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Sir John Marks Templeton (29 November 1912 – 8 July 2008) was an American-born British
investor An investor is a person who allocates financial capital with the expectation of a future return (profit) or to gain an advantage (interest). Through this allocated capital most of the time the investor purchases some species of property. Type ...
, banker,
fund manager Fund may refer to: * Funding is the act of providing resources, usually in form of money, or other values such as effort or time, for a project, a person, a business, or any other private or public institution ** The process of soliciting and gathe ...
, and philanthropist. In 1954, he entered the mutual fund market and created the Templeton Growth Fund, which averaged growth over 15% per year for 38 years.William Greene (1999)
The Secrets Of Sir John Templeton
(January 1, 1999). CNN Money, accessed 29 August 2020
A pioneer of
emerging market An emerging market (or an emerging country or an emerging economy) is a market that has some characteristics of a developed market, but does not fully meet its standards. This includes markets that may become developed markets in the future or wer ...
investing in the 1960s, ''
Money Money is any item or verifiable record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts, such as taxes, in a particular country or socio-economic context. The primary functions which distinguish money are as ...
'' magazine named him "arguably the greatest global stock picker of the century" in 1999.


Early life and education

John Marks Templeton was born in the town of
Winchester, Tennessee Winchester is a city in and the county seat of Franklin County, Tennessee, Franklin County, Tennessee, United States. It is part of the Tullahoma, Tennessee Tullahoma micropolitan area, Micropolitan Statistical Area. The population of Winchester as ...
, and attended
Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
, where he was an assistant business manager for campus humor magazine ''
Yale Record ''The Yale Record'' is the campus humor magazine of Yale University. Founded in 1872, it became the oldest humor magazine in the world when ''Punch'' folded in 2002."History", The Yale Record, March 10, 2010. http://www.yalerecord.com/about/histor ...
'' and was selected for membership in the Elihu society. He financed a portion of his tuition with winnings from playing
poker Poker is a family of comparing card games in which players wager over which hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, however in some places the rules may vary. While the earliest known form of the game w ...
, a game at which he excelled. He graduated in 1934 near the top of his class. He attended
Balliol College Balliol College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. One of Oxford's oldest colleges, it was founded around 1263 by John I de Balliol, a landowner from Barnard Castle in County Durham, who provided the ...
in
Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
as a Rhodes Scholar and earned an
M.A. A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...
in law. He was a CFA charterholder and was a student of the "father of
value investing Value investing is an investment paradigm that involves buying securities that appear underpriced by some form of fundamental analysis. The various forms of value investing derive from the investment philosophy first taught by Benjamin Graham ...
", Benjamin Graham.


Investment career

In 1939, Templeton, during the Depression of the 1930s, had his broker purchase 100 shares of each
NYSE The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its liste ...
-listed company which was then selling for less than $1 a share ($ today) (104 companies, 34 in bankruptcy, in 1939), later making many times the money back when US industry picked up as a result of
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. According to Templeton, he called his broker the day World War II began and instructed him to purchase every stock trading at less than a dollar. This stratagem helped make him a wealthy man. Templeton became a billionaireMark Stousen
"John Templeton's Five Steps for Financial Success"
, thestreet.com, 11 December 2005.
by pioneering the use of globally diversified
mutual fund A mutual fund is a professionally managed investment fund that pools money from many investors to purchase securities. The term is typically used in the United States, Canada, and India, while similar structures across the globe include the SICAV i ...
s. His Templeton Growth Fund, Ltd. (
investment fund An investment fund is a way of investing money alongside other investors in order to benefit from the inherent advantages of working as part of a group such as reducing the risks of the investment by a significant percentage. These advantages inc ...
), established in 1954, was among the first to invest in Japan in the middle of the 1960s. Templeton also created funds specifically in certain industries such as nuclear energy, chemicals, and electronics. By 1959, Templeton went
public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...
, with five funds and more than 66 million dollars under management. In 2006 he was listed in a seven-way tie for 129th place on ''
The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...
''s " Rich List".


