Book Review – “The Value Investors”

I managed to complete reading a book called “The Value Investors: Lessons from the World’s Top Fund Managers” during my two-weeks of In-Camp Training.

It is authored by Ronald Chan and it features interviews with famous investors such as Walter Schloss, Irving Khan, Thomas Khan, William Browne, Jean-Marie Eveillard, Francisco Garcia Parames, Anthony Nutt, Mark Mobius, Teng Ngiek Lian, Shuhei Abe, V-Nee Yeh and Cheah Cheng Hye.

Basically, the book covers how the various investors started off their investing journey, what their investing style is and almost all talk about the temperament needed to invest profitably. This book served as a good refresher for me, especially the part on the mindset needed to invest successfully.

Also, something that caught my attention was during William Browne’s interview. In it, he mentioned about a Tweedy, Browne article titled “10 Ways to Beat an Index“, where one of the studies shows that 80% to 90% of investment returns have occurred in spurts that amount to only 2% to 7% of the total length of the holding period. The rest of the time, stocks’ returns have been minimal. This was an eye-opener when I related back to my own experience with stocks.

The last chapter serves as a summary to the book. If do not have time, you can read the last chapter to get a gist of the book. However, nothing beats reading the whole book in entirety. This is a highly recommended book for those who want to learn more about the lives of some of the greatest investing legends!