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16 Investor Types · Collectors · PVDS

Stash Squirrel

You stock up on whatever the market is ignoring, and you tuck it away for later.

PPatient

VValue

DDiversified

SStories

Who is the Stash Squirrel?

The Stash Squirrel (PVDS) is a patient, story-first investor who buys a little of whatever the market has stopped caring about and tucks it away for later. Squirrels spread their money across many forgotten industries and are happy to wait years for the season to change.

When a whole industry has a bad year, most investors quietly cross it off their list. Airlines, homebuilders, banks, oil: once the headlines turn sour, people stop looking. That’s when a Squirrel starts paying attention, because prices in a corner with no fans left may have fallen further than the business has.

Squirrels aren’t contrarian just to be different, and their test is plain: will people still need this in five years? If yes, they start stashing. The best Squirrels also remember the gap between an industry still mattering and a stock in it being a good buy, since a company selling something people need can still struggle to make money.

Buying coats in July

Squirrels like to shop out of season. They buy unloved stocks the way some people buy winter coats in July: it’s the same coat, just cheaper because nobody is cold right now. While the group chat argues about the stock of the week, a Squirrel is happily reading about why nobody wants to build houses this year.

The catch is that a cheap coat only pays off if winter comes. Some industries are resting between good years and others are shrinking for good, so the wiser Squirrels ask which kind they’re looking at before they start digging.

A stash in many places

A real squirrel buries food all over the yard, and a Stash Squirrel’s portfolio looks about the same. There’s a little in energy, a little in a retailer everyone wrote off, and a little in an industry they can’t explain without a napkin. Each bet is small, so a corner that stays forgotten too long doesn’t sink the stash.

Friends joke that Squirrels forget where they buried half of it. That’s only partly a joke. With this many holdings, a quiet stock nobody checks on can sit there for years without anyone asking why it’s still there.

Waiting for the weather

Squirrels think in years, so a stock that does nothing for eighteen months doesn’t make them nervous. They expect their stash to look out of step with the market for long stretches, and they’re mostly at peace with that.

What separates a thoughtful Squirrel from a stubborn one is knowing what they’re waiting for. “Its turn will come” can’t be checked. “People keep flying and fuel gets cheaper” can be watched month by month, which makes it easier to spot a case that has quietly fallen apart.

Strengths and weaknesses

Strengths

Looks where others don’t

Squirrels keep studying an industry long after the headlines have moved on. That gives them a wider field to search, and prices in neglected corners can fall further than the business deserves.

Patient

They can hold a stock for years while a slow recovery plays out. Many recoveries take longer than most investors will sit through, and a dull year doesn’t bore a Squirrel into selling.

Fine being unpopular

Owning what nobody wants doesn’t embarrass them. When a friend asks why on earth they own a struggling industry, a Squirrel has the story ready and doesn’t need anyone’s approval.

Small slices

Squirrels spread their money across many stocks and industries, so one bad call stays a small one. They accept that some corners will stay forgotten and size each bet with that in mind.

Calm in a slump

They expect their stash to look bad for a while, so a rough month doesn’t send them looking for the exit. When everything is falling, a Squirrel is more likely to start a shopping list than to sell.

Asks the human question

Their first question about a business is whether people will still need what it sells. That keeps their thinking tied to real demand, like homes and electricity, instead of the mood of the week.

Weaknesses

Need isn’t profit

People can keep needing something while the companies that sell it barely make money. A Squirrel who stops at “people will always need this” can end up owning a busy industry full of businesses that never earn much.

Waits too long

Some industries stay unloved for years, and a few never come back. Calling a slump “cyclical” can make a recovery feel certain when the business may be changing for good.

Forgotten positions

With a big stash, it’s easy to stop checking on part of it. A stock can sit untouched for two years simply because nothing about it ever felt urgent.

Lopsided stash

Forgotten corners are often related, like energy and mining. A Squirrel can think they own ten different bets when most of them are waiting on the same thing, such as lower interest rates.

Misses the winners

Squirrels steer away from popular industries, including the ones that keep winning for good reasons. Distrusting the crowd as a habit means skipping excellent businesses just because other people like them too.

Too early

They often start stashing long before the turn comes. Being three years early can feel a lot like being wrong, and it ties up money that could have been doing something else.

In every market

In a sharp decline

Everything goes out of season at once

A crash is the Squirrel’s version of a clearance sale. Almost every corner of the market gets dumped at once, and suddenly a dozen industries look forgotten enough to stash. Some Squirrels feel a little guilty about how cheerful this makes them.

The risk is grabbing a bit of everything. Two stocks that fell by the same amount can have very different reasons behind the drop. Squirrels do best when they stick to the industries they would have wanted anyway and add in small steps, since being out of favor can last a while.

In a strong rally

The stash sits still

This is the hardest stretch for a Squirrel. Friends are making money on whatever is hot, the stash has barely moved, and the news is full of exactly the companies the Squirrel decided to skip.

The trap is deciding that anything popular must be a bad buy. A better habit is to pick one popular company and look at how the business is doing, because if it earns more every year, the attention may be deserved.

In a quiet market

The stash starts to wake up

Quiet markets can be kind to Squirrels. With no big story pulling everyone one way, money slowly moves from expensive corners toward cheap ones, and a forgotten industry or two starts getting noticed again.

The danger is mistaking a quiet stretch for patience. It’s a good moment to go through the whole stash and see what has moved forward. Anything fading for good, rather than just taking a nap, can go.

Day to day

How they research

A Squirrel’s research often starts when an industry drops out of the conversation, like airlines after a bad year or homebuilders when mortgage rates jump. They read about why people gave up on it, then about which companies could survive the slump and earn well when it ends. They care more about the story than the latest quarterly figures, which is part of their charm.

How they talk about stocks

Bring up a hot stock at a party and the Squirrel will listen politely, then ask what happened to some industry everyone stopped talking about two years ago. They aren’t changing the subject, they just find the forgotten stuff more interesting.

Friends who chase what’s popular may think Squirrels are stubborn, and Squirrels may think those friends follow the crowd. Each side is right about the other some of the time.

How they handle losses

Squirrels take a falling price well, since they expected the wait to be bumpy. They take it much harder when the drop comes from a business that is shrinking for good, because admitting that means letting go of a story they liked.

A few times a year, the careful ones trim what has recovered and move the money to the next forgotten corner. Squirrels who put that review on a calendar keep a tidier stash than the ones who wait until they feel like it.

With other types

Bargain Tortoise

Collectors · PVDN

Kindred spirit

The Bargain Tortoise collects cheap stocks too, but picks them by the numbers instead of the story, so the two often own the same forgotten companies. Squirrels can borrow its habit of checking whether the financial figures back up the recovery they’re picturing.

Big-Picture Octopus

Climbers · PMDS

Fellow storyteller

The Big-Picture Octopus also thinks in long stories that cut across industries, but it buys the ones already gaining strength. Its habit of checking that each stock really fits the bigger idea suits Squirrels, whose stash can drift away from the reasons it was started.

Conviction Lion

Climbers · PMFN

Friendly challenger

The Conviction Lion owns a few strong businesses and keeps asking what each one is already delivering. That question helps a Squirrel tell a recovery that is happening from one that is only possible, and reminds it that a stock doesn’t have to be forgotten first to be worth owning.

Growing as a Squirrel

1
Trace the path from need to stock
Before you add something to your stash, write four short answers:
1. Need
  Why does this industry’s product or service still matter?
2. Business
  Which company benefits, and how exactly does it make money from that?
3. Change
  What has to get better from where things are now?
4. Price
  Given all that, what makes today’s price a good one?
If your notes stop at “people will keep needing this,” you’ve described an industry rather than a reason to own one stock. The other three answers show where your case leans on something you haven’t checked.
2
Go through your stash on a schedule
Once a quarter, look at everything you own, including the stocks you haven’t thought about in months. For each one, compare what you expected to happen with what has actually happened to the business.
If nothing has moved and you have no new reason to wait, treat that as a question to answer rather than as patience. Some holdings are taking a nap, and some are fading for good.
3
Sort your stash by what it’s waiting for
Write down what each stock needs in order to recover, then group your holdings by that answer instead of by industry. Then ask:
- Are several holdings waiting on the same change, like lower rates or stronger spending?
- Which recoveries have started to show up in the business itself, not only in the price?
- Did you add to each idea in small steps, or all at once?
- Did you trim anything that came back into favor?
After a few rounds, you’ll see whether your stash holds many different bets or one bet made many times.

Strategies that fit

Squirrels tend to like strategies that buy the industries with the worst past year, own a little of every corner nobody wants, or move money from recovered industries to waiting ones. Each starts with the same question: what has everyone stopped paying attention to?

Whichever one appeals to you, know what it does with a corner that never comes back. Any rule that buys the unloved will also buy some industries that are unloved for good reasons, so check how often it looks again and when it lets go.

The Squirrel in the long run

Squirrels rarely own what everyone is bragging about this year. What they often have instead is a stash bought cheaply in the off season, spread wide enough that one bad corner doesn’t hurt much.

Growing as a Squirrel isn’t about caring less for forgotten industries. It’s about knowing what each holding is waiting for, and being willing to let go of the ones that were never going to come back.

Pick one forgotten industry in your stash. How would a recovery actually reach the company you own, and what would tell you it isn’t coming?

Curious how your style would actually do? Describe its rules in Alphaground and let an agent follow them with practice money, so you can watch every decision it makes.

16 Investor Types describes the preferences you report in the test, not your skill. Nothing here is investment advice.