The Core of Value Investing: A 33-Stock Strategy of Buying Only When Price Diverges from Value

🎯 What "Stocks I Want to Own Forever" Really Means

Earlier this year, an investor revealed a list of over 30 stocks they want to own forever. The important thing is these aren't hype stocks or story stocks. They're real businesses that make real money, companies with long-proven track records.

When someone asks, "If you had to choose just one?" — that's incredibly tough. Because going all-in on a single stock isn't investing, it's speculating. The real investment process is simple:

Build a basket of great companies and buy them when their price falls below the value you've assigned to them.

Some will outperform, some won't. But over time, buying at the right price means that as value comes into play and price meets value, you can hopefully outperform the market.

📋 The Full 33-Stock List

The entire premise of this list is straightforward: I'd love to own these companies forever, but I will only buy them when price is disconnected from value. When price and value are aligned, I wait. Patiently.

Group 1: Tech & Financial Giants

Microsoft — Cloud and AI powerhouse
Google (Alphabet) — Search and advertising dominance
Meta — Social media ecosystem
Apple — Premium ecosystem and growing services
Alibaba — Chinese e-commerce and cloud
American Express — Premium payment network
Berkshire Hathaway — Warren Buffett's conglomerate
Visa — Global payment infrastructure
Mastercard — Global payment network

Group 2: Consumer & Retail

Home Depot — Home improvement leader
Lowe's — Home improvement #2
McDonald's — Global franchise king
Disney — Entertainment empire
Costco — Membership-based warehouse
Target — Major US retail chain
TJ Maxx — Off-price retail champion
Sprouts — Health food specialty grocer

Group 3: Lifestyle & Luxury

Nike — Global sports brand #1
Ferrari — Ultra-premium automobiles
Louis Vuitton (LVMH) — Luxury icon
Starbucks — Global coffee chain

Group 4: Software & Services

Adobe — Creative software standard
Intuit — Tax and accounting software monopoly
T. Rowe Price — Asset management

Group 5: Industrials & Consumer Staples

Sherwin Williams — Paint industry dominance
Generac — Emergency generator market leader
Otis — Elevators and escalators
Brookfield Asset Management — Infrastructure asset management
Cintas — Uniforms and facility services
Southwest Airlines — Low-cost airline leader
Johnson & Johnson — Healthcare giant
Hershey — Chocolate and confections
Procter & Gamble — Consumer goods king

That's 33 businesses total, with 13 currently owned.

🔍 How to Find Value: The 10-Year Analysis Process

The core question in value investing never changes: Price relative to value.

The Analysis Process

Run a full 10-year analysis using a stock analyzer tool
Set future assumptions for key metrics:
- Price-to-Earnings Ratio (P/E)
- Free Cash Flow Ratio
- Profit Margin
- Revenue Growth
Apply a margin of safety: If you truly expect 10% growth, plug in 8%. This margin of safety ensures you're not buying based on best-case scenarios alone.

🎨 This Is an Art, Not a Science

Because we use lots of numbers, people think, "It's numbers, so it must be exact." That's simply not true. Your assumptions will differ from mine, and that's perfectly fine.

The key is learning the process. Don't buy a stock because someone else owns it. Even if Warren Buffett owns it, that's not a reason for you to. Get ideas from others, but always do your own research.

We're not here to give you a fish. We're teaching you how to fish.

🎯 Narrowing the Candidates: Stocks Worth Watching Now

Based on price relative to value, here are the standout candidates right now:

Stock	Why It's Interesting
Southwest Airlines	Major pullback on airline sector fear
Adobe	Massive drop from AI fear, strong fundamentals
Nike	Undervalued relative to brand power
Sprouts	Health food trend beneficiary
Target	Beaten down on consumer slowdown fears
Intuit	Monopolistic position in accounting software

Each of these, based on conservative assumptions, is trading at a level that at least gets immediate attention. The market has pulled them back enough to warrant deeper analysis.

Additional Watchlist Stocks

From live streams and video analyses:

Meta — Prices starting to get interesting
Alibaba — Discounted for China risk
American Express — Reflecting premium spending slowdown
Visa — Starting to come down in price

And here's the best part: We haven't even had a bear market yet. In a real bear market, these stocks could fall further. And that's when the biggest opportunities emerge.

💡 Key Takeaways

This is a journey. It's about showing the process of how to filter, how to eliminate, and how to compare opportunity versus risk.

Invest, don't speculate
Don't chase price movements
Focus on price relative to value
Always maintain a margin of safety
Use a basket approach to diversify risk

Value investing is a game of patience. Recognizing great businesses and waiting for the right price — that's the most reliable path to beating the market. 🌱