Growth investing vs value investing

Growth investing means buying shares of companies expected to expand faster than average, growing their sales and profits quickly as they open new stores, launch new products, or enter new markets. Investors are willing to pay a higher price relative to today's earnings because they're betting on tomorrow's earnings being much bigger.

Value investing means buying shares that look cheap relative to what the company is actually worth, often because the market has overlooked them, gotten too pessimistic, or simply isn't paying attention. The bet isn't that the company will suddenly grow faster, it's that the price will eventually catch up to the company's real, steadier worth.

Neither style is automatically better than the other, and plenty of investors mix both. What matters is knowing which lens you're using before you buy, because a growth stock and a value stock earn their returns in different ways, and judging one by the other's standards leads to bad decisions.

An investor buys shares of a fast-expanding food delivery company at ₱120 each, even though its current profits are small, betting that revenue will multiply as it grows. Another investor buys shares of an established conglomerate at ₱40 each, well below what its land, buildings, and business units are worth on paper, betting the market will eventually notice the mismatch.