Investment philosophy

''Money'' magazine in 1999 called him "arguably the greatest global stock picker of the century". Templeton attributed much of his success to his ability to maintain an elevated mood, avoid anxiety and stay disciplined. He rejected
technical analysis In finance, technical analysis is an analysis methodology for analysing and forecasting the direction of prices through the study of past market data, primarily price and volume. Behavioral economics and quantitative analysis use many of the sam ...
for stock trading, preferring instead to use
fundamental analysis Fundamental analysis, in accounting and finance, is the analysis of a business's financial statements (usually to analyze the business's assets, liabilities, and earnings); health; and competitors and markets. It also considers the overall sta ...
. Thus he did not attempt to predict future stock movements, but paid close attention to valuation. From the late 1930s Templeton and his colleagues developed sophisticated
quantitative finance Mathematical finance, also known as quantitative finance and financial mathematics, is a field of applied mathematics, concerned with mathematical modeling of financial markets. In general, there exist two separate branches of finance that require ...
methods that anticipated by decades now-common features such as the Shiller P/E,
rebalancing In finance and investing, rebalancing of investments (or constant mix) is a strategy of bringing a portfolio that has deviated away from one's target asset allocation back into line. This can be implemented by transferring assets, that is, selling ...
and
Tobin's q Tobin's q (or the q ratio, and Kaldor's v), is the ratio between a Asset, physical asset's market value and its replacement value. It was first introduced by Nicholas Kaldor in 1966 in his paper: ''Marginal Productivity and the Macro-Economic Theo ...
.Johnathan Davis and Alasdair Nairn (2012). Templeton's Way With Money: Strategies and Philosophy of a Legendary Investor. Wiley, ISBN 1118149610 Despite the name of his flagship fund, Templeton Growth Fund, he was more a practitioner of
value investing Value investing is an investment paradigm that involves buying securities that appear underpriced by some form of fundamental analysis. The various forms of value investing derive from the investment philosophy first taught by Benjamin Graham ...
rather than
growth investing Growth investing is a style of investment strategy focused on capital appreciation. Those who follow this style, known as ''growth investors'', invest in companies that exhibit signs of above-average growth, even if the share price appears expens ...
.Lauren Templeton and Scott Phillips (2008). Investing the Templeton Way: The Market-Beating Strategies of Value Investing's Legendary Bargain Hunter. McGraw Hill Education Templeton focused on buying stocks he calculated were substantially undervalued, holding them until selling when their price rose to fair market value. His average holding period was about four years. He believed holding assets priced above fair market value in hopes they would further increase in price was speculation, not investing. However, Templeton did not buy stocks merely because they were undervalued but also took care investing in companies he determined were profitable, well-managed and with good long-term potential. By emphasizing overlooked or unpopular stocks Templeton was in many ways a
contrarian A contrarian is a person who holds a contrary position, especially a position against the majority. Investing A contrarian investing style is based on identifying, and speculating against, movements in stock prices that reflect changes in t ...
and became known for his "avoiding the herd" and "buy when there's blood in the streets" philosophy to take advantage of market turmoil. He also was known for taking profits when values and expectations were high. He was among the earliest American investors to devote substantial focus to investment opportunities in then-overlooked foreign markets such as Asia and Eastern Europe. Always on the lookout for bargain-priced stocks and hoping to avoid expensive stocks, he rotated out of Japanese stocks as they became more fashionable in the 1970s and turned to US stocks when they were at historic lows. In 2005, he wrote a brief memorandum predicting that within five years there would be financial chaos in the world, anticipating a collapse of the housing market and decline in yields on government-issued bonds to near zero. Templeton also predicted within the next few decades a major decrease in traditional schooling due to internet-based learning options. Initially privately circulated to family and a small number of Franklin-Templeton management, the memo was eventually made public in 2010. Templeton was a
Chartered Financial Analyst The Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) program is a postgraduate professional certification offered internationally by the American-based CFA Institute (formerly the Association for Investment Management and Research, or AIMR) to investment and fina ...
(CFA) charter-holder. He received AIMR's first award for professional excellence in 1991.


