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Manchester, Vermont · A family lineage since 1925

We wrote the book on
rational investing.

Our founder set down a lifetime of investing in a book called The Rational Investor: own a small number of exceptional businesses, value them rationally, and hold them for a very long time — on behalf of families who would rather think about almost anything other than their money. Three generations later, those principles are still how this family works. We read. We wait. We answer the phone.

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SEC-Registered Investment AdviserAuthor of “The Rational Investor”Concentrated, Low-Turnover PortfoliosSeparate Accounts, Held in Your NameThree Generations of Practice · Founded 1995
Our Philosophy

We Wrote the Book. Then We Lived By It.

In 1990, our founder distilled a lifetime of investing into a single framework and published it as The Rational Investor — twelve principles of investing, paired with three of personal finance. It was a statement of philosophy, not a sales pitch: a plain account of how this family thinks about owning businesses. The principles are old-fashioned on purpose. They are also, in our view, the whole of the job.

I

Own the Business, Not the Stock

Our founder’s test for any holding: “Would you be willing to buy the shares in this business if you knew the financial markets were going to close down for 10 years?” A share is a fractional stake in a real enterprise — not a ticker to be traded.

II

Demand a Franchise

In the founder’s words, the best businesses have “a superior product, service, or reputation, which creates demand, thwarts competition, and allows a company to charge a high price.” His favorite example was a place he once worked, the National Geographic Society — its members, with old issues stacked in attics and basements, a fortress no competitor could storm.

III

Insist on a Margin of Safety

As one value investor he quotes puts it, “When they build a bridge, they design it to be able to support a lot of additional weight.” We buy meaningfully below our estimate of a business’s worth, so an error or a surprise is survivable rather than fatal.

IV

Buy Straw Hats in Winter

“Men, it has been well said, think in herds… they go mad in herds.” The investor’s job is to keep his head when the crowd loses theirs — to see quality and value where others do not. The professionals call it buying straw hats in winter.

Read all twelve principles → See why earnings drive prices — an interactive demonstration →

The Rational Investor was first published in 1990 and is offered for educational purposes only. It is not investment advice and not an offer or solicitation. Mr. Hutner is the general partner of affiliated private investment funds; references to the firm’s philosophy do not represent the performance of any fund or account.

One Idea, Three Generations

The Frameworks Have Multiplied. The Philosophy Has Not Moved.

Own a few wonderful, understandable businesses, buy them with a margin of safety, and hold them — quietly, through boredom and through panic — while good management compounds their value. That is the whole conviction, and each generation has inherited the idea while sharpening the tools.

1925

The Lineage

It traces to Pulsifer & Hutner, a Wall Street investment adviser founded in 1925, where our founder later served as president — the firm whose discipline our work descends from.

1990

The Book

Our founder set the discipline down in writing as “The Rational Investor”: twelve principles for owning businesses rather than trading stocks, drawn from Graham, Buffett, and a lifetime of practice.

Today

The Sharpened Tools

The principles haven’t changed; the instruments have. We measure the moats we used to merely assert, think in owner earnings rather than headline profits, study how a company’s management allocates its capital, and write an explicit bear case for everything we own. The school of thought we study is the one Buffett, Munger, and Tom Russo made famous. The discipline is still our founder’s.

Our Approach

How We Actually Spend Our Time

Our edge isn’t a faster computer or a bigger committee — it’s patience, and a discipline that hasn’t needed to change in three generations. The work is reading, thinking, and waiting.

01

Read

Most of our day is spent the way it was in 1925: reading. Annual reports, filings, trade press, history. Ideas come from understanding businesses for years — not from screening thousands of tickers. For every business we seriously consider, we write the bull case and the bear case, judge whether its competitive moat is widening or narrowing rather than simply assuming it has one, think in the owner earnings a business actually throws off rather than headline profit, and study how its managers allocate a dollar of capital. We separate what we know from what we merely believe — and we keep an honest “too-hard pile.”

