Jack Bogle dead
- Thread starter dmclone
- Start date
Sad news. He made investing a lot easier for the ordinary person.
Very sad. Jack was a very rich man, but not nearly as rich as he could have been...and I mean that as a compliment. He extolled the virtue of being an “average investor” and lived what he preached. He profoundly changed the personal investigation landscape.
In an industry that is, to put it charitably, not focused on its customers' best interests, he put the customer first. Eventually Vanguard got so dominant other firms had to dramatically cut their own expenses. He kept tens, perhaps hundreds, of billions of dollars in the hands of investors and changed his industry for the better. Let's hope it's permanent.
My quick google search had his net worth at $80M. Vanguard has just over $5 TRILLION assets under management. $80M is nothing to slouch at, but Jack invented an entirely new form of investing and could have easily been a multi-billionaire. I’m grateful for his foresight. He’s saved personal investors millions of dollars in fees over his career.
If you've read any interviews with Bogle or listened to podcasts in which he's appeared - there have been a number of them in recent years, even right up until the last few weeks - he has hinted at some disagreements he's had with Vanguard's more recent leadership and hinted that they keep him at arm's length. What I hope does not happen is that now that he's passed, Vanguard's philosophy changes and becomes more aggressively sales-oriented. Or more simply, I hope they don't lose what makes them Vanguard and become more like most other financial firms.
Little surprised this isn’t getting more press, but good stories rarely seem to in the current environment.
Read a good quote from Bogleheads (paraphrasing)
“He could have been a billionaire, but he instead chose to make millionaires out of others”
“He could have been a billionaire, but he instead chose to make millionaires out of others”
