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Bruce Greenwald

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How has Bruce impacted the field of value investing?

The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Khachig Tölölyan, professor and director, College of Letters at Wesleyan University writes "I can’t answer that question directly, since I am not an economist or a serious investor. Everything I know about it I learned from him, so not Graham, not Dodd, not Buffett, not Mario Gabelli, but Bruce IS value investing for me. His successful performance as an investor is persuasive in itself, but so is his ability to explain why he is right and all who disagree with him are pitifully mistaken; he is simultaneously ruthless and intellectually irresistible when he is doing that.

Part of what makes his analyses so compelling is their range. When he is explaining why a particular company's stock is ripe for purchase, he offers reasons at three different registers. First, he discusses expertly a range of sometimes obscure but always relevant factors, for example, what technical innovations and managerial decisions place the particular company he is studying ahead of the competition. He combines this with an explanation of why the so-called wisdom of the market can be safely ignored in a particular case. Finally, he caps these two with a powerful narrative of where the economy as a whole is going and why its long-range trajectory favors the company in question. He offers a view of the whole even as he demonstrates a painstaking grasp of the necessary details."
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Jon Salinas of Plymouth Lane Capital and Heilbrunn Center adjunct faculty member writes "Bruce's most significant impact on the field of value investing is his research on competitive dynamics and conceptualizing the notion of barriers-to-entry. Bruce has defined the concept of business quality for this generation's value investors."
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Ken Shubin Stein of Spencer Capital and Heilbrunn Center adjunct faculty member writes "His focus on competitive advantages and their importance to long-term performance has helped advance the thinking of many investors globally."
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Erin Bellissimo , former Heilbrunn Center director writes "It is difficult to articulate the tremendous impact Bruce has had on the investing field. Bruce truly connected theory and practice in the field of investing. He understood that in spite of traditional efficient market literature, that there were a subset of investors, who Buffett called the SuperInvestors of Graham and Doddsville, that were able to generate superior returns by following a Graham and Dodd Approach. He has brought that to the forefront and connected the practitioner community to Columbia Business School in a much more substantive way. His Competition Demystified work on competitive advantage and valuing growth is groundbreaking and a huge tool for modern day investors."
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Leo Cruz '15 writes "If Buffett struck the blow that faltered the Efficient Market Theory in practice, Greenwald was the one to shake it to its core in academia. There’s no one else who could have done it the way that he has. He synthesized the Old Testament (Graham) with the New Testament (Buffett) to create a legion of new ‘superinvestors’ who will go on to produce even more spectacular investment records."
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Peter Bowley '14 writes "I thought Professor Greenwald’s books “Value Investing”, “Competition Demystified” and “The Curse of the Mogul” were generous contributions to anyone interested in learning about value investing, but without access to his classes. He is extremely talented at distilling down his core insights for the benefit of the reader/student.

Professor Greenwald also contributed to value investing by never letting any conference speaker off the hook without at least a few tough questions."
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Rick Carew ’12 writes "He is the top academic in his field. First and foremost, he remains the guru of Wall Street's gurus. While staying above the fray of daily fund management he continues to be a sounding board for many of the biggest player on the Street and his impact is profound among many of the top value investing and special situations fund management companies."
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Tom Russo, partner at Gardner Russo Gardner and Heilbrunn Center advisory board member writes "Bruce Greenwald arrived at Columbia Business School after a period of time when the current brilliance of Columbia’s value investment star had tarnished by neglect in the aftermath of relentless assaults upon this discipline brought about by legions of academicians committed to modern portfolio theory.
Professor Greenwald, equipped with the tools to respond to modern portfolio theorists, nonetheless began to espouse the virtues of stock-specific investing recognizing as he does that the capacity for such investors, in admittedly rare circumstances, add considerable value over the offering suggested by disciples of modern portfolio theory. Bruce understands that markets offer opportunities for investors as a result of overconfidence and has raised generations of investors equipped with analytical tools to go after such opportunities. In addition, Professor Greenwald has advised his students to take advantage of markets through investment specialization. Today, Wall Street continues to enjoy thought leadership in value investing through Bruce’s prolific writing on this and on the related subject of competitive advantage. In addition, the investment world is filled with students whose confidence in attempting active management is underpinned by the example Bruce leads and the time spent with Bruce as students. "
The Heilbrunn Center for Graham & Dodd Investing
Peter Lawrence '11, Heilbrunn Center adjunct faculty member writes "Bruce has made important contributions to the fields of valuation and competitive analysis. He's simplified and focused Michael Porter's work on competitive advantage around the key issue of barriers to entry and updated valuation methodology for 21st century business models. Perhaps most significantly, he's integrated the field of competitive analysis with the field of valuation more robustly than anyone before him, creating a holistic framework for investment analysis."