The world’s greatest investors

796-John-Templeton-1200 — John Templeton was one of the earliest managers to spot Japan's potential

John Templeton was born in 1912. He attended Yale University, funding his studies partly through his winnings from poker games, then went on to study at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. After working for Merrill Lynch, he became the finance director of an oil exploration company. He continued to dabble in the stockmarket, and bought a small investment advisory firm in 1940. However, he is best known for the Templeton Growth Fund, which he ran from 1954 until his retirement in 1992.

What was his strategy?

price/earnings

Did it pay off?

What were his biggest successes?

After his retirement he advised investors to get out of the stockmarket, only a few months before the technology bubble burst. However, his most famous decision was to buy every stock selling for below $1 on the outbreak of World War II. Within four years, his portfolio had quadrupled in value.