Markel Gayner Asset Management 2018 Annual Investor Letter

Markel Gayner Asset Management recently released its 2018 annual investor letter – you can download a copy below.

Thomas Gayner’s fund posted a loss of 3.5% on its equities for the full year 2018, still managing to outperform the S&P 500, which reported a loss of 4.4%. In a bigger picture, more precisely, over 30 years, the fund has also beaten the S&P 500 index by more than 100 basis points.

“2018 was a good, but not great, year. We grew the business both organically and by acquisition. We increased the capabilities of the Markel Corporation in every aspect of our business. As a marker of this growth we set a new record in revenues. While we are reporting lower bottom line profitability due to downdrafts in investment markets and ongoing high levels of insured catastrophes, we believe that the economic value of Markel stands at a new record level as well. Finally, we ended the year with fewer shares of Markel than at the beginning, so each share of Markel that you own represents a bigger piece of the company than what it did a year ago.” – Thomas Gayner and Richard Whitt, Co-Chief Executive Officers, wrote in the letter.

You can download a copy of the letter below:

Markel Gayner Asset Management – Annual Letter 2018