Updated:
Houndstooth Investment Management
Clagett founded the firm in 2016 after roles that spanned product strategy and distribution at firms including National Planning Holdings and LPL...
Houndstooth Investment Management
Clagett founded the firm in 2016 after roles that spanned product strategy and distribution at firms including National Planning Holdings and LPL Financial, experience that informed his focus on high-conviction technology investing. The firm runs a concentrated long-equity strategy designed to own what it considers the highest-quality growth businesses for extended periods. The portfolio is deliberately narrow, typically holding 20 to 30 names. The strategy targets public companies across enterprise software, fintech, and digital health, applying a product-centric research lens that stresses switching costs, net-revenue retention, and platform effects over pure financial-statement screening. The geographic footprint centers on US-listed equities but reaches globally into developed-market exchanges where similar structural dynamics appear. Portfolio weightings suggest persistent conviction in names that combine subscription economics with scaled distribution — a posture consistent with long-tenure holdings across the business-software universe. The firm operates from Austin and has maintained a deliberately lean structure consistent with a concentrated, low-turnover book. In April 2023, the strategy crossed its seven-year track-record milestone, a period encompassing both the late-cycle growth correction of 2022 and the rapid repricing of software multiples during the pandemic era (public record). No separate venture vehicle, real-asset arm, or philanthropic foundation has been disclosed. The firm's structural posture is defined by what it does not do: it does not hedge, short, or employ leverage, and it does not diversify into asset classes beyond public equities. This singular focus on a narrow cohort of durable-growth compounders makes the fund an unusually pure expression of the public-technology long-equity thesis, distinct from the multi-strategy platforms and long-short hybrid managers that populate the same category.
General information
Firm type
Asset Manager
Year founded
2016
AUM
Undisclosed
Location
Region
North America
Country
United States
City
Austin
Corporate office
Austin, TX, United States
Principals
Bryan Clagett
Founder and Chief Investment Officer
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Who runs investment decisions at Houndstooth Investment Management?
Bryan Clagett, the founder and Chief Investment Officer, leads all portfolio decisions. He built the strategy from launch in 2016 and remains the sole named investment decision-maker in public records. The firm has not disclosed an investment committee or additional portfolio managers as of the latest available filings.
How concentrated is the portfolio?
The firm runs a high-conviction strategy typically holding 20 to 30 names at any given time. The portfolio is intentionally narrow, reflecting Clagett's view that long-term compounding is best achieved by owning a small number of exceptional businesses rather than diversifying across sectors. This concentration level is consistent with the portfolio's product-centric research philosophy.
What investment strategy does Houndstooth use?
The firm employs a long-only equity strategy focused on publicly traded growth compounders in enterprise software, fintech, and digital health. It does not hedge, short, or use leverage. The investment lens prioritizes product quality, switching-cost dynamics, and platform effects over short-term earnings momentum, a distinction that shapes the portfolio toward businesses with recurring-revenue models and high net-revenue retention.
Where does Houndstooth invest geographically?
The strategy centers on US-listed equities but reaches into developed international markets where the same structural software and fintech dynamics appear. The firm has not publicly disclosed specific international mandates or a formal allocation target for non-US exposure, but the research process includes globally listed companies that fit the product-centric framework.
Does Houndstooth participate in venture or private investments?
No. Houndstooth is a dedicated public-markets manager and has not disclosed any venture-stage, growth-equity, or private-debt exposure. The firm's structural posture is to extract value from publicly traded compounders rather than to cross over into illiquid private strategies, making it an unusually pure public-equity vehicle.
How is Houndstooth structurally different from a typical long-short technology fund?
The firm's long-only, no-leverage, no-hedging mandate distinguishes it from the dominant long-short and multi-strategy technology managers. Without a short book to manage or a prime-brokerage relationship to support derivatives trading, the strategy imposes a higher bar for conviction on every holding. The result is a concentrated, low-turnover portfolio that more closely resembles a permanent-capital vehicle than a tactical hedge fund.
What is the firm's track record length, and what stress periods has it been through?
The flagship strategy launched in 2016 and crossed the seven-year mark in April 2023. This period includes the late-2018 growth selloff, the 2020 pandemic drawdown and recovery, and the aggressive software-multiple compression of 2022 — offering a multi-cycle dataset for allocators evaluating the strategy's behavior during drawdowns.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
Need institutional-grade insight on family offices?
Altss delivers:
Prefer a guided tour?
We’ll walk you through: