Martin Whitman, Founder of Third Avenue Management, Dies at 93Martin Whitman, Founder of Third Avenue Management, Dies at 93
Whitman was known for The Whitman Way - a reverence for deep-value investing in unappreciated names with strong balance sheets and good long-term potential.
April 18, 2018
NEW YORK, April 17 (Reuters) - Martin J. Whitman, thefounder of New York-based investment firm Third AvenueManagement and known for his "safe and cheap" value-investingstrategy, died Monday evening at 93, the firm announced onTuesday.
Whitman, who was named Morningstar’s mutual fund manager ofthe year in 1990, became known for The Whitman Way - a reverencefor deep-value investing in unappreciated names with strongbalance sheets and good long-term potential.
His Third Avenue Value Fund, which Whitman ran from its 1990inception through 2012, had an average annual total return of11.1 percent, compared with 9 percent for the S&P 500 Index,according to Lipper data.
"Everyone in the Third Avenue family was blessed to have hadthe opportunity to know Marty and learn from him. He was anextraordinary investor, an impactful teacher, and a true capitalmarkets pioneer," the firm's management committee said in astatement.
The Third Avenue Value Fund, and the firm, struggled duringand after Whitman's final years in management. The firm’sassets, which reached $26 billion in 2006, sunk to $8 billion atthe end of November 2015, right before the firm shut down itsFocused Credit Fund - which became the biggest mutual fundblowup since the 2008 financial crisis.
And investment advisory fees at the firm’s flagship ValueFund were just $22 million in the fiscal year ending Oct. 31,2014, down 77 percent from $97.2 million in fiscal 2007, funddisclosures show.
While Whitman loved investing, his passion was teaching.
He frequently taught at Syracuse University’s Whitman Schoolof Management, which was named in his honor. He was adistinguished Management Fellow at the Yale School ofManagement, conducting seminars for over 30 years. He alsoserved as an adjunct professor at Columbia University BusinessSchool.
In addition to being widely recognized for his frank andinsightful quarterly letters to Third Avenue Value Fundshareholders, he authored several books on investing andsecurity analysis.
Most recently, Whitman published a best of anthology of hisprolific shareholder letters, "Dear Fellow Shareholders" in2016.(Reporting by Jennifer AblanEditing by Tom Brown)
