RWH019: Winning the Long Game w/ John Spears

The Investor's Podcast (We Study Billionaires) - The Investor’s Podcast Network

Stig Brodersen

Investing, Education, Business

4.6 • 3.6K Ratings

🗓️ 25 December 2022

⏱️ 125 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN: 04:04 - How John Spears became obsessed with investing when he was 12 years old. 11:34 - How skipping school to meet an investing legend set him on a path to success. 16:07 - How a catastrophic early investment humbled John & taught him to be more prudent. 24:12 - Why he focuses intensely on tracking insider buying of cheap stocks by top executives. 27:28 - What he learned by studying Ben Graham & teaching himself to buy cheap stocks. 32:42 - How Warren Buffett bought his stake in Berkshire Hathaway through Tweedy, Browne. 41:54 - What it was like sharing an office with another fabled investor, Walter Schloss. 50:12 - Why John owns high-quality compounders like Heineken & Nestle, which aren’t cheap. 52:01 - What empirical research has taught him about the strategies that work best over time. 1:01:29 - Why we should focus on achieving “satisfactory” returns, not shooting the lights out. 1:08:40 - Why it’s wise to avoid a lot of debt, live within your means, & keep ample cash reserves. 1:12:02 - Why we should diversify overseas, maximizing our odds of finding undervalued stocks. 1:13:36 - How John thinks about investing in foreign markets like China, the U.K., & Switzerland. 1:20:40 - Why he prefers to own a “dull old” stock like Tesco, instead of something sexier & riskier. 1:27:42 - What factors have contributed to him having a happy life. 1:38:01 - How the principles he learned as a Quaker have influenced the way he lives & works. 1:50:36 - Why he regards capitalism as a powerful force for good. Disclaimer: Slight discrepancies in the timestamps may occur due to podcast platform differences. BOOKS AND RESOURCES Join the exclusive TIP Mastermind Community to engage in meaningful stock investing discussions with Stig, Clay, and the other community members. Tweedy, Browne’s research papers on what’s worked in investing over the long run. The Tweedy, Browne International Value Fund. William Green’s book, “Richer, Wiser, Happier” – read the reviews of this book. William Green’s Twitter. NEW TO THE SHOW? Check out our We Study Billionaires Starter Packs. Browse through all our episodes (complete with transcripts) here. Try our tool for picking stock winners and managing our portfolios: TIP Finance Tool. Enjoy exclusive perks from our favorite Apps and Services. Stay up-to-date on financial markets and investing strategies through our daily newsletter, We Study Markets. Learn how to better start, manage, and grow your business with the best business podcasts. SPONSORS Support our free podcast by supporting our sponsors: River Toyota Sun Life The Bitcoin Way Range Rover Sound Advisory BAM Capital Fidelity SimpleMining Briggs & Riley Public Shopify Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://theinvestorspodcastnetwork.supportingcast.fm

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to TIP.
0:02.9	Hi there, I'm really happy to introduce today's guest, John Spears.
0:07.0	John is a great investor who spent 48 years working at an iconic investment firm called
0:12.2	Tweety Brown.
0:13.2	This is a company with an incredibly rich history.
0:16.4	It's been at the epicenter of the value investing world for as long as anyone can remember.
0:22.0	Ben Graham, the patron saint of value investing, used to place his stock trades through Tweety
0:27.2	Brown as far back as the 1930s.
0:30.8	Graham's most famous disciple Warren Buffett actually bought his stake in Berkshire Halfaway
0:35.7	through Tweety Brown in the 1960s, back when Tweety was a broker and Berkshire was still
0:40.9	a small, struggling business that owned an ailing textile mill.
0:46.1	John's obsession with the stock market goes back a long way.
0:49.7	He bought his first stock when he was only 12 years old, as a teenager he tore himself
0:55.2	accounting and finance, and he was in such a hurry to become a professional investor that
1:00.5	he dropped out of college and went to work full time on Wall Street when he was only 20.
1:06.4	These days, John is a managing director at Tweety Brown.
1:09.7	He's also part of the investment committee that runs the company's flagship international
1:14.2	value fund.
1:15.8	The fund has crushed the MSCI EFA index by something like 600 percentage points over the last
1:22.8	29 years.
1:25.6	When you see that level of long-term outperformance over three decades, I think you want to pay serious
1:30.7	attention and ask yourself, what if these people figured out about what works over time?
	...

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