In the short run, the market is a voting machine.
But in the long run, it is a weighing machine.
To buy when others are despondently selling and to sell when others are greedily buying requires the greatest fortitude but pays the greatest reward.
Latest Exits
Financial Services (2026)
Europe’s second-largest lender, BNP Paribas, had become a powerhouse in asset management following its takeover of AXA Investment Managers. At the time of our—short-lived—investment in late 2025, it traded at roughly two-thirds of its tangible book value, despite delivering solid double-digit returns and offering an attractive 8.5% dividend yield. Indexing and ETF heavyweight Amundi, Europe’s largest asset manager, faced similar valuation multiples when Standard invested on the same day. Both stocks were selected for their discounts and income-producing characteristics. Their market values appreciated shortly thereafter, prompting a sale in favor of more compelling opportunities.
E&P, Frontier Markets (2026)
Listed in Canada, active in Tanzania, and registered in the British Virgin Islands, natural gas producer Orca Energy Group served as the parent company of PanAfrican Energy Tanzania. Controlled by the son of its late founder, David Lyons, PAET operated the prolific Songo Songo Field, partnering with national utility Songas and playing a strategic role in the country’s path to economic development. Our oldest shareholding, Orca distributed to us multiples of its original acquisition price in dividends.
Distribution (2025)
A specialist in furniture hardware with 112 centers and soon half of its business in the United States, Québec-based Richelieu Hardware, which caters primarily to a clientele of professionals, sports a pristine M&A record, an unusually high level of employee shareholding, and a thoughtful, value-driven expansion strategy under the guidance of its chief executive officer Richard Lord.
Information Technology (2025)
The Los Angeles company formerly chaired by the late Berkshire Hathaway’s vice-chairman Charlie Munger, Daily Journal Corporation, had a legacy business, a portfolio of marketable securities and real estate properties that covered virtually its entire valuation at the time of our investment, leaving just a modest multiple on its burgeoning information technology business serving courts in the United States, Canada and Australia.
Aerospace (2024)
French manufacturer of military aircrafts and business jets Dassault Aviation remains firmly controlled by the Dassault family, who owns close to two-thirds of equity capital. In late 2021, at €87 per share, minus the €3bn in excess cash and 25% stake in defense group Thales valued €4bn—itself at rock-bottom levels—the company’s market capitalization assigned zero value to its core aviation business, home to its acclaimed Rafale and Falcon franchises, among others.
Integrated Oil & Gas (2024)
Depressed commodity prices, limited export options, bloated pipeline capacity and fears of a prolonged pandemic had sent valuations of Canadian producers spiraling down to historic lows. In spite of its fortress balance sheet and integrated model, Suncor, which owns a non-replicable refining infrastructure and decades of reserves in Alberta, was no exception. The company’s business plan stated its intention to return $21 per share to its shareholders over a five-years horizon, and astonishingly that promise came against a share price of just $18 at the time of our investment.
Advertising (2022)
As the Covid-19 pandemic broke out in spring 2020, French advertising giant Publicis—which owns a number of premier franchises in the creative business, has negligible debt and can adjust its cost structure at will—saw its market capitalization shrunk to levels not even seen in the depths of the 2008 financial crisis, as its shares briefly traded at just four times earnings. The rebound was quick, however, and so was our sale.
Consumer Staples (2021)
The fifth largest brewer worldwide, Molson Coors has a 25% market share in North America, where it also controls highly strategic distribution networks. Despite stable earning power and multiple short-term catalysts—dividend reinstatement, asset sales, restructuring program, etc.—the company saw its shares priced at badly depressed multiples during the pandemic, triggering our interest and most sizeable—albeit short-lived—investment in recent years.
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