Howard D. Punch

Howard D. Punch Jr. is President and Chief Investment Officer of Punch & Associates Investment Management, Inc. He directs all research and investment initiatives at Punch & Associates. Mr. Punch honed his investment management skills the old-fashioned way: by making a lot of mistakes. Starting his career in the early 1980s at Merrill Lynch in NYC and then as a retail guy in Minneapolis, it was normal practice to call clients with one stock at a time, state the case for owning it and hope for the best. Win, lose or draw, each pick would have to be revisited with each client — talk about transparency! The end result was a deep respect for risk, a large dose of humility and a risk-averse investment approach that anticipates what could go wrong before fantasizing about what could go right. After spending nearly 19 years at Merrill Lynch, Mr. Punch started Punch & Associates in 2002. A hopeless research addict and devout student of behavioral finance, Mr. Punch actively researches market anomalies and inefficiencies. Mr. Punch resides in Eagan, Minnesota, with his wife, Julie, and three teenage kids. He is a magna cum laude graduate of Carleton College, enjoys hockey and golf, and believes the Vikings will have the opportunity to lose their fifth Super Bowl before he dies.