Pillars of Stability for Volatile Times

And today, we are navigating a particularly complex backdrop.

War is not a word that markets take lightly. The energy sector is in tumult and supply chains are at risk. Meanwhile, the artificial intelligence race for technological prowess has capital expenditures rising and competitive pressures intensifying.

Experience teaches that when headlines accelerate, investors must slow down. Discipline, patience, and a long-term approach are key. As careful stewards of your capital, we want to reiterate several enduring principles guiding our investment strategy:

• High quality management teams are core to our philosophy. These teams are purpose-driven and committed to creating long term stakeholder value.

• Well-positioned companies benefiting from strong secular growth themes. We seek businesses aligned with durable forces such as technology and infrastructure advancements, healthcare innovation, energy reliability, and productivity enhancement.

• Financial strength and discipline, including sustainable free cash flow, conservative balance sheets, prudent capital allocation, and improving return on invested capital.

• Valuation discipline as we seek to invest when companies trade below our assessment of intrinsic value, with an eye toward attractive long-term risk-adjusted returns.

• Business 360® alignment, with a focus on servant leadership and solutions providers.

Leadership, a strong moat, and financial discipline are of utmost importance for companies during periods of geopolitical and economic complexity. Careful underwriting of our investments supports valuation assessments and is essential with technological speculation soaring. Finally, we believe companies built on the foundation of creating authentic human value are often better equipped to navigate challenging environments.

Our team of more than two dozen investment professionals dedicates tens of thousands of hours each year to fundamental research and internal debate to hone our decision making, with these five principles guiding our thinking.

Over my career, I have witnessed energy shocks, currency crises, technology bubbles, financial system stress, and geopolitical upheaval. History repeats itself and today is a new day. Both are true.

We remain confident in our process and mindful of the limits of foresight, seeking humility as markets evolve. Thank you for the trust you place in us; we do not take it for granted.