Not for quarters.
But for wealth.

The Value Investment Office (VIO) sees itself as a steward of family wealth and as a capital allocator following the value investment philosophy. It supports families and professional investors in the long-term building and preservation of their wealth, with discipline, analytical depth, and patience.

Unlike traditional wealth management firms, VIO does not follow a product architecture but a clear investment philosophy: value investing according to Benjamin Graham and Warren Buffett.

At the core of this approach lies a simple but demanding distinction. Every company has two values: a long-term economic value, derived from its substance and earning power, and a daily fluctuating market price. A value investor keeps the two clearly apart and invests only when the market price stands noticeably below the intrinsic value.

This difference between price and value is the margin of safety. It protects against valuation errors, against unexpected developments, and against the pressure to remain invested at all times. The aim of the Value Investment Office is to build and preserve wealth on this basis, over long periods of time. Not for quarters, but for decades.

The Value Investment Office allocates capital exclusively to value investment funds, that is, to strategies that work consistently according to the principles of value-oriented investing. This specialisation is the core of my work.

Within the value approach, several schools have developed: Deep Value, Quality Value, Opportunistic Value, Macro Value, Credit Value. A second dimension is concentration: there are focused value funds with few, high-conviction positions, and broadly diversified value funds spread across many holdings, sectors, and regions. Both have their strengths and complement one another within the overall portfolio. How I combine these building blocks depends on two factors: the prevailing market phase and the individual risk profile of the client. In this way each client receives an individual portfolio, in which the styles complement and stabilise one another, and which does not depend on a single assumption or a single manager.

At the centre stands the careful selection of exceptional value investment managers. The standard is not their visibility, but their substance: a track record consistently demonstrated over many years, disciplined processes, and a clearly anchored value-oriented philosophy. How I select these managers and the role they play in the portfolio is described in the section “Value Investment Managers”.

My focus is capital allocation. Tax and administrative matters I deliberately leave to specialised experts. My task is the construction and continuous development of a sound architecture of capital allocation, with a clear strategy, disciplined execution, and a long-term view on substance and stability.

The Value Investment Office is free of product interests and commission incentives. I conduct my work within the framework and under the regulatory umbrella of Inno Invest GmbH, an investment firm authorised under § 15 WpIG and supervised by the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin). Compensation is paid solely within a wealth management mandate, without commission- or transaction-based incentives.

Successful investing rests on a few clear principles, not on many tactical decisions. The challenge lies not in knowing these principles, but in applying them consistently. Particularly when markets put convictions to the test.

Markets fluctuate, sentiment shifts. Every generation experiences phases of euphoria and uncertainty. What matters is not predicting these movements, but structuring a portfolio in such a way that it can withstand even significant market movements.

I deliberately refrain from short-term forecasts. Instead, I focus on structural connections and long-term developments. At the centre stands the selection of globally exceptional value investment managers with a clearly defined and transparent value investment process.

Over the long term, it is more effective to manage the equity allocation appropriately, to diversify with focus along convincing value approaches, to maintain sufficient risk buffers, and to make disciplined use of phases of market sentiment, than to lose oneself in constant optimisation.

Diversification does not mean investing blindly across a multitude of value funds, but doing so in a structured way. A clearly defined decision-making framework protects against short-term impulses and preserves rationality even in demanding market phases.

My interests are connected with those of my clients. Reallocations or manager changes are made only when they are structurally required.

My principle: quality arises from considered decisions, not from rapid actions.

My approach has grown over many years. It has developed out of the attentive study of the portfolio decisions and writings of a few outstanding value investors, and out of engagement with various mental models that describe long-term investing clearly and rationally.

Charlie Munger, known for his mental-models approach, held the view that a relatively small, carefully chosen set of around 80 to 90 fundamental mental models from psychology, economics, biology, and mathematics is sufficient to make sense of most real-world problems. The point is not to explain the world perfectly, but to think with the right tools. I have taken up this idea and built my own library of mental models, gathering central concepts from investment, economics, psychology, and philosophy. For me it is not an archive, but a working instrument: in the construction and continuous development of my portfolios, I draw on it deliberately.

