Picking “Growth” Stocks.

PRICE, T. Rowe.

Item Number: 19086

New York: Barron's , 1939.

First edition of this early book/ pamphlet by Wall Street legend T. Rowe Price. Octavo, original wrappers. Name on the front panel and some neat underlining, otherwise in near fine condition. Rare.

Thomas Rowe Price spent his formative years struggling with the Depression, and the lesson he learned was not to stay out of stocks but to embrace them. Price viewed financial markets as cyclical. As a "crowd opposer," he took to investing in good companies for the long term, which was virtually unheard of at this time. His investment philosophy was that investors had to put more focus on individual stock-picking for the long term. Discipline, process consistency and fundamental research became the basis for his successful investing career. Price graduated from Swarthmore College with a degree in chemistry in 1919 before discovering that he liked working with numbers better than chemicals. He moved into a career in investments when he started working with the Baltimore-based brokerage firm of Mackubin Goodrich, which today is known as Legg Mason. Price eventually rose to become its chief investment officer. Over time, Price became frustrated by the fact that "the firm did not fully comprehend his definition of growth stocks," so Price founded T. Rowe Price Associates in 1937. At that time, he defied convention by charging fees based on investments that clients had with the firm, not commissions, and always "putting the client's interests first." Price believed that as his clients prospered, the firm would too. In 1950, he introduced his first mutual fund, the T. Rowe Price Growth Stock Fund. He was the company's CEO until his retirement in the late 1960s.