02

Wait

A wonderful business at the wrong price is a poor investment. We are willing to do nothing — sometimes for years — until quality and price meet.

03

Own

When we buy, we buy as owners: a concentrated portfolio of businesses we expect to hold for a decade or more. Selling is the rarest thing we do.

04

Fit

No two families hold the same portfolio. Each one is built around a family’s income needs, taxes, and temperament — in separate accounts, in your name.

05

Answer

Clients call about the portfolio — but also about the house, the tuition, the inheritance. Operating in the manner of a family office, we would rather be your first call than your largest holding’s ticker symbol.

Before a Single Investment

Be Objective About Your Objectives.

The Rational Investor pairs three principles of personal finance with its twelve principles of investing — and in practice, the personal-finance decisions come first. The most important choices a family makes are made before any business is ever bought, and they have nothing to do with the market.

I

Know What the Money Is For

Income today, or growth for a generation? A house, a tuition, an inheritance? We write your objectives down, in plain language, and build the portfolio to fit them — not the other way around. As the book puts it, without firm objectives “it is all too easy to try and change your overall investment strategy to capitalize on the recent performance of various markets.”

II

Work With an Adviser

We are an SEC-registered investment adviser. Your account is held in your name, and one phone call reaches the people who actually invest your money.

III

Measure What Actually Matters

Any single quarter or year is close to meaningless — even excellent investors trail the market over short stretches. We judge results the right way: over years, against a benchmark that fits your objectives, and by the operating performance of the businesses we own, not the mood of their share prices.

Since 1925
The Lineage Our Discipline Descends From
1990
The Year Our Founder Published His Philosophy
Decades
How Long We Expect to Hold a Great Business
One Call
Reaches the People Who Invest Your Money
Perspective

Market Insights

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Our Heritage

Deep Roots in
Wall Street & Vermont.

Our discipline descends from Pulsifer & Hutner, a Wall Street investment adviser founded in 1925, where our founder served as president before establishing Hutner Capital Management in 1995 to carry that stewardship forward. Three generations on, investing is still the family's work — practiced from Manchester, Vermont, a useful distance from the herd psychology of the financial centers.

We operate in the manner of a multi-family office: a deliberately small number of families, separate accounts built around each one, and a standing invitation to call about anything with a dollar sign attached. We invest our own family's capital in the same manner as our clients'.

1925 Where the Lineage Begins
"Investing has been our family's dinner-table conversation since 1925."
Leadership

Stewards of Capital

Dan Hutner Sr.

Dan Hutner Sr.

President

President of Hutner Capital Management, which he founded in 1995 after serving as president of Pulsifer & Hutner (est. 1925). Author of The Rational Investor — and a financial author beyond it, having written for the Smithsonian Institution and the National Geographic Society and contributed to Better Investing, the magazine of the National Association of Investors Corporation. Earlier work included econometric research and economic consulting for groups including the Joint Economic Committee of Congress. Middlebury, University of Virginia, NYU.

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Dan Hutner Jr.

Dan Hutner Jr.

Vice President & Chief Compliance Officer

The first of the third generation in the family business, he joined the firm in 2006 after growing up in it — back to research and special projects in high school. He holds a B.A. in economics, with honors, from Middlebury College, has passed CFA Levels I & II (Level III candidate), and holds the Series 65. He serves as Vice President & Chief Compliance Officer, and speaks Spanish, German, and Mandarin Chinese.

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Mr. Hutner is the general partner of affiliated private investment funds. The firm’s separately-managed-account clients are managed separately from those funds, and references to the firm’s philosophy do not represent the performance of any fund or account.

Contact

Begin a Conversation

Whether you are planning for the next generation, or simply want one number to call about anything with a dollar sign attached, we welcome a private, no-obligation conversation.

Prefer to read first? Ask us for the firm brochure (Form ADV Part 2A) and an overview of how we invest.

Headquarters

Manchester, Vermont
United States

Phone

(802) 362-2303

Email

info@hutner.capital