And god is revealing himself more and more to human inquiry, not always through prophetic visions or scriptures but through the astonishingly productive research of modern scientists. Presbyterians thought the Methodists were wrong. Catholics thought all Protestants were wrong.
The Jews thought the Christians were wrong. The Economist observed: Sir John revered thrift and had a horror of debt. His parents had taught him that in small-town Tennessee, instilling it so well that in his white-columned house in the Bahamas, overlooking the golf course, he still cut up computer paper to make notebooks. But he made an exception for love, which needed spending. You could give away too much land and too much money, said Sir John, but never enough love, and the real return was immediate: more love.
He lived a life firmly rooted in the Christian traditions of modesty and charity. Yet he was also a great admirer of science, the undogmatic practice of which he believed led to intellectual humility. His love of science and his God led him to form his foundation in on the basis that mutual dialogue might enrich the understanding of both.
He was a trustee on the board of Princeton Theological Seminary , the largest Presbyterian seminary, for 42 years and served as its chair for 12 years. He lived year-round in the Bahamas. He was 95, [1] and was survived by two sons, one of whom, John Templeton Jr. Templeton was given this honour for his "pursuit of spiritual understanding, often through scientific research" through his establishment of the John Templeton Foundation.
He was created a Knight Bachelor in for his philanthropic efforts. Simon Prize for Philanthropic Leadership. TRT has been active since and supports projects and the dissemination of results from projects seeking to enrich the conversation about religion via three broad initiatives: Improving the methods of inquiry into the existence and nature of spiritual realities. Establishing the fact and improving our understanding of the underlying dynamics of the often overlooked or unforeseen benefits of religious faith and practice at its best.
TRT's aim is to improve the well-being of individuals and societies through spiritual growth and an ever-improving understanding of spiritual realities and spiritual information. While all three organizations have similar aims, they operate as separate charitable entities. However, Templeton eschewed dogma and declared relatively little was known about the divine through scripture, espousing what he called a "humble approach" to theology and remaining open to the benefits and values of other faiths.
Why shouldn't I go to Hindu services? Why shouldn't I go to Muslim services? If you are not egotistical, you will welcome the opportunity to learn more. The John Templeton Foundation encourages research into "big questions" by awarding philanthropic aid to institutions and people who pursue the answers to such questions through "explorations into the laws of nature and the universe, to questions on the nature of love, gratitude, forgiveness, and creativity.
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He avoided consumer debt — in fact, Templeton bought his first home with cash. I met Sir John once in the Bahamas in his Rolls Royce, but he was quick to tell me that he bought it used! He always works hard, putting in 60 hours a week. He would agree with J. He always searched for companies around the world that offered low prices and an excellent long-term outlook. I agree. The best technicians make the most profitable trades in companies with sound fundamentals in sales and earnings.
Strategy 4: Take advantage of international free markets. When he returned 40 years later, he noted a sharp contrast. The major difference is between free enterprise and socialism. India is finally pursuing market-friendly policies; consequently, those investing in India are seeing one of the hottest stock markets around these days.
With a high level of awareness and self-discipline, it should be possible to fill your mind with nothing but good, productive, thoughts and constantly weed out whatever negative or unproductive thought pops up. Keep Your Distance When Templeton started out as a professional money manager, he set up shop in New York at first, where he had easier access to information and could easily build a client base and a web of personal contacts.
However, he never really felt at home in New York. As soon as his business was established and going well, he was ready to set up a lifestyle that suited him personally. In , Templeton moved from New York to the Bahamas. The performance record of the Templeton Growth Fund became even better when he managed it from the Caribbean. Templeton always stressed the fact that if you want your performance to be better than average, you have to do something different from what other money managers are doing.
He found that by living in the Caribbean, far away from the hectic Wall Street crowd, it was much easier to maintain the detachment necessary to be a contrarian. Instead of being around salespeople and chasing hot tips every day, Templeton would spend time around relaxed people who were there on vacation, oftentimes successful and financially literate individuals themselves.
Even if there were discussions about markets, or investments, they were still in an easy-going bunch of people in a very laid back environment. Templeton liked to go the beach for an hour or so daily, where he would sit, read and reflect in solitude. These concentrated retreats in his favourite surroundings were often surprisingly productive.
It is certainly no coincidence that many of the most successful value investors choose not to take domicile in New York, but set up a lifestyle that suits them and protects them from unwanted influences - Warren Buffett being the most famous example. Oftentimes, successful investors enjoy relatively unpretentious and quiet lifestyles. Rather than buying things to impress others, they are well attuned to what they really want out of life. After all, how can you expect to discover intrinsic value in the market, if all you care about in everyday life are high price tags and popularity contests?
