Kenneth L. Fisher
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Kenneth L. Fisher (b. 1950) is founder, Chairman, and CEO of Fisher Investments, a money management firm headquartered in Woodside, California. He writes the monthly “Portfolio Strategy” column in Forbes magazine, contributes to other financial and news magazines, has authored four books, and has written research papers in the field of behavioral finance[1].
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[edit] Early years
Kenneth L. Fisher was born November 29, 1950 in San Francisco, California, the third and youngest son of Philip A. Fisher, an investor and author of the standard investing book, Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits. Ken Fisher was raised in San Mateo, California. He initially went to Humboldt State University to study forestry, but graduated with a degree in economics in 1972. Upon graduating, he worked for his father’s money management firm in the 1970s, before starting his own firm in 1979.[1]
[edit] Professional career
[edit] Fisher Investments
Fisher founded Fisher Investments in 1979. He is currently Chairman and CEO. Fisher Investments manages over $35 billion (as of December 31, 2006) for private clients and institutions.[2] The firm has clients in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K., and is headquartered in Woodside, California.[3]
[edit] Forbes
Fisher has been writing the “Portfolio Strategy” column in Forbes since 1984. Each column details Fisher’s current market outlook, and usually has 2 or 3 recommended stocks.[4]
[edit] Price-to-sales ratio
Fisher’s theoretical work identifying and testing the price-to-sales ratio (PSR) is detailed in his 1984 Dow Jones book, Super Stocks. He is credited with being the first to define and use the PSR to identify undervalued stocks.[2] In Fisher’s most recent book, The Only Three Questions That Count, he states the PSR, being widely used, is no longer an indicator for undervalued stocks.[3] However, the PSR is still frequently included as required curriculum for the chartered financial analyst exam.[5]
[edit] Small cap value
Small-cap value was not defined as an investing category until the late 1980s. Fisher's firm, Fisher Investments, was among the first institutional money managers offering small-cap value investing to clients.[6]
[edit] Behavioral finance
Fisher is active in the field and study of behavioral finance. He has published several white papers on the topic in collaboration with Meir Statman, the Glenn Klimek professor of finance at the Leavy School of Business at Santa Clara University.[7]
[edit] Accomplishments
Fisher is currently ranked #297 on the 2006 Forbes 400 list of richest Americans.[8]
Based on forecasts published in Forbes, Fisher was ranked the number one most accurate market forecaster by CXO Advisory Group as of March, 2007.[9]
Fisher won a Bernstein Fabozzi/Jacobs Levy Outstanding Article Award for "Cognitive Biases in Market Forecasts," a paper co-authored with Meir Statman on behavioral finance appearing in the Fall 2000 issue of Journal of Portfolio Management.[4]
[edit] Personal life
Fisher lives in Woodside, California with his wife, Sherrilyn. They have three grown sons. His hobbies include the history of Kings Mountain, a community located in Woodside. He also takes an active role in researching redwood lumbering history, having located and excavated more than 35 pre-1920 steam-era lumber mills.[5]
He endowed the Kenneth L. Fisher Chair in Redwood Forest Ecology at his alma mater, Humboldt State University in order to support the study of coastal redwood ecology. The chair is currently held by Stephen C. Sillett, a biology professor at Humboldt State.[10]
[edit] Books and other authorship
Fisher has authored four investing books – Super Stocks (Dow Jones, 1984), The Wall Street Waltz (McGraw Hill, 1987), 100 Minds that Made the Market (McGraw Hill, 1993), and The Only Three Questions That Count (John Wiley & Sons, 2006).
Fisher wrote the introduction to the Wiley Classics Series re-publication of Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits[6] and the introduction to The Warren Buffett Way by Robert Hagstrom.[7]
In addition to his regular Forbes column, Fisher has also authored investment related articles appearing in Research,[11] Financial Planning,[12][13] Journal of Portfolio Management, The Financial Analyst’s Journal, The Journal of Investing, The Journal of Psychology, and The Journal of Behavioral Finance,[14] among others.
[edit] Further reading
- Market Gurus: Investing Strategies You Can Use from Wall Street's Best by John P. Reese and Todd O. Glassman. Validea Press. 2005.
- The Money Monarchs: The Secrets of 10 of America's Best Investment Managers by Douglas J. Donnelly. Irwin Professional Pub. 1992.
- Super Stocks by Kenneth L. Fisher. McGraw Hill. 1990.
[edit] External links
[edit] Notes
- ^ See "Bay Area Billionaires" by Jennifer Roberts, San Jose Magazine, February, 2007
- ^ See What Works on Wall Street by James O'Shaughnessay. McGraw Hill, 2005.
- ^ See The Only Three Questions that Count: Investing by Knowing what Others Don’t. Kenneth Fisher with Jennifer Chou and Lara Hoffmans. John Wiley & Sons. 2006.
- ^ See Five Years of Award-Winning Articles from The Journal of Portfolio Management. Peter L. Bernstein, Frank J. Fabozzi, Bruce I. Jacobs, Kenneth N. Levy. Institutional Investor. 2005.
- ^ See "Bay Area Billionaires" by Jennifer Roberts, San Jose Magazine, February, 2007.
- ^ See Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits and Other Writings. Phillip A. Fisher. John Wiley & Sons. 2003.
- ^ See The Warren Buffet Way, Second Edition. Robert G. Hagstrom. John Wiley & Sons. 2005.
