Hidden Value Stocks Q3 2025 Issue: Will Nasgovitz of Heartland Advisors

Welcome to the Q3 2025 issue of Hidden Value Stocks from Hedge Fund Alpha (formerly ValueWalk Premium).

We hope you enjoy this issue of Hidden Value Stocks. Please contact us at [email protected] with any comments, questions or suggestions.

This issue features Will Nasgovitz of Heartland Advisors. We will be having a special edition deep dive with an under the radar top performing manager in the coming weeks to compensate for just one manager this quarter, stay tuned for that issue. Q4 2025 will publish as normal with two managers.

Before diving into the firm’s top two under-the-radar value picks, let’s revisit Apis Capital’s theses for Osaka Titanium and E-Ink Holdings.

Jacob Wolinsky, Founder, Hedge Fund Alpha

Michelle deBoer-Jones, Editor-in-Chief, Hedge Fund Alpha

Introduction to Will Nasgovitz and Heartland Advisors, Inc.

Will Nasgovitz has been at Heartland Advisors since 2003 and has co-managed the firm’s Mid Cap Value (MUTF:HRMDX) strategy since 2015 and its Value Fund (MUTF:HRTVX) from 2009 to 2013 and again since 2019. He started at the firm as an analyst focusing on industrial stocks, gradually broadening his coverage over time to include materials and health care, although he remained a true generalist.

Nasgovitz became a portfolio manager a few years after joining Heartland and now serves as the firm’s CEO. He actually grew up in the fund management business as his father, Bill Nasgovitz Heartland’s founder, was a broker when Will was a kid. Bill also worked at Dean Witter in the 1960s.

Recalling time spent at the office with his father when he was a kid, Nasgovitz became acquainted with stock research at a young age. In fact, he found success with the first stock he bought when he was 12, which was Nike, a value stock at the time.

“I liked the product or really, Michael Jordan, ” Nasgovitz said. “ I did not realize it was a value stock at the time.”

He decided to follow in his father’s footsteps and go into fund management after becoming interested in economics and the connection to capital markets.

Heartland’s 10 Principles of Value Investing™

Heartland Advisors is a 100% employee-owned value boutique management firm that focuses on U.S. stocks in the micro-to-mid-cap range. The firm launched its first mutual fund, the Heartland Value Fund, under the guidance of Bill Nasgovitz.

The firm has long utilized its proprietary 10 Principles of Value Investing™ when picking stocks, which are based on Benjamin Graham’s philosophy as presented in The Intelligent Investor.

The 10 Principles of Value Investing™ are:

1. Low price to earnings
2. Low price to cash flow
3. Low price-to-book value
4. Company value
5. Financial soundness
6. Catalyst for recognition
7. Capable management and insider ownership
8. Sound business strategy
9. Positive earnings dynamics
10. Positive technical analysis