Philip A. Fisher
Founder, Fisher & Co.

Born in San Francisco in 1907, Philip Fisher was one of the first investment "philosophers" to focus almost exclusively on qualitative and growth factors. He is widely regarded as one of the early seminal thinkers in the evolution of growth stock investing.

Philip Fisher's career began in 1928, when he dropped out of the newly created Stanford Graduate Investment program to take a job as a securities analyst for the Anglo-London bank in San Francisco. Four years later, he founded Fisher & Co., the investment counseling firm he managed until retiring in 1999 at the age of 91.

The author of three books, a Financial Analysts Federation (now the CFA Institute) monograph and the subject of many articles, Philip Fisher's investment principles have been studied and used by countless contemporary finance professionals. Philip Fisher was the first to contribute an analytical framework within which to judge a growth stock and contemplate its potential in growth instead of just price trends and absolute value. He was also a seminal proponent of what are now called concentrated portfolios. His principles espoused identifying long-term growth stocks and their emerging value through the analysis of quality as opposed to choosing short-term trades for initial profit.

At a time when many investment professionals sought profits by betting on business cycles, Philip Fisher favored holding stocks of firms that were well-positioned for long-term growth. This positioning could best be determined by examining factors that are difficult to measure through ratios and other mathematical formulations - the quality of management, the potential for future long-term sales growth, and the firm's competitive advantage.

Philip Fisher outlined his philosophy for the average investor in his book Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits, published in 1958, which became the first investment book to make the New York Times best seller list. He later expanded upon his work in Conservative Investors Sleep Well and Paths to Wealth through Common Stocks, and went on to write, Developing an Investment Philosophy. All his writings, with the exception of Paths to Wealth, have been republished in Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits and Other Writings by Philip A. Fisher, which is listed under the John Wiley & Sons Publishers Investment Classics publications.

Philip A. Fisher passed away in San Mateo, CA in March 2004 at the age of 96.