🗣️ Investor Talk #56: Mark Mulhern

Mark invests with a contrarian value approach, targeting mispriced companies.

Mar 11, 2026

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Every interview follows the same set of sharp, insightful questions — such as “What is your investment strategy?”, “What are your highest conviction stocks?”, and “If you could give one piece of advice to investors, what would it be?”

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Including interviews with Brian Feroldi (Founder - Long Term Mindset), Shay Baloor (Host of Stocktwits) and Gav Blaxberg (CEO - WOLF Financial).

In this edition, we have the pleasure of interviewing:

Name: Mark Mulhern @ManuInvests
Age: 38
Residence/Country: United States
Invests since: 2008

Introduction
I’ve been interested in investing since high school. I was in college during the 2008/2009 financial crisis and it was an extremely cool education experience. We watched the stock market crash live on TV at night and analyzed government responses in class the next day.

I graduated with a degree in Economics and Finance and worked in the finance industry for nearly a decade. My background in finance mainly included accounting for investment funds/mutual funds, financial statement preparation, internal audit and 3rd party audit support, and eventually working on some popular ETFs. It is this background in accounting and financial statement analysis that I lean on when analyzing a company and I think differentiates the way I write about investing on Substack.

On a more personal note, I am very open about being in recovery from addiction. Today I have over 10.5 years sober/in recovery. As you can imagine, addiction takes everything. In my journey, I spent down my entire portfolio, retirement savings, and all discretionary funds to fuel it. I had spent ever cent I made in finance.

Eventually, I got help, prioritized my health and chose to leave my career in finance to begin working in the addiction recovery non-profit world. Today, I am the Executive Director (CEO) of a growing non-profit recovery organization and love what I do.

What is your investment strategy?
My investing style has been heavily inspired by people like Buffett. I have always leaned contrarian; I’m a value investor at heart. To me, that means I’m looking to buy companies that are fundamentally disconnected from their current prices. I like to anchor my portfolio in a set of ‘core’ businesses while also allocating a small percentage to smaller cap stocks crossing an inflection point.

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How many stocks are currently held in your portfolio?
I generally aim to hold 8 to 15 companies in my portfolio with a maximum of 20. Currently, I am holding 16 positions, with my top four holdings making up roughly 46% of the total and my top six holdings accounting for 62%.

Which sectors do you mainly focus on?
I wouldn’t say I am necessarily super focused on particular sectors but my portfolio leans towards tech and fintech – though I hold everything from construction to retail and in between. I will say, I do avoid certain sectors – pharma, health insurance, healthcare. Too much regulatory risk and unknowns for me.

What are your 3 highest conviction stocks?
$GOOGL - Alphabet
$META - Meta
$UBER - Uber

What is the stock in your portfolio with the highest return?
Currently, $IESC – IES Holdings. A picks and shovel play on the data center buildout. I trimmed recently at highs on about a 200% return but it’s come down a bit in last week.

I am proud to say however that I am still holding many META shares I bought as low as $103 in 2022.

What is the biggest investing mistake you have made?
Not having a plan or not knowing fully what I own. There has been many times along my journey that I didn’t do enough research when I first opened a position and that makes it hard to have conviction when they market is saying your wrong. It is always important for me to understand and know what I own and why so that when the market, or my stocks, inevitably experience a downturn I am not shaken out.

Also, wanting to get rich fast. When I first got back on my feet I was eager to make up for lost time and started to invest using options without an appropriate plan. It didn’t go well. Today I have rules for myself in what I do and why to prevent hard, past lessons from happening again.

If you could give one piece of advice to investors, what would it be?
At the risk or being repetitive, know what you own and why. It’s ok to be inspired by others, I certainly am, but it needs to go deeper than that. In investing, emotion is the enemy and trusting your work is key to keeping a steady temperament.

Mark’s Favorites

📖 Favorite book: 100 Baggers by Chris Mayer.

🎧 Favorite podcast: The Compound with Josh Brown and Michael Batnick

💬 Favorite quote: “Price is what you pay, value is what you get.” - Warren Buffett

👤 Favorite FinX account: Not one in particular but I’ll give a shout to Aria @qualityinvest5 because he has been a big supporter of me to find my voice. And I also enjoy Dimitry @DimitryNakhla.

Where can we find more info about you?
On X @manuinvests or at my Fundamentally Sound Substack: manuinvests.substack.com.

I also have a discord and plans for an upcoming youtube channel. Stay tuned!

That’s a wrap!
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