Characteristics

  • As of Sep 30, 2024

Investment Philosophy

The U.S. Value Fund’s philosophy reflects the teachings of Benjamin Graham and Warren Buffett. We believe there is a persistent market failure to recognize a company’s intrinsic value. The Fund attempts to exploit this failure on behalf of our investors through a bottom-up, fundamental investment approach.

  • Focus on Absolute Returns

    We attempt to avoid the permanent impairment of capital and generate long-term positive absolute returns across market cycles.

  • Flexible, Benchmark-Agnostic Approach

    The Fund has the ability to invest across asset classes, regions, sectors/industries and market-capitalization ranges, without regard to a benchmark.

  • Seeks Downside Mitigation

    Our attempts to avoid the permanent loss of capital result in a portfolio that has exposure to US equities purchased with what we believe to be a "margin of safety" in price.

Characteristics

  • As of Sep 30, 2024

Our Process

The fundamental research process has remained constant since the inception of the Fund. The Fund looks for opportunities in companies that have temporarily disappointed investors; industries in turmoil or out of favor; and countries in economic downturns or overlooked by the market.

The investment process involves the following steps:

  • 01

    Analyze, Understand Business Models

    Thoroughly understand a company and the market in which it operates. Among other critical factors, the team’s document-driven analysis examines:

    • A company’s market share
    • The nature of its products and its business contingencies

  • 02

    Recast Financial Statements

    Financial statements are recast because:

    • Conservative accounting practices can mask the true earnings power of a company
    • In our view, accounting practices are sometimes too liberal

    Our goal is to uncover a company’s true economic earnings using only demonstrated results.

  • 03

    Calculate Intrinsic Value

    The team places great emphasis on:

    • Balance sheet valuation (such as Enterprise Value to Asset Replacement Value)
    • Cash flow valuation (such as EV/EBIT)

    Investments are made based on significant discounts to what is believed to be a company’s intrinsic value

  • 04

    Typically Invest for the Long Term

    The team typically seeks a discount to what they believe is a company’s intrinsic value

    • They seek further downside mitigation by determining a “margin of safety” in each holding
    • This “margin of safety” is viewed as a form of risk mitigation against uncertainty in a fundamentally unknowable future.

The U.S. Value Fund may also invest in non-equity securities in an attempt to help preserve purchasing power. These include:

  • Gold bullion
  • Corporate bonds (senior or subordinated bonds, convertible bonds)
  • Cash and cash equivalents (commercial paper)

Growth of $10K

Select Benchmarks

Source: FactSet; data as of Sep 30, 2024.

  1. This chart illustrates a hypothetical investment in Class A shares without the effect of sales charges and assumes all distributions have been reinvested and if a sales charge was included values would be lower. Date selected assumes purchase at month end.

  1. Disclosures

  2. U.S. Value Fund Inception dates: A Shares 09/04/2001 , C Shares 09/04/2001, I Shares 09/04/2001,R6 Shares 03/01/2017.

  3. For the First Eagle U.S. Value Fund, The Adviser has contractually agreed to waive its management fee at an annual rate in the amount of 0.05% of the average daily value of the Fund's net assets for the period through February 29, 2025. This waiver has the effect of reducing the management fee shown in the table for the term of the waiver from 0.75% to 0.70%.

  4. The average annual returns shown above are historical and reflect changes in share price, reinvested dividends and are net of expenses. Investment results and the principal value of an investment will vary.

  5. Returns for periods less than one year are not annualized.

  6. The average annual returns for Class A Shares “with sales charge” of First Eagle U.S. Value, Global Income Builder and Fund of America gives effect to the deduction of the maximum sales charge of 5.00%.

  7. The average annual returns for Class C Shares reflect a CDSC (contingent deferred sales charge) of 1.00% in the year-to-date and first year only.

  8. Performance information for Class I Shares is without the effect of sales charges and assumes all distributions have been reinvested and if a sales charge was included values would be lower. Had fees not been waived and/or expenses reimbursed, the performance would have been lower. Class A and C Shares have maximum sales charges of 5.00% and 1.00% respectively, and 12b-1 fees, which reduce performance.

  9. Class I Shares require $1MM minimum investment and are offered without sales charge. There is no minimum subsequent investment amount for Class I Shares.

  10. Class R Shares are offered without sales charge.

  11. The annual expense ratio is based on expenses incurred by The Fund, as stated in the most recent prospectus.

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  1. Definitions

  2. Standard deviation is a statistical measure of the distance a quantity is likely to be from its average value.  It is applied to the annual rate of return to measure volatility.

  3. R-Squared reflects the percentage of a fund's movements that are explained by movements in its benchmark index, showing the degree of correlation between the fund and the benchmark.

  4. Beta is a measure of the fund's volatility (risk) relative to the overall market. The higher the fund's Beta, the more the fund price is expected to change in response to a given change in the value of the market.

  5. Alpha is a measure of the Fund's excess return relative to the return of the benchmark index.

  6. Information ratio evaluates the ratio of a fund's returns above those of a benchmark against the volatility of those returns.

  7. Active share measures the percentage of a fund’s portfolio holdings differing from its benchmark. Active share can range from 0% (index fund) to 100% (no commonality with the benchmark index).

  8. A real estate investment trust (REIT) is a company that in most cases owns and operates income-producing real estate assets. To qualify as a REIT under the Internal Revenue Code, a REIT is required to distribute at least 90% of its taxable income to shareholders annually and receive at least 75% of that income from rents, mortgages and sales of property.

  9. One cannot invest directly in an index. Indices do not incur management fees or other operating expenses.

  10. Standard & Poor's 500 Index: Standard & Poor's 500 Index is a widely recognized unmanaged index including a representative sample of 500 leading companies in leading sectors of the U.S. economy and is not available for purchase. Although the Standard & Poor's 500 Index focuses on the large-cap segment of the market, with approximately 80% coverage of U.S. equities, it is also considered a proxy for the total market.

  11. The Fund’s portfolio is actively managed and holdings can change at any time. Current and future portfolio holdings are subject to risk.

  12. Third-party marks are the property of their respective owners.

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