Being far away from Wall Street, John Templeton was certainly able to cope with the common behavioural traps that investors face. Nassim Taleb, the author of The Black Swan , wrote that knowing about cognitive biases is not enough. To some extent, you will still fall prey to them. You have to get around them. In other words, you have to avoid situations in which they occur — for example by adopting rules in your investment process.
John Templeton, operating on a very high awareness level, probably thought similarly about the influences he was being exposed to in New York. Even if he knew he was being exposed to noise, short-termism and braggery, he could only truly rise above irrelevant chatter if he cut it off completely. By moving to the Bahamas, he took care of that as best as he possibly could. Valuation Matters In , Businessweek published a cover with the Title The Death of Equities after a decade of the stock market going sideways.
Due to high inflation, real returns were devastating. Stocks had fallen out of favour, while real assets like commodities and real estate where popular instead. At that time, pension funds won permission to quit stocks and bonds for real assets. John Templeton saw this as a sign that the point of maximum pessimism was close. The last holdouts in stocks were ready to sell and were leaving the market. In addition to that, Templeton looked at valuation levels.
What he found excited him. Click here for insight into the highest performing deep value strategies. John Templeton particularly liked to assess stocks based on their Price to Replacement Value of the firm's assets or business. Whereas the Price-to-Book Value level had been even lower after the crash of , the Price-to-Replacement Value ratio told a different story: Because of runaway inflation, replacement costs of assets were estimated to be 70 percent higher than Book Values — contrast that to , when replacement values where actually about 20 percent below stated Book Valuesdueto deflation at that time.
Templeton always considered multiple valuation metrics because he knew that one ratio would never tell the whole story. During a television appearance in , in the midst of the death of equities pessimism, John Templeton made a contrarian prediction: There would come a great bull market with the Dow reaching 3' over the next 10 years — nearly a fourfold increase. Templeton went on to explain why: Assuming long-term average growth rates of 7 percent and inflation staying in the neighbourhood of 7 percent, profits would increase 14 percent nominally per year.
This alone could almost account for a rise to 3' People thought he had sunstroke from the tropical Bahamian sun, but the prediction turned out to be almost frighteningly accurate. The Dow reached 3' points in and, once again, Templeton seemed like a genius. It is important to note what kind of a prediction Templeton actually made. Low valuations can get even lower, after all. Valuation levels are not a market timing tool but they have certain predictive power over, say, a year period.
Learn From History In , in the midst of the internet bubble, Lauren Templeton, great niece of John Templeton, visited her famous relative on the Bahamas. She asked him whether he had been buying any technology stocks lately. John Templeton smiled and went on to talk about major financial bubbles throughout history — from the Dutch tulip mania in the s to 20th century bubbles. He pointed out that one element was often present in these frenzies: some new-era item or industry that seemed to be changing the world and therefore defying the old rules of valuation.
Many of these new inventions actually did change the world — the railroad, the automobile, the airplane, the internet. Yet, many investors lost money trying to participate. In the beginning stages, many players rush into the new field, creating fierce competition, resulting in few survivors. For every Amazon, there are dozens of WorldComs. At the same time, these new companies are often bid higher and higher, reflecting the overflowing optimism that surrounds them.
At some point, people wake up to the fact that their assumptions were unrealistic, fuelled by greed and rationalized by wishful thinking. They expected too much too soon. Valuations start to sink and investors who were hoping to get rich fast actually lose money. Strangely enough though, most investors tend to extrapolate present conditions far ahead into the future. Assuming mean reversion is usually a wise bet.
Selling short means betting that the stock will decline in price by borrowing it and immediately selling it. Later, the short seller buys the stock back hopefully at a lower price and returns the shares to the lender. The most an investor can make in a short sell is percent — the potential loss is unlimited.
This accounts for why short selling is a somewhat dangerous activity. Many value investors had started to go short in the nineties, only to see stock prices to climb even higher. The economist Keynes famously stated that the market could "stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.
John Templeton, contemplating this problem, flipped his maximum pessimism concept on its head and saw the point of maximum optimism coming closer. Besides the absurd valuation levels, with some tech companies being valued on the basis of how many engineers with PhDs they had on their payroll, Templeton considered other factors, too.
He was particularly interested in insider transactions following IPOs. At initial public offerings, where shares are sold to the public, insiders often get rewarded for their contributions with substantial stakes in the company. In and , there was tremendous IPO activity with stocks being valued at lofty levels. Templeton felt confident that in many instances, insiders would start to sell immediately after the lockup period, acting as catalysts to initiate heavy selling.
Templeton researched lockup expirations. He concentrated on the stocks that had increased at least three times in price since the IPO and sold them short a few days before the lockups expired.