Personal life

Templeton married Judith Folk in 1937, and the couple had three children:
John John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Secon ...
, Anne, and Christopher. Judith Templeton died in February 1951 in a motorbike accident. He remarried, to Irene Reynolds Butler in 1958; she died in 1993. A Christian, he was a lifelong member of the
Presbyterian Church Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...
. He served as an elder of the
First Presbyterian Church of Englewood Brookside Cemetery is a historical cemetery in Englewood, New Jersey. History It was started in May 1876, by a group of Englewood residents who purchased of land for a cemetery. The property sits on the East side of Engle Street adjacent to Tena ...
(Englewood, New Jersey). He was a trustee on the board of
Princeton Theological Seminary Princeton Theological Seminary (PTSem), officially The Theological Seminary of the Presbyterian Church, is a private school of theology in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1812 under the auspices of Archibald Alexander, the General Assembly of t ...
, the largest Presbyterian seminary, for 42 years and served as its chair for 12 years. Uninterested in consumerism, he lived relatively frugally and never flew first-class. He lived year-round in the Bahamas. A friend jokingly described Templeton as
Calvinist Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Ca ...
in his approach to wealth: "He believes it's okay to make money so long as you don't enjoy it." On 8 July 2008, Templeton died at Doctors Hospital in
Nassau, Bahamas Nassau ( ) is the capital and largest city of the Bahamas. With a population of 274,400 as of 2016, or just over 70% of the entire population of the Bahamas, Nassau is commonly defined as a primate city, dwarfing all other towns in the country. ...
, of
pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severity ...
at 12:20. He was 95, and was survived by two sons, one of whom,
John Templeton Jr. John Marks Templeton Jr. (February 19, 1940 – May 16, 2015), also known as Jack Templeton, was an American physician. The elder son of Judith (née Folk) Templeton and investor, businessman and philanthropist Sir John Templeton, Jack Templeton s ...
, has since died, in 2015, of brain cancer.


Wealth and philanthropy

Templeton was one of the most generous philanthropists in history, giving away over $1 billion to charitable causes.The 50 Most Generous Philanthropists
Templeton renounced his
US citizenship Citizenship of the United States is a legal status that entails Americans with specific rights, duties, protections, and benefits in the United States. It serves as a foundation of fundamental rights derived from and protected by the Constituti ...
in 1964, which some sources claim was a strategy to minimize taxes. However, in a 1997 interview with Charlie Rose, Templeton asserted the Bahamas had a higher tax rate than the United States and denied he renounced his citizenship to avoid paying taxes to the United States. He held dual naturalised Bahamian and
British citizenship British nationality law prescribes the conditions under which a person is recognised as being a national of the United Kingdom. The six different classes of British nationality each have varying degrees of civil and political rights, due to the ...
and lived in the
Bahamas The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to ...
. In 2007, Templeton was named one of ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' magazine's 100 Most Influential People (
Time 100 ''Time'' 100 (often stylized as ''TIME'' 100) is an annual listicle of the 100 most influential people in the world, assembled by the American news magazine ''Time''. First published in 1999 as the result of a debate among American academics, po ...
) under the category of "Power Givers". Templeton was given this honour for his "pursuit of spiritual understanding, often through scientific research" through his establishment of the John Templeton Foundation. As a philanthropist, Templeton established: *the Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities in 1972; *the Templeton Library in
Sewanee, Tennessee Sewanee () is a census-designated place (CDP) in Franklin County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 2,535 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Tullahoma, Tennessee Micropolitan Statistical Area. Sewanee is best known as the home of ...
; *the Templeton College of the
University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...
(by endowing the Oxford Centre for Management Studies to become a full college of the university having as a focus business and management studies). Templeton College is now closely associated with Oxford's
Saïd Business School Saïd Business School (Oxford Saïd or SBS) is the business school of the University of Oxford. The School is a provider of management education and is consistently ranked as one of the world's top business schools. Oxford School of Management ...
. In 2007, Templeton College transferred its executive education program to Saïd Business School. In 2008, Templeton College merged with Green College to form
Green Templeton College Green Templeton College (GTC) is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. The college is located on the previous Green College site on Woodstock Road next to the Radcliffe Observatory Quarter in North Oxford and ...
. This is one of the exceptional mergers in recent history of the University of Oxford. He was created a
Knight Bachelor The title of Knight Bachelor is the basic rank granted to a man who has been knighted by the monarch but not inducted as a member of one of the organised orders of chivalry; it is a part of the British honours system. Knights Bachelor are the ...
in 1987 for his philanthropic efforts. Templeton was inducted into the
Junior Achievement JA (Junior Achievement) Worldwide is a global non-profit youth organization founded in 1919 by Horace A. Moses, Theodore Vail, and Winthrop M. Crane. JA works with local businesses, schools, and organizations to deliver experiential learning ...
US Business Hall of Fame in 1996, and in 2003 awarded the
William E. Simon Prize for Philanthropic Leadership The William E. Simon Prize for Philanthropic Leadership is an annual award given by the William E. Simon Foundation in honor of its founder, former Secretary of the Treasury and financier William E. Simon, and administered by the Philanthropy Ro ...
.


