John Templeton

For other people named John Templeton, seeJohn Templeton (disambiguation).

Sir John Templeton
Born	John Marks Templeton (1912-11-29)29 November 1912 Winchester, Tennessee,U.S.
Died	8 July 2008(2008-07-08)(aged 95) Nassau,Bahamas
Citizenship	United Kingdom
Alma mater	Yale University(BA) Balliol College, Oxford(MA)
Occupation(s)	Investor, fund manager, and philanthropist
Known for	Managing theTempleton Growth Fund EndowingTempleton College, Oxford Founding Templeton Religion Trust Founding Templeton World Charity Foundation Founding theJohn Templeton Foundation Creating theTempleton Prize Humility theology
Board member of	Princeton Theological Seminary
Spouses	Judith Folk ​ ​ (m.1937; died 1951)​ Irene Reynolds Butler ​ ​ (m.1958; died 1993)​
Children	John Jr.,Anne, Christopher
Awards	Rhodes Scholar Knight Bachelor

Sir John Marks Templeton(29 November 1912 – 8 July 2008)was an American-born Britishinvestor,banker,fund manager,and philanthropist. In 1954, he entered themutual fund marketand created theTempleton Growth Fund,which averaged growth over 15% per year for 38 years.A pioneer ofemerging marketinvesting in the 1960s,Moneymagazine 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 ofWinchester, Tennessee,and attendedYale University,where he was an assistant business manager for campus humor magazineYale Recordand was selected for membership in theElihusociety.He financed his tuitionwith a scholarship, odd jobs and winnings from playingpoker,a game at which he excelled.He graduated in 1934 near the top of his class. He attendedBalliol College, Oxford,as aRhodes Scholarand earned anM.A.in law. He was aCFA charterholderand was a student of the "father ofvalue investing",Benjamin Graham.

Investment career

In 1939, Templeton, during theDepressionof the 1930s, had his broker purchase 100 shares of eachNYSE-listed company which was then selling for less than $1 a share (equivalent to $22 in 2,023) (104 companies, 34 in bankruptcy, in 1939), later making many times the money back when US industry picked up as a result ofWorld War II.According to Templeton, he called his broker the day World War II began and instructed him to make the purchases. This stratagem helped make him a wealthy man.

Templeton became a billionaireby pioneering the use of globally diversifiedmutual funds.HisTempleton Growth Fund,Ltd. (investment fund), established in 1954, was among the first American firms to invest in Japan starting in the mid-1960s.Templeton also created funds specifically in certain industries such as nuclear energy, chemicals, and electronics. By 1959, Templeton's company made theirinitial public offering,with five funds and more than 66 million dollars under management.

In 2006 he was listed in a seven-way tie for 129th place onThe Sunday Times's "Rich List".

Investment philosophy

Moneymagazine 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 rejectedtechnical analysisfor stock trading, preferring instead to usefundamental analysis.Thus he did not attempt to predict future stock movements, but paid close attention tovaluation.From the late 1930s Templeton and his colleagues developed sophisticatedquantitative financemethods that anticipated by decades common features such as theShiller P/E,rebalancingandTobin's q.

Despite the name of his flagship fund,Templeton Growth Fund,he was more a practitioner ofvalue investingrather thangrowth investing.However, his stock-selection strategies could be eclectic and often defied easy categorization other than avoiding stocks he considered expensive, defined as an estimated five-year forwardprice to earnings ratiohigher than about 12-14.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 acontrarianand 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.His time at Oxford started an interest in global investing, which was uncommon in the United States but more popular in the UK due to the widespreadBritish Empire.Templeton was one of the earliest American investors to devote substantial focus to investment opportunities in then-overlooked foreign markets such as Asia and Eastern Europe.He was such early investor in Japan during the 1950s that he had difficulty finding bi-lingual stockbrokers in either Japan or the United States to handle his firm's trades. 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.Templeton's flagship fund outperformed a global stock index by an average of three percent a year for his entire career, and by over six percent a year for the period after his relocation to the Bahamas.Typical of value-oriented investors, Templeton often had disappointing results duringbull marketsdue to his avoidance of hot stocks of the moment. His outperformance typically came during crashes andbear marketswhen his fund suffered smaller losses than average, or had modest gains relative to the broad market.

