📖Philip Fisher

Hold Outstanding Companies

🌿 Intermediate★★★★★

Almost never sell an outstanding company.

💬

If the job has been correctly done when a common stock is purchased, the time to sell it is almost never. Truly outstanding companies grow for decades.

— Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits,1958

🏠 Everyday Analogy

Market cycles resemble seasons: planting, growth, harvest, and winter. Using one strategy in every season leads to repeated mistakes.

📖 Core Interpretation

Philip Fisher sees markets as cyclical rather than linear. Understanding cycle position improves risk-taking decisions more than trying to call exact tops and bottoms.
💎 Key Insight:Exceptional companies compound wealth over decades.

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❓ Why It Matters

Ignoring cycles repeats the same mistakes: excessive optimism at peaks and excessive pessimism near troughs. Context matters for position sizing.

🎯 How to Practice

Monitor credit, valuation, earnings, and sentiment signals; reduce aggressiveness in euphoric phases and preserve flexibility in fearful phases.

⚠️ Common Pitfalls

Treating short rebounds as full cycle turns
Extrapolating peak conditions indefinitely
Becoming maximally defensive near valuation troughs

📚 Case Studies

1
Motorola Early R&D Bet (1955)
Fisher evaluated Motorola’s heavy R&D in semiconductors and communications, seeing a pipeline of products and strong technical leadership.
✨ Outcome:Invested and held long term; Motorola became a multibagger as R&D translated into dominant positions in radios and early electronics.
2
Texas Instruments Semiconductor Leadership (1960)
Fisher studied TI’s R&D intensity in transistors and integrated circuits, focusing on management’s ability to commercialize lab advances.
✨ Outcome:Maintained investment; TI’s technological edge drove strong revenue and profit growth, validating Fisher’s emphasis on sustained, productive R&D spending.

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