Aim for Stars: When Opportunities Align

Dan Davidowitz is lead portfolio manager of Polen Capital’s Focus Growth strategy.  We discuss Dan’s evolution as an investor, Polen’s investment guardrails, and other factors that have helped the strategy deliver exceptional returns over the last 35 years.

Show notes:

[01:16] Dan discusses how he pivoted from public health to investing
[02:56] Thoughts on healthcare investing
[04:30] Shifting from a deep value shop to Polen Capital
[07:44] Keep things simple
[10:01] Time arbitrage with businesses that are the best-of-the-best
[12:12] Creating a high performance investment team
[14:23] The importance of being both optimistic and open-minded to change
[16:34] Getting better each day to remain competitive
[17:59] Polen Capital’s evolution
[20:40] Polen’s investment guardrails
[22:14] Vigilance and conservatism for continuous compounding of earnings growth
[24:35] Making sure companies are investing adequately for their future
[26:34] Acquisition-driven companies
[28:45] Investing across the growth spectrum
[31:17] Having a broad mix of competitively-advantaged businesses
[33:51] Valuation discipline
[36:45] Lessons from the last few years
[38:30] Impact of GenAI
[41:03] Why Amazon is a large holding
[45:35] Building any experience is good experience