John Templeton, 95, a billionaire investor whose lifelong fascination with science, the spiritual realm and their mutual connection to the meaning of life prompted him to establish the Templeton Prize to honor what he called progress in religion, died July 8 of pneumonia at Doctors Hospital in Nassau, Bahamas. A naturalized British citizen, he was born in small-town Tennessee and lived in Nassau.
Mr. Templeton started his Wall Street career in 1937 and from the beginning took an unconventional approach to investing. He scoured the world for bargains, picked against common wisdom and was an early postwar investor in then-obscure Japanese companies such as Hitachi and Fuji. In 1954, he founded the Templeton Growth Fund, one of the largest and most successful international investment funds in the world. Described by Money magazine in 1999 as "arguably the greatest global stock picker of the century," he sold his combined Templeton funds to the Franklin Group in 1992 for $440 million. At the time of the sale, Templeton funds had assets of $22 billion. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/08/AR200807\ 0801232.html ------------------------------------------------------------------------\ ------------- IF, ON any day over the past few decades, you had chanced to be strolling in the early morning at Lyford Cay in the Bahamas, you might have seen a wiry, determined figure power-walking in the sea. Keen as a whippet, his thin arms pumping, he headed into the prevailing swell. In his 80s, he would do an hour of this. In his 90s, he still managed 25 minutes. Sir John Templeton spent his life going against the flow. In September 1939, when the war-spooked world was selling, he borrowed $10,000 to buy 100 shares in everything that was trading for less than a dollar a share on the New York Stock Exchange. All but four eventually turned profits. In early 2000, conversely, he sold all his dotcom and Nasdaq tech stocks just before the market crashed. His iron principle of investing was "to buy when others are despondently selling and to sell when others are greedily buying". At the point of "maximum pessimism" he would enter, and clean up. It took fortitude, he would say, to do the opposite of what the crowd was doing. At the very beginning, a southern boy on Wall Street against the east-coast preppies, living in a sixth-floor walk-up filled with $25-worth of furniture, it was almost foolhardy. But he learnt to look at shares distinct from the flow and emotion of the market, and his contrarian habits brought him huge success. A sum of $10,000 invested in his Class A portfolio in 1954, when he set up the Templeton Growth Fund, would have grown to $2m by 1992, when he sold his stake. That represented an annualised average return of 14.5%. http://www.economist.com/obituary/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11745591 ------------------------------------------------------------------------\ -------------Sir John Templeton, RIP By Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson <http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/authors.aspx?GUID=9d447ed9-58e5-4\ 31c-b5fd-78ab2d79e73f> FrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, July 18,2008 Sir John Marks Templeton passed from this world on July 8. In an extraordinary life of 95 years, John Templeton was one of the world's wealthiest individuals, most successful investors, most generous philanthropists, and a tireless seeker for spiritual truth. I first learned of John Templeton nearly 30 years ago when he appeared on the PBS show "Wall Street Week with Louis Rukeyser." The late Mr. Rukeyser, for those of you who didn't know him, had a dominating personalitycolorful, witty, brilliant, cocky, and no sufferer of fools. His ego was sizable, and he liked being the center of attention. On the night I first saw John Templeton, though, Rukeyser was transformed. His persona that night was humble, deferential. He spoke quietly, almost reverently, in introducing Mr. Templeton, and then, during their interview, he treated his guest with the utmost respect, even awe. It was almost impossible to envision Louis Rukeyser playing second fiddle to anyone, but he humbly assumed this role in the company of John Templeton. What explained Rukeyser's deference that night? Did his guest have a personality even more dominating than Lou's? On the contrary, Sir Johna slightly built man without an ounce of bravadowas very soft-spoken and mild-mannered. It was as if Rukeyser had introduced Superman, and then Clark Kent appeared. But underneath the modest surface, there was something about this quiet, unassuming man that held one's attention. Suffusing John Templeton's being were powerful spiritual qualitiesintelligence, insight, optimism, and an inner strength anchored securely on an unshakable faith in the ultimate power of good. In an investment world full of wannabe gurus and Barnum-like economic forecasters, John Templeton was the real thing. For decades, he demonstrated an amazing ability to discern economic value and long-term trends. A pioneer in global investing, he made many investors very wealthy. He was immune to investment fads. In fact, at the beginning of this decade, he profited handsomely from the bubble in tech stocks, selling overvalued stocks short and profiting from their inevitable fall to earth. Earlier this decade, already in his 90s, he warned that U.S. housing was a bubblea painful realization that came to others too late. Sir John Templeton was born in Tennessee. In 1968, he gave up his American citizenship to become