Templeton Religion Trust

Templeton Religion Trust (TRT) is a global charitable trust chartered by Sir John Templeton in 1984, with headquarters in Nassau, The Bahamas, where Sir John lived until his death in 2008. TRT has been active since 2012 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. *Bringing about and enhancing the “conditions of possibility” of cooperative, constructive engagement (aka “Covenantal Pluralism”) in the context of religion. *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. TRT is the first of three charitable entities established by Sir John Templeton. The other entities are the John Templeton Foundation and the Templeton World Charity Foundation. While all three organizations have similar aims, they operate as separate charitable entities.


John Templeton Foundation

As a member of the Presbyterian Church, Templeton was dedicated to his faith. 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. Commenting on his commitment to what he called spiritual progress, "But why shouldn't I try to learn more? Why shouldn't I go to
Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
services? Why shouldn't I go to
Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...
services? If you are not egotistical, you will welcome the opportunity to learn more." Similarly, one of the major goals of the John Templeton Foundation is to proliferate the monetary support of spiritual discoveries. 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." In an interview published in the Financial Intelligence Report in 2005, Templeton asserts that the purpose of the John Templeton Foundation is as follows: "We are trying to persuade people that no human has yet grasped 1% of what can be known about spiritual realities. So we are encouraging people to start using the same methods of science that have been so productive in other areas, in order to discover spiritual realities."


Publications and works

*''The humble approach: Scientists discover God'', 1981. *''Templeton Plan: 21 Steps to Personal Success and Real Happiness'', 1992. *''Discovering the Laws of Life'', 1994. *''Is God the Only Reality? Science Points to a Deeper Meaning of the Universe'', 1994. *''Golden Nuggets from Sir John Templeton'', 1997. *''Worldwide Laws of Life: 200 Eternal Spiritual Principles'', 1998. . *''Riches for the Mind and Spirit: John Marks Templeton's Treasury of Words to Help, Inspire, and Live By'', 2006. *''Investing the Templeton Way: The Market-Beating Strategies of Value Investing's Legendary Bargain Hunter'', 2007. *''Buying at the Point of Maximum Pessimism: Six Value Investing Trends from China to Oil to Agriculture'', 2010.


See also

*
John Templeton Foundation The John Templeton Foundation (Templeton Foundation) is a philanthropic organization that reflects the ideas of its founder, John Templeton, who became wealthy via a career as a contrarian investor, and wanted to support progress in religious an ...
*
Templeton Prize The Templeton Prize is an annual award granted to a living person, in the estimation of the judges, "whose exemplary achievements advance Sir John Templeton's philanthropic vision: harnessing the power of the sciences to explore the deepest quest ...
*
John Templeton Jr. John Marks Templeton Jr. (February 19, 1940 – May 16, 2015), also known as Jack Templeton, was an American physician. The elder son of Judith (née Folk) Templeton and investor, businessman and philanthropist Sir John Templeton, Jack Templeton s ...
*
Franklin Templeton Investments Franklin Resources, Inc. is an American multinational holding company that, together with its subsidiaries, is referred to as Franklin Templeton; it is a global investment firm founded in New York City in 1947 as Franklin Distributors, Inc. It is ...
* Benjamin Graham, another famous value investor and teacher of Templeton *
Warren Buffett Warren Edward Buffett ( ; born August 30, 1930) is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He is currently the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. He is one of the most successful investors in the world and has a net ...
, another famous value investor and student of Benjamin Graham


References


External links


John Templeton FoundationProfile of the John Templeton Foundation in The NationObituary of Sir John Templeton in Philanthropy magazineGod's Venture Capitalist
Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...
article by David Plotz
16 Rules for Investment Success by Sir John TempletonThe John Templeton Award for Theological Promise
A research award funded by the John Templeton Foundation *
Contrarian
', a documentary film about John Templeton {{DEFAULTSORT:Templeton, John 1912 births 2008 deaths Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford American stock traders British spiritual writers British money managers British stock traders British Presbyterians Deaths from pneumonia in the Bahamas Knights Bachelor People from Winchester, Tennessee Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom American Rhodes Scholars Stock and commodity market managers The Yale Record alumni American emigrants to the United Kingdom Former United States citizens CFA charterholders American emigrants to the Bahamas British people of American descent 20th-century British philanthropists Writers about religion and science Yale University alumni British philanthropists American philanthropists Member of the Mont Pelerin Society