Over the years, a few investors and thinkers have become lasting points of reference. Their works have accompanied me for a long time:

• Benjamin Graham: founder of value investing and of the principle of the margin of safety.
• Warren Buffett & Charlie Munger: long-term entrepreneurship and capital allocation.
• Howard Marks: thinking in probabilities and awareness of risk.
• Seth Klarman: valuation discipline and independent thinking.
• Li Lu: concentrated investing in exceptional companies.
• Michael Mauboussin: decision quality and probabilistic thinking.
• Nassim Nicholas Taleb: robustness and the handling of uncertainty.

Their works do not provide recipes, but mental guardrails for the handling of uncertainty, valuation, and risk.

Knowledge does not replace experience, but it creates a framework in which experience can be placed more meaningfully.

I work with exceptional value investment managers whose quality and way of thinking have convinced me over a long period. My aim is to remain invested for the long term and to be a reliable capital partner.

What stands at the centre is not size or visibility, but the quality of thinking, process discipline, and the integrity of action.

Many of the selected managers operate independently and outside common distribution structures. Access to their expertise is often limited and develops over time, through trusted relationships.

Unconventionality is not a disadvantage, but rather is often a positive sign of independent thinking.

A short track record is not a reason for exclusion, provided that the quality of process and value research is convincing. A long track record must demonstrate substance.

Managers who never underperform will scarcely outperform over the long term. Anyone who is not prepared to act against the consensus will rarely achieve more than the average. And the average is not what I aim for.

An old story, attributed to the architect Christopher Wren, tells of three men cutting stone. A passer-by asks the first: “What are you doing?”

“I am cutting a stone.”

He asks the second the same question. “I am earning my living,” he says, and goes on with his work.

At the third, the passer-by pauses. The man sets down his hammer, thinks for a moment, and then answers calmly:

“I am building a cathedral. For eternity.”

Three men. The same work. Three entirely different answers.

Peter Drucker, whom BusinessWeek called “the man who invented management”, used this parable to illustrate one of the most important statements of his work: that the question of the why determines the value of all work.

Three men, the same work, three horizons. What distinguishes them is not their activity, but the timeframe within which they see their work: the day, the year, the generation. Long-term investing follows this logic.

In value investing, the attitude of the third stone-cutter acts as an inner compass. Anyone allocating capital can take their daily orientation from the noise of the market, from headlines, from the benchmark of the quarter, or from the relationship between intrinsic value and market price, a measure that gives an honest answer only over long periods. It is precisely this relationship that lies at the core of the school in which Benjamin Graham, Warren Buffett, Walter Schloss, Seth Klarman, and Howard Marks built their life’s work.

My investment style at the Value Investment Office is the consistent translation of this attitude into a portfolio architecture. I do not buy stories. I allocate capital to selected value investment managers who invest only where there is a sufficient margin of safety between price and intrinsic value. I do not measure managers by a single quarter, but by their valuation discipline across full market cycles. And I accept that wealth does not arise through activity, but through the patient effect of a few good decisions over years.

What endures rarely arises quickly. But often precisely where patience, clarity, and discipline work together over a long period of time.

I work with families and professional investors who invest capital with a long time horizon and who understand entrepreneurial thinking, analytical depth, and structured decisions as the foundation of lasting wealth creation. They are prepared to bear temporary fluctuations in value and to assess investment decisions across market cycles.

My approach can be implemented appropriately from an investment volume of two million euros. At the same time, I deliberately limit the number of clients in order to ensure careful and concentrated execution.

Collaboration generally takes the form of a discretionary wealth management mandate. I exercise this mandate within the framework and under the regulatory umbrella of Inno Invest GmbH, an investment firm authorised under § 15 WpIG and supervised by the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin).

If you have the impression that the Value Investment Office is suited to your way of thinking and your time horizon, I would be glad to speak with you.

A personal conversation is the best way to get to know one another and to consider whether a collaboration would be appropriate.

I generally provide documents only after a first conversation.

You can reach me at:

filbert@valueinvestmentoffice.com

I will get back to you in good time and look forward to a good exchange.