Reblog: Top 7 Principles of Growth Investing


Investors have many different strategies that they can follow to build wealth in the stock market. Income investors tend to prize dividends above all else. Value investors seek to buy stocks that trade below their intrinsic value. Growth investors, on the other hand, aim to buy businesses that hold the greatest upside potential and tend to de-emphasize traditional valuation metrics that generally show a growth stock to be expensive compared with the company’s current earnings.

Growth investing is highly attractive to many investors because buying the right companies early can lead to life-changing returns. However, companies that promise huge upside potential usually trade at lofty valuations. That amps up the risk that they will fail in spectacular fashion if they don’t meet expectations.

So how can investors increase their odds of buying the next Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) instead of a Fitbit (NASDAQ: FITB)? While there’s no bullet-proof solution to this conundrum, I’ve found that buying companies with the following traits can greatly increase the odds of success:

  • A large and expanding market opportunity
  • A durable competitive advantage
  • Financial resilience
  • Repeat purchase business model
  • Strong past price appreciation
  • Great corporate culture
  • Talented leadership with skin in the game

Let’s dig into each of these principles in detail to see why they work.

Coins and a roll of bills stacked to look like rocket ship

Continue Reading