McElvaine Value Fund

Victoria, British Columbia

A Canadian value fund since 1996, run by its largest investors.

We buy good businesses when they're out of favour and cheap, and then we wait. Independent and owner-operated, led by founder Tim McElvaine with Lorne Porayko.

Minimum investment $1,000 · Registered (RRSP · RRIF · TFSA · FHSA · RESP · IPP) & non-registered accounts

What a business is worth$1.00
What we try to pay50¢
Tim McElvaine and Lorne Porayko at the boardroom table
30 yearsOne fund, one approach since 1996.
Two disciplinesTim trained under Peter Cundill, an Investment Industry Hall of Fame inductee. Lorne still practises critical care medicine, and invests the way he diagnoses: evidence first.
FundGrade A+Awarded 2022 and 2023. Required disclosure

How we invest

Buying dollar bills for 50 cents

Real bargains only appear when others are selling for reasons other than price. Four questions, or what we call ABBA, guide every purchase.

Read the full ABBA approach

  • AAccident

    Why is it cheap? We want to know exactly what went wrong.

  • BBird in hand

    We pay for value that exists today, not a forecast of what someone hopes will happen.

  • BBrick house

    Staying power. In business a wolf always comes to the door; we want to be in a brick house.

  • AAlignment

    As Charlie Munger said: incentives matter. We prefer to invest alongside owners.

Aligned with you

We are the fund's largest investors

  • Together with their families, Tim and Lorne have skin in the game alongside you, which is why we worry about the downside first.
  • A low base fee: we get paid more only when we perform.
  • Small by design: our size lets us do things that big funds can't.
  • We hold cash when nothing meets our standards.

How our fees work

A fair question

Why not just buy an ETF?

An index fund buys everything, good and bad. It is price agnostic. We are price focused, and we are watching the downside.

What makes us different

Independent and owner-operated

Value investing is hard, and harder inside a bank or a large fund company

Buying something unpopular and then waiting years for it to work is difficult to do inside a large institution. Committees, quarterly targets and a sales force all push the other way. We own the firm and we run the fund, which gives us the flexibility to do things differently.

Getting started

Open to any Canadian investor, from $1,000

Through your advisor

Ask your advisor: we're on most Canadian dealer platforms.

On your own

Buy directly through your discount brokerage, like any other fund.

Minimum$1,000
AccountsRegistered (RRSP · RRIF · TFSA · FHSA · RESP · IPP) & non-registered
Questions?Talk to us

Step-by-step instructions

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