Wally Weitz To Let 2 Co-Managers Take Over Firm’s Flagship Mutual Fund In 2016 via Russell Hubbard, Omaha World-Herald
Wally Weitz, Omaha’s second-largest value investor, has told clients and regulators that he plans to relinquish management of his flagship mutual fund at the end of this year.
That will make 2016 the first year since 1986 that Wally Weitz will not have a hand in picking stocks for his firm’s Value Fund, which was modeled after the “find a cheap gem” investing style of Berkshire Hathaway Chairman and Chief Executive Warren Buffett.
“Clients want a succession plan,” Wally Weitz said of the leadership changes. “There has always been a ‘hit-by-a-bus’ plan, but this reinforces the idea of a long-term succession plan.”
The $6 billion that Weitz Investments has under management and advisement makes the 66-year-old Weitz the second-biggest value investing proponent in Omaha, considered a mecca for the style popularized by Omaha-born Buffett, whose Berkshire Hathaway owns marketable securities worth $117 billion and whose value template was emulated by Weitz.
Weitz Investment Management filed documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission stating that Brad Hinton and Dave Perkins, who run the Value Fund along with Weitz, will take charge of portfolio management of the fund at the end of the year.
The move hasn’t changed the fund family’s rating in the competitive mutual fund industry.
See full article here Omaha
