Patient Capital

Long-duration, relationship-grounded investing — the opposite of the quarterly-flip model. The thesis: “buy or build to keep rather than buy or build to flip.” In Ho Nam’s framing, a great investor’s career may produce only ONE transformational company relationship, and the right response is to hold it for decades while the compounding works.

The canonical examples Ho Nam cites (VCs Today Do Not Remember… (tweet)):

• Arthur Rock — on Intel’s board for 30+ years. The early Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia partners treated him almost as a figure of worship. “A telephone call from Arthur Rock was viewed by other venture capitalists… as the financial equivalent of white smoke emerging from a Vatican Chimney” (Mike Moritz).
• Naspers/Tencent — “the greatest investor/investment combo of all time”: Naspers held Tencent through to $275B+ in gains from a $34M investment. Not “as if held” accounting — actual, realized and unrealized position in the real company.
• Ben Graham/Geico — one growth stock made more than all of Graham’s “cigar butt” value investments combined over 20 years of running his fund.

The observation about modern venture: articles from 1995 already noted VC becoming a mega-fund, AUM-and-fees game — “things are far worse 25+ years later.”

Where this appears

• VCs Today Do Not Remember… (tweet)