended college, outperformed most MBAs.) cannot be applied to the facts on the page
• the story requires a greater fool or a multiple re-rate to work