Abstract
Value investing refers to the buying or selling of stocks on the basis of a perceived gap between their current market price and their fundamental value – commonly defined as the present value of the expected future payoffs to shareholders. This style of investing is predicated upon two observations about publicly listed companies and their stock prices: (1) a share of stock is merely a fractional claim on the futures cash flows of an operating business, and that claim is the basis of its long-run value; (2) over shorter horizons, prices can deviate substantially from the long-run value of the stock. Value investors buy stocks that appear to be cheap relative to their intrinsic value and sell (even sell short) stocks that seem expensive.
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* This article was prepared for delivery at a keynote session of the China Accounting and Finance Review (CAFR) Special Issue Conference held on 6-7 December 2013 in Hong Kong.
1 Lee is the Joseph McDonald Professor of Accounting at Stanford Graduate School of Business, Stanford, California (CLEE8@stanford.edu). He is also General Partner and Co-founder of Nipun Capital, LLC, a California-based asset management firm focused on Asian equities. Lee wishes to thank Eric So (MIT), Will Cong (Stanford), Jim Ohlson (NYU), Stephen Penman (Columbia), and Ken Chu (HK PolyU), as well as workshop participants at the CAFR Special Issue Conference, for their helpful suggestions and comments.
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Lee, C. Value Investing: Bridging Theory and Practice. China Account Financ Rev 16, 5 (2014). https://doi.org/10.7603/s40570-014-0005-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.7603/s40570-014-0005-3