a British citizen domiciled in the Bahamas, a tax haven. In 1987, Queen Elizabeth II knighted him for his philanthropic works. For some, the renunciation of American citizenship would be an act of protest or something done in anger. Sir Johna man so clearly at peace with himself and his fellow mandid not operate at that level. While I can't say with absolute certainty, from everything I have read about him or heard him say, I believe he took this step because of his supreme loyalty to the highest principles. A devout Christian (a lifelong Presbyterian who routinely opened the board meetings of his mutual funds with prayer) John Templeton served God first. It must have seemed strange to him for the U.S. government to want to take a much larger share of his income than the tithe (tenth) that the Bible says is due to Almighty God. But Sir John was a man for whom faith and reason are compatible and interrelated, and I believe that human rationality was as significant a factor as his faith in his decision to change his citizenship. As one who saw wealth creation as the essential precursor to removing the curse of poverty from the human race, he clearly understood the utter stupidity of the American government's myriad wealth-destroying policies. It was only natural for him, then, to move to where he could help wealth-generating capital flourish. He did this not for himselfhe could have afforded everything he wanted for himself here in the States, and indeed, as a billionaire who traveled in economy class, his personal consumption was modest; instead, he did it for his fellow man. The vast extent of Sir John's charitable donations was made possible by his decision about his citizenship. John Templeton believed that human beings can fulfill their potential only when they are free from oppressive government policies. He was convinced that free men, imbued with Christian values, could and would do more to vanquish poverty than heavy-handed government policies that infringed man's God-given rights. That is why he supported various organizations that work to maximize individual liberty under law, in addition to charities, like Mother Teresa's, that directly ministered to human needs. Sir John's mission in life was to serve God. He did so admirably, and now receives the heavenly benediction, "Well done thou good and faithful servant." http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=01A81C29-0ABC-49C6-\ 9310-A877993D3E18 ------------------------------------------------------------------------\ ------------- Templeton: Lessons from the dean of contrarians http://www.domain-b.com/people/in_the_news/20080717_john_marks_templeton\ .html --- In obrolan-bandar@yahoogroups.com, "alfanendya" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > "Sir John Templeton's investment philosophy was to look for what he > calls "the point of maximum pessimism" and accommodate anxious, > panicky sellers by buying their stocks. At the other end of the > market, he aided excited and acquisitive buyers by selling them the > stocks they craved. "Buy low and sell high" is not an unusual theory, > but Templeton was unusually successful with it. The Templeton Growth > Fund, which he started in 1954, had an average annual return of 14.3 > percent as of February 1999. An investor named Leroy Paslay put > $65,500 into the fund at its inception. By 1996, Paslay's shares were > worth $37 million." > > http://www.investopedia.com/university/greatest/johntempleton.asp > > > --- In obrolan-bandar@yahoogroups.com, "jsx_consultant" > jsx-consultant@ wrote: > > > > MARKET INSTINCT (Saturday, 3 Nov 07) > > > > > > Maen saham itu harus FUN kata pak DE, jadi kalo Maen Saham malah > > bikin kita stress atau susah tidur atau malah bikin siOTONG > > susah bangun, mungkin itu saatnya kita musti merubah TRADING > > STYLE kita, misalnya dari daytrade menjadi weektrade atau > > menjadi investing... > > > > Begitu juga dengan ANALISA BATIN, yaitu semacam NALURI terhadap > > bahaya. Binatang mempunyai NALURI terhadap bahaya yang akan > > datang. NALURI ini ada yg bersifat ALAMIAH sejak lahir seperti > > anak kura kura yg LANGSUNG lari kelaut, begitu telurnya menetas > > supaya tidak dimakan oleh binatang lain. > > > > Ada juga NALURI yg diasah dengan pengalaman, NALURI yg disebut > > ANALISA BATIN ialah NALURI yg terbentuk karena pengalaman > > seperti pelaut yg bisa merasakan bahaya dengan melihat awan, > > angin dan sekeliling. > > > > Begitu juga dibursa, memang betul ada NALURI para trader yg > > berpengalaman untuk MENJAUH DARI MARKET seperti yang dikatakan > > Mr C.C. Ini mungkin bisa disebut sebagai MARKET INSTINCT... > > > > Apakah anda punya MARKET INSTINCT ?. > > > > Market Instinct ini tidak bisa ditunjukan oleh analisa teknikal, > > bisa saja anda bangun pagi dan melihat portfolio anda sudah > > crash. Sesudah ini baru signal teknikal MUNCUL tapi harga > > sudah jatuh duluan. Atau embah salah, MUNGKIN sebenarnya ada > > yg BISA melihat saat ini mau CRASH dari segi analisa TEKNIKAL > > atau analisa Fundamental ekonomi makro ?. > > > > Embah juga mau tanya apakah ADA orang disini yg saat ini PUNYA > > market instinct bahwa market mau CRASH saat anggota milis OB > > kebanyakan bergembira ria melihat IHSG berhasil rebound ditengah > > badai regional ?. Apakah cuman si Elaine DOANG , anyone ELSE ?. > > > > Jika jawabannya YA, tapi anda TAKUT posting kemilis karena > > resiko digebugin orang sekampung, anda bisa email private > > ke embah dan embah akan mempostingkan tulisan anda secara > > ANONYMOUS... > > > > .... > > > > embah, bandarmologist >
