Glossary

Data and Filings

13F

A US institutional investment manager with investment discretion over $100 million or more in US-listed stocks and similar securities must report its holdings to the SEC within 45 days after each quarter ends, on Form 13F. It lists only long positions on the last day of the quarter; short positions, cash, foreign-listed shares and trades during the quarter are not shown.

Amendment (13F-HR/A)

A corrected or supplemented filing. An amendment that adds new holdings is added to the original; a full restatement replaces it.

Confidential Treatment

A manager can ask to keep some holdings private for up to a year; during that time they do not appear on the 13F.

Value Giant (Giant)

A value investor selected by this site’s public rules. See How giants are chosen.

Stock Split

A company turns each share into several (say four for one): more shares at a proportionally lower price, same total value. Buys, sells and costs are split-adjusted before they are calculated.

Prices

Quarter-End Price

13F quarter-end value ÷ shares, roughly the closing price on the last day of the quarter; the median when several giants hold it. “Now” on this site always means the latest quarter-end price.

Quarter-Start Price

The previous quarter-end price (split-adjusted).

Est. Trade Price

(Quarter-start price + quarter-end price) ÷ 2. A 13F does not say when or at what price the giant traded, so only a rough level can be estimated.

Est. Trade Value

Change in shares × est. trade price.

Est. Average Cost

Shares added each quarter × est. trade price, as a weighted average; trims leave the cost unchanged.

Start Point

Positions held before Q1 1999 (or the giant’s earliest electronic filing) take that quarter’s price as their cost, which is not what the giant actually paid.

Price vs Cost

Quarter-end price ÷ est. average cost − 1. Positive means the price is above the estimated cost (a paper gain), negative the opposite; dividends excluded.

Holdings and Consensus

Weight

A company’s quarter-end value ÷ the giant’s total quarter-end stock value.

Giants Holding

The number of giants holding the company that quarter; share classes of one company count once.

Composite Weight

The sum of each giant’s weight in the company, divided by the number of giants counted that quarter. Every giant gets one vote, so big portfolios cannot dominate. Example: with 60 giants, one holding 10% and another 5% and nobody else, the composite weight is (10% + 5%) ÷ 60 = 0.25%.

Share of Combined Value

The company’s share of everything the giants hold, by value. Dominated by big portfolios such as Berkshire’s, which is why the site mainly uses the composite weight.

New, Added, Trimmed, Sold Out

New: not held last quarter, held now. Added: more shares. Trimmed: fewer shares but still held. Sold out: held last quarter, not now. Share counts are split-adjusted; switching between share classes of one company is not a trade.

Position Shift

Change in shares × quarter-end price ÷ the giant’s whole portfolio, in percentage points. It shows how much a trade mattered to that giant: $100 million is a big move for a small portfolio and a small one for a large portfolio.

Heaviest Single Bet (Highest Conviction)

A company’s weight in one giant’s portfolio. The higher the weight, the more conviction it suggests.

Repeat Buying

The same giant buying the same company two or more quarters in a row.

Crowding and Disagreement

Crowding: three or more giants buying or adding to the same company in one quarter. Disagreement: three or more buyers and three or more sellers in the same quarter.

Average Quarters Held

For a giant’s current holdings, the number of quarters each has been held, averaged.

Trends

Net Buyers

The share of giants whose estimated buying exceeded their selling that quarter. Above 50% means most giants were adding.

Net Deployment

Estimated net buying this quarter ÷ last quarter’s portfolio. The average net deployment averages this over all giants, one vote each, so big portfolios do not dominate.

Turnover

The smaller of buying and selling ÷ the average portfolio: how much of the portfolio changed during the quarter.

Top-10 Concentration

The combined weight of a giant’s 10 largest holdings. Higher means more concentrated.

Consensus Concentration

The combined composite weight of the top 10 companies. Higher means the giants crowd into the same few names.

Overlap

For each company, the smaller of the giant’s weight and the composite weight, summed over all companies. Higher means the giant’s portfolio looks more like everyone else’s.

Long-Run Results

Survivorship Bias

Overstating results by looking only at those who survived. This site’s roster is chosen today, and managers who closed early are missing, so the earlier the year, the rosier the picture.

Price Only (No Dividends)

Returns on this site count only changes in quarter-end prices, without dividends, fees or taxes. For 2006–2025, the S&P 500 with dividends returned 11.00% a year (S&P Dow Jones Indices, SPIVA report), while this site’s price-only SPY figure is 8.87%; the gap of about 2 percentage points is mainly dividends.

SPY

An ETF that tracks the US S&P 500 index, used here to stand for the market. Its price also comes from 13F quarter-end values.