Most of those reading this have never heard of Baillie Gifford. The UK investment firm is not really a household name here in the United States.

Their oldest funds, Scottish Mortgage Trust and Monks Investment Trust, are investment trusts listed on the London Exchange and not available to US investors.

Ballie Gifford is one of the best growth investors in the world and has been almost form inception.

The firm was founded in 1907 when Lieutenant Colonel Augustus Baillie, a Boer War veteran, partnered with 27-year-old lawyer Carlyle Gifford. The two were not investment managers but merely opportunists who spotted a trend nobody else saw coming.

Henry Ford’s Model T was about to create massive demand for rubber tires, and Southeast Asian rubber planters needed capital.

The pair created the Straits Mortgage and Trust Company in 1909 to finance rubber plantations in Malaya and Ceylon.

The timing was perfect.

The automobile boom sent rubber prices soaring, and their first investment trust grew from £1 million in assets by 1925 to £4 million by 1929.

When the 1929 crash brought down banks and investment firms across the globe, Baillie Gifford didn’t just survive, they expanded. They took over three failed investment trusts and opened their first London office.

The pattern was set. Baillie Gifford would spot transformational trends early, hold through volatility, and expand when others retreat.

After World War II, while most British investors stayed home, Baillie Gifford made what might be their smartest strategic call ever. Led by investment manager George Chiene, they placed massive bets on post-war American growth.

The sterling devaluation in 1949 gave them their opening. Suddenly it was much easier to buy American assets. What followed was nothing short of spectacular: their net asset value multiplied more than six-fold between 1950 and 1965.

Think about that for a moment. While American investors were buying American stocks, a small Scottish firm was quietly accumulating the best American businesses and riding the greatest economic expansion in history. By 1957, over 44% of their assets were invested in the US and Canada.

The firm has not missed too many major trends in the global economy over the last 118 years.

They were early investors in both Japan and China and racked up huge profits for investors.

They were also ahead of the pack in every major tech trend over the last fifty years as well.

Baillie Gifford is a long-term owner of the companies it buys. As long as a company is growing and the underlying trend is intact, they hold the stock.

Over time some of the companies failed. Some early tech leaders get bought out. Some just faded into mediocrity

Shedding the losers and holding the winders for years and even decades has been the secret to the firms more than century of success.

A look at the firm's largest holding tells the story of long-term success.

Baillie Giffords first purchase of Mercado Libre (Ticker: MELI) was in $2010 at around $50 a share.

The current price is more than 20 times higher.

Its first purchase of NVIDIA (Ticker: NVDA) was at $.90 in 2016.

Safe to say the stock has done okay since then. The shares have gained almost 200 times the original cost.

The first purchase of Amazon (Ticker: AMZN) was in 2004 at around $2. The price is currently 100X their original purchase price.

I could go on but I think you get my point. Ballie Gifford has made its investors tons of money by buying early in the trend and holding on through thick and thin if the fundamentals were strong.

The firm usually files its 13F early in the porting period and it attracts almost no attention. The firm is in Edinburgh, Scotland, 3300 miles from Wall Street and about 5500 from Silicon Valley.

As one who understands the power of combining fundamental momentum and time, I always check the filings to see what Baillie Gifford has been buying and selling.  I look at the newer positions in stocks that do not yet have media panache and a faithful institutional following.

Some will drop back into mediocrity. Some will get taken over. There is a decent chance that one or two will keep growing for a very long period of time and deliver potentially life-changing wealth.

A few of their positions look to have the potential for massive long term gains and institutions are not yet heavily involved.

Tempus (Ticker: TEM) represents the convergence of artificial intelligence and healthcare, positioned to fundamentally transform how medical decisions are made through data-driven insights.

The global precision medicine market is projected to reach $217 billion by 2028. Tempus’s unique combination of the world’s largest multimodal healthcare dataset and AI capabilities positions it to capture significant market share as healthcare increasingly adopts data-driven treatment protocols.

Pony AI (Ticker: PONY) offers pure-play exposure to the autonomous vehicle revolution, with operational robotaxi services in China and expanding global partnerships positioning it for the massive mobility transformation.

Rocket Lab (Ticker: RKLB) is positioned as the premier alternative to SpaceX in the rapidly expanding commercial space market, with end-to-end space services capabilities and strong competitive moats.

BBB Foods (Ticker: TBBB)represents a compelling growth opportunity in Mexico’s rapidly evolving retail landscape, operating the country’s leading hard discount grocery chain under the Tiendas 3B brand. Trading at $26.18, the company offers investors exposure to one of Mexico’s fastest-growing retail formats, with a proven business model that combines aggressive expansion, operational efficiency, and a deep understanding of value-conscious consumers.

BBB Foods operates through its flagship Tiendas 3B chain, whose name references “Bueno, Bonito y Barato” – a Mexican expression meaning “Good, Nice and Affordable.” This simple phrase encapsulates the company’s mission of delivering exceptional value to budget-conscious consumers through high-quality products at market-leading prices.

The company’s expansion strategy centers on opening approximately one new store per day, a pace that has enabled BBB Foods to reach 2,772 stores by year-end 2024 from just over 2,000 stores two years earlier. Management has articulated an ambitious long-term vision of operating 20,000 stores across Mexico, representing nearly a seven-fold increase from current levels and highlighting the significant runway for growth.

All these stocks have the potential to be huge winners. Not all of them will be.

It only takes one 100-bagger to change your financial conditions dramatically. Baillie Gifford has excelled at finding these massive winners in the past and I doubt they have lost their touch.