In 2005, he wrote a brief memorandum predicting that within five years there would be financial chaos in the world, anticipating acollapse of the housing marketand 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 aChartered Financial Analyst(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,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 thePresbyterian Church.He served as an elder of theFirst Presbyterian Church of Englewood(Englewood, New Jersey). He was a trustee on the board ofPrinceton Theological Seminary,the largest Presbyterian seminary, for 42 years and served as its chair for 12 years.

In 1964, TempletonrenouncedhisUS citizenship,which some sources claim was a strategy to minimize taxes (the United States taxes citizens globally regardless of residency underFATCA).However, in a 1997 interview withCharlie 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, stating he intended to live out his life in the Bahamas and felt obligated.He held dual naturalised Bahamian andBritish citizenshipand lived in theBahamasfull-time from 1968.His neighbors includedJoe Lewis,Sean Connery,Arthur Hailey,andFahad Al Sabah.

Uninterested in consumerism, Templeton lived relatively frugally and never flew first-class. A friend jokingly described Templeton asCalvinistin 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 inNassau, Bahamas,ofpneumoniaat 12:20. He was 95,and was survived by his children, Anne, Christopher and John.John Templeton Jr.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.

In 2007, Templeton was named to theTime 100 listas one of the world's 100 Most Influential People byTimeunder the category of "Power Givers".Timecited his "pursuit of spiritual understanding, often through scientific research" through his establishment of the John Templeton Foundation.

As a philanthropist, Templeton established:

• theTempleton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realitiesin 1972.
• the Templeton Library inSewanee, Tennessee,on a hillside 2 miles from and overlooking The University of the South, and which is 12 miles from his birthplace of Winchester, Tennessee. The building was intended to house his papers and "a collection of literature concerning science and religion, promoting scholarly research that combines the two fields".
• theTempleton Collegeof theUniversity of Oxford(by endowing the Oxford Centre for Management Studies in 1983 to become a full college of the university by royal charter in 1995).

Templeton College is closely associated with Oxford'sSaïd Business School.In 2007, Templeton College transferred its executive education program to Saïd Business School. In 2008, Templeton College merged with Green College to formGreen Templeton College.This is one of the exceptional mergers in recent history of the University of Oxford.

He was created aKnight Bachelorin 1987 for his philanthropic efforts. Templeton was inducted into theJunior AchievementUS Business Hall of Fame in 1996, and in 2003 awarded theWilliam E. Simon Prize for Philanthropic Leadership.

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

Main article: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 toHinduservices? Why shouldn't I go toMuslimservices? 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."In 2004, Templeton donated an additional $550 million to the foundation.

Publications and works

• The humble approach: Scientists discover God,1981.ISBN0-8164-0481-X
• Templeton Plan: 21 Steps to Personal Success and Real Happiness,1992.ISBN0-06-104178-5
• Discovering the Laws of Life,1994.ISBN0-8264-0861-3
• Is God the Only Reality? Science Points to a Deeper Meaning of the Universe,1994.ISBN0-8264-0650-5
• Golden Nuggets from Sir John Templeton,1997.ISBN1-890151-04-1
• Worldwide Laws of Life: 200 Eternal Spiritual Principles,1998.ISBN1-890151-15-7.
• Riches for the Mind and Spirit: John Marks Templeton's Treasury of Words to Help, Inspire, and Live By,2006.ISBN1-59947-101-9
• Investing the Templeton Way: The Market-Beating Strategies of Value Investing's Legendary Bargain Hunter,2007.ISBN978-0-07-154563-1
• Buying at the Point of Maximum Pessimism: Six Value Investing Trends from China to Oil to Agriculture,2010.ISBN978-0-13-703849-7

See also

• John Templeton Foundation
• Templeton Prize
• John Templeton Jr.
• Franklin Templeton Investments
• Benjamin Graham,another famous value investor and teacher of Templeton
• Warren Buffett,another famous value investor and student of Benjamin Graham

External links

• John Templeton Foundation
• Profile of the John Templeton Foundation in The NationArchived11 February 2019 at theWayback Machine
• Obituary of Sir John Templeton in Philanthropy magazine
• God's Venture CapitalistSlatearticle by David Plotz
• 16 Rules for Investment Success by Sir John Templeton
• The John Templeton Award for Theological PromiseA research award funded by the John Templeton Foundation
• Contrarian,a documentary film about John Templeton