Investing at Caldwell
Mission
The management team at Caldwell invests on behalf of pensions, charities, foundations, insurance companies, government agencies and municipalities, but our investment philosophy grew out of our long experience with managing the investments of private clients. This experience has taught us that our primary focus must be to first reduce our clients' risk and then seek to maximize their returns.
To accomplish this, Caldwell invests on behalf of our clients in government bonds and the shares of large, well-known corporations. We buy shares in these companies when we perceive that their prices represent good value in light of our firm's overall economic view, the fundamentals of each company and our confidence in corporate management.
Team
Our investment process is built upon working as a team. Every working day we discuss and re-evaluate our ideas in light of changing circumstances in order to anticipate what lies ahead. The physical and organizational structures of our firm's offices are designed to encourage discussion. Each member of our team has strengths and expertise, which are as varied as mineral exploration and bond trading and it is vital that differing and dissenting views are communicated and understood.
For our clients, this means that we have a depth of expertise on which they can draw. For example, our clients can speak with any of our team members about their account, because each member is informed about and participates in the decisions that we make. To see profiles of Caldwell's management team, please click here.
To have a Caldwell team member contact you about professional investment management, please click here.
Investment Policy
Our team works with our clients to help develop an Investment Policy Statement that is right for them We discuss with each client the many factors that influence this Policy including their need for cash, their investment experience, tax issues, goals and plans for the future and any legal requirements. Each account is monitored on a daily basis to ensure that we are investing in a way which will help our clients achieve their goals.
Strategy
In our view, the fundamentals of any single investment cannot be properly understood in the absence of a substantive discussion around interest rates, markets and the economy as a whole – and no one person can have a complete grasp of all these topics. Our team's first step is to build an overall economic forecast through debate and deliberation, which takes these and other factors into account.
We publish our view to our clients at least every quarter, but more frequently when the pace of change in the world warrants it. Over the years, these forecasts have been excellent guides to what markets and the economy had in store.
Active Management
In our fixed-income, equity and balanced portfolios, our team buys only those issues we believe buys only those issues we believe will make the very best investments for our clients. When our views change about a particular bond or stock, we will act in the best interests of our clients to change that security. This is active management. Our focus on only our best ideas means that our portfolios can look very different from the major market indices, which can be a very good thing, particularly in trying times.
Fixed Income
For our clients for whom income and stability are of primary importance, we manage the fixed-income portion of their portfolio actively in order to preserve capital in rising interest rate environments and to preserve income in times when interest rates are falling.
Our focus is on sovereign credits – government bonds. One of the lessons of recent history is that no company is too big to fail. Banks, trusts, insurance companies, power generators and pipelines are in the most stable industries, but all have seen high-profile insolvencies. When we are buying a bond for our clients, we are lending their money and we want to be assured that we will get that money back. Moreover, when our views on interest rates change, we prize liquidity which government bonds provide. This allows us to act on opportunities to preserve our clients' capital and income.
To learn more about Caldwell's fixed income capabilities, please click here.
To have a Caldwell Fixed Income Professional contact you, please click here.
Equity Value Investing
While not impervious to circumstances and their own mistakes, major companies do possess a resilience that enables them to emerge from difficult times – often stronger than they were before. It is this resilience along with the liquidity, market dominance and information flow which larger companies have that attracts us to their shares.
Large companies do not have the same growth trajectory as smaller companies, due to the constraints imposed by the size of the economy as a whole. In order to add value to the investing process, our team looks for opportunities when we believe these shares are undervalued in the market.
The single greatest factor which determines the success or failure of any company is the management that controls it. If a company is underperforming for an extended period of time, then it is the management that is responsible. When a weak management is changed at a company whose fundamentals appear attractive, our team is interested in understanding their vision for that company and evaluating whether their subsequent actions are consistent with that vision.
There are also times when an industry or the entire stock market as a whole can be very weak. It is at these times that our managers seek companies with longer-term potential. Conversely, there are times when market euphoria differs from our overall view. This is a signal to us to take profits and we will reduce our clients' holdings in a stock, an industry or in equities as a whole.
To have a Caldwell Equity Specialist contact you, please click here.
Conclusion
At Caldwell, our management team integrates our overall economic and market strategy with research on the individual stocks and bond credits which we hold for our clients. This combination fosters better decisions through an improved understanding of the whole investing picture and the pieces incorporated in it.
Action
It is important for us to make investing easier to understand for our clients in order that we can better help them achieve their goals. Should we be able to assist you or answer questions about our company, our team or our investment process, please click here to request that a Caldwell Investment Management Team contact you.