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Daily Journal Corporation
Daily Journal publishes newspapers and websites covering California and Arizona news and sells case management software to courts and justice agencies.
Daily Journal is a small California company with two very different jobs under one roof. It publishes newspapers and websites that cover legal and business news in California and Arizona, and it sells case management software that helps courts and justice agencies track their cases. One side is old media, the other is modern software. The software side is the one that really pays the bills.
The publishing business is essentially a niche newspaper operation for lawyers, judges, and government officials. It runs the Daily Journal newspaper in Los Angeles, the San Francisco Daily Journal, and the Arizona Daily Journal, plus websites that carry legal notices and court information. This is a small, steady business, but it is not where the growth or profit normally comes from. The software business is the interesting part. Courts are drowning in paperwork and scheduling headaches, so Daily Journal sells tools that keep track of cases, documents, and court calendars. It sells to courts and justice agencies, mostly in California but also elsewhere. The company built much of this through acquisitions, including a company called ISD Corporation, and it charges courts for software licenses, maintenance, and support. Courts are sticky customers — once a court system is running on your software, ripping it out is painful, so the business tends to be stable and recurring. Here is the fun part: Daily Journal has a long history of buying stocks with whatever cash it does not need for operations. It is essentially a tiny newspaper-and-software company that also runs a very unusual investment portfolio. Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett's late partner, was chairman of Daily Journal for decades and steered its investing. The company's stock portfolio is concentrated in a handful of names, and in recent years its market value has been driven more by those investments than by selling newspapers or software. That makes this a business where the balance sheet can matter as much as the income statement.
So what do you actually own? A small publisher, a court-software vendor, and a quirky investment vehicle all rolled into one, guided for years by one of the most famous investors in America. It is not a household name, but it is a genuinely odd and interesting company.
Saved answer · last researched 15 Nov 2026