Kevin Conor

Functions as a College/University

Nakoma Capital Management is a long/short equity manager. The firm manages separate accounts and limited partnerships that are designed to produce an absolute rate of return commensurate with the stock market with risk levels similar to the bond market. The firm employs a style-agnostic, expectations investment approach. Their investment philosophy is based on a fundamental view of how stock prices are set that begins with the idea that stock prices reflect consensus expectations of company business performance. The securities held in Nakoma portfolios are mainly US stocks of large to medium sized companies may also include ETFs. Though not limited by sector, Nakoma tends to invest in the stocks of companies in the electronic technology, retail and healthcare technology sectors. They invest across all market-caps, primarily in US companies. The firm maintains a high turnover rate. The firm's investment approach includes three processes: dynamic asset allocation, fundamental stock selection and risk management. The approach was designed to succeed regardless of the stock market environment with an overriding objective to participate in rising markets and protect capital in falling markets. Their dynamic asset allocation process is designed to increase net equity exposure when it is the firm's view that the equity market environment is favorable and decrease net equity exposure when they believe the equity market environment is less favorable. The actual net exposure results from the flow of long and short ideas as well as an analysis of macro factors affecting investor expectations for market returns. The firm surveys economists and strategists to determine the expectations distribution for a number of drivers of growth, interest rates and investor sentiment. When trends in the leading indictors of growth, interest rates and investor sentiment are consistent with the more optimistic forecasts, the net exposure is increased. Nakoma's fundamental stock selection process seeks to identify companies with the potential for positively or negatively surprising business results over a 6 to 18 month time horizon. For each stock, the firm monitors key business drivers (macroeconomic, secular trends, industry dynamics and company specific events) that will affect the underlying company's business over the investment time horizon. They believe that when a company's key drivers exceed expectations, the company's share price can be expected to follow a positive price trend until investor expectations and actual company performance converge. Conversely, if a company's results fall short of investors' expectations, its securities will usually under perform until those expectations are lowered to the level at which the company is actually performing. The firm's risk management process analyzes the sources of volatility in the portfolio such as capitalization, style and interest rate sensitivity. They seek to match risk exposures with the firm's overall market view and avoid unintended risk exposures. Additional risk management techniques, such as maintaining a well diversified portfolio with maximum position sizes, are employed in a further effort to minimize volatility.

Provides investment research