Sir John Templeton is regarded as one of the greatest value investors of all time. His well-timed moves into Japanese stocks when no one else would touch them and then back into US stock when no one went near those have earned him a reputation as a savvy bargain hunter.
His niece -- Lauren C. Templeton -- and her husband Scott Phillips have written a book devoted to his investment methods: Investing the Templeton Way: The Market-Beating Strategies of Value Investing's Legendary Bargain Hunter.
Unfortunately, there's nothing that's new here, and there are several infinitely better tomes devoted to the same principles of value investing. The tone is also annoying, written with a reverence for "Uncle John" as he is always referred to. This gets annoying. After about the 23rd reference, I somehow got the idea that he is her uncle.
The book has some bright spots: the chapter on shorting bubbles is interesting as very few investment books -- especially those focused on a value-based approach -- delve into short-selling.
Other than that, this book is surprisingly trite. Die hard value investors won't be able to pass this up, but everyone else probably should.
Book review: Investing the Templeton Way
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
5-01-2008 @ 11:49AM
Michael Schneider said...
Zac- I agree with your point about the "Uncle" reference being a bad choice even though I understand why she did it that way- I keep thinking of her as John Templeton's daughter despite this and even made the mistake of calling her that in a blurb I posted on the book. On the book itself though, I totally disagree because I find John Templeton to be very worth the time of most people and this book really updates things by going beyond his own earlier books to discuss some of his more recent investment moves. I think this work is very appropriate for both beginning investors who are not familiar with John Templeton and more experienced investors. For example, I find John Templeton's view on debt (it can be good if put into investment but not for consumption) to be advice that many people may wish they would have taken years ago and it is very important in this age of the debt bomb. His patient approach to looking for bargains also is advice that many people who came into the market at the height of stock euphoria in the late 1990s may also wish they would have listened to. The book has some problems and experienced investors do have to suffer through somewhat simplified examples like the lemonade stand hypothetical example but this might be helpful for young readers who I think really should be reading Templeton. One area where I think this book really could have improved would have been to discuss some of John Templeton's investment mistakes rather than just his successes. If the book goes into a 2nd edition, I hope the authors consider mixing some misses with the hits as we learn as much from mistakes as from what worked out.