[Music]

you know, talking about cloning. So,

Mish decide Mish and I do the lunch with

Warren Buffett and then um uh yeah, come

on up on stage. It's uh this is Ardol

and uh so then um about 5 years ago I

decide that I Mish has already cloned

Warren and he's doing these charity

launches and then I decide to clone Mish

who cloned Warren and do these charity

launches and Ardell was the one who won

the charity launch about a couple of

years ago and I can tell you that um

I've learned more and gotten more value

from all the charity launches that I've

done. And Ardell was a particularly

spectacular one. But it's amazing how I

auctioned a lunch off and I get these

amazing people who come into my life

that I wouldn't have otherwise met and

Ardell was one of them. I still want to

meet your girlfriend. I was very

grateful to meet your parents. I think

you've written a wonderful book and I'm

looking forward to hearing from you.

Thank you.

[Applause]

Hello everybody. Um thank you guy for

the introduction. Um, thank you also to

the wider aquamarine team for putting on

on this fantastic event. And then last

but not least, thank you to everybody

here in the audience that's come today,

including all the ones that are watching

online. Um, so today the subject of my

talk is going to be a little bit

different. It's going to be on giving

back. So we're all here today in Omaha,

Nebraska because of this man that you

can see on the left hand side in the

photo. And we all know that that's uh

that's Warren Buffett. So he both

inspired and he's taught us all so much.

For me personally, Warren was the

inspiration for setting up my own

investment partnership uh called Logan

Partners and we set that up on the

principles of the original Buffett

partnerships that Warren ran in the

1950s and60s.

However, we're all actually here in this

room today because of the woman seated

on Buffett's left hand side, and that's

his first wife, uh, Susan Thompson

Buffett. Susan was mother to their three

children, and she was also a civil

rights activist with a strong focus on

promoting women's rights and those of

oppressed minorities. When asked about

money in their relationship, Warren said

that his job was to pile it high,

whereas Susan's job was to pass it out

to worthwhile

causes. He credited Susan with

broadening his view of the world and his

approach to helping those less fortunate

than himself or using his own words um

making him more of a whole

person. Susan encouraged Warren to give

back.

One of the ways that Susan did this was

by introducing Warren to the Glide

Foundation. So for those of you that

don't know about the Glide Foundation

based in San Francisco, it's one of the

leading charities in the world that

tackles

homelessness. So Warren was so impressed

by their work that he decided to auction

an annual charity lunch on eBay with the

winner along with five of their friends

being invited to dine with him and all

of the proceeds from that auction going

to charity. And so began the now famous

annual Buffett charity lunch. The first,

I only learned this when when I wrote

this speech, went for only $25,000 back

in the year 2000. And then the final one

went for just under $20 million in 2022.

So in total, Warren raised over $50

million for the Glide

Foundation. This is where the story of

Susan and Warren intersects with our

host today, Guy Spear.

In 2007, Guy along with his friend and

fellow fellow value investor Manish Pbry

teamed up and they won the Buffett

charity lunch famously with a winning

bid of

$650,100 which when the final one went

for 22 or just under 20 million seems

like a bargain. Um, a photo of which you

can see from there on the right. I read

a newspaper article around the time

citing both Guy and Manish that stuck

with me really ever since. And that was

that when they were asked by a reporter

why they had bought the lunch, they had

said together that their sole purpose

was to thank Warren for everything that

he had done for them as investors. And

that really struck a chord with me.

Despite the seemingly simple goal

though, their now famous lunch with

Warren I think altered both Guy and

Manisha's personal outlooks on life

forever. When I asked Guy about this

when I had lunch with him, he said that

Warren encouraged them both to give

back.

So with this in mind, Guy and Manish

took a leaf out of Warren's book and

began to auction their own annual

charity lunches for the benefit of

worthwhile causes. Some might say this

is a tad unimaginative, but I would say

that this is cloning at its finest. So I

won the now famous annual Cheers Spear

charity lunch auction with a winning bid

of

$21,200 in 2022 for the benefit of UN

watch. myself and my three fellow

founding partners of my investment

partnership. There's Derek Varel, our

chief risk officer on the left, Jamie

Goodman, our chief operating officer

sitting next to him, myself, then Guy,

and then finally our chief engagement

officer, Dr. Christian Yresperson on the

right. And we met with Guy in London

with a sole objective of thanking him

for through his work inspiring a new

generation of investors like ourselves.

When I shared this with Guy, he fully

understood what I meant. And he

encouraged me by saying that even as a

young fund manager, it was never too

early to start giving

back. And this brings me back full

circle to why I'm standing in front of

you all here

today. Giving back comes in many forms.

And I've always been a strong advocate

for financial literacy both in schools

and in universities as a way of

empowering the youth of today. After a

chance meeting with a publisher, I

decided to write my own book about my

own investing journey with the objective

of demystifying the subject. Instead of

being in my 70s talking down to my

audience, I'd be talking directly to my

audience as we're both on the start of

our respective journeys. My book, The

Perceptive Investor, which many of you

have got a copy on your seats here, and

for those on watching online, is is

available to purchase at all major

bookstores. Apologies for the the plug

there guy. It's also audio book is

coming out

soon. My book is published in

conjunction with a Financial Times

newspaper. They have a charitable arm

called the Financial Times Financial

Literacy and Inclusion Campaign. Quite a

mouthful, but because we all work in

finance, they've helpfully made an

acronym, so it's called FT Flick. Um, to

whom all proceeds from the book are

being donated. FT Flick provides free

training and course materials to empower

teachers with the confidence to teach

basic, intermediate, and advanced

financial concepts to high school and to

university

students. Susan, Warren, and Guy were

all correct. It is never too early to

start giving back, and I encourage you

all here today to do the same. Thank

you.

[Applause]

[Music]

Thank you, Arlo. I didn't realize that

this was going to be about me. I I I

never cease to be amazed this cloning

idea, how when you clone people, you

don't even know what you're going to

get. You think from the outside, it's

one thing. So, I never realized that I'd

meet somebody like Ardal at the charity

launch. And I've met people who've

helped me to learn so much about

companies that I've invested in uh just

because they wanted to meet me and they

gave charity in most cases to you and

watch. So it's I it's been a real eye

openener for me to me. I want to tell

you one thing about the charity launcher

that I think is in my book that um Chris

Davis was asked about fee structures and

I felt so terrible about the fact that I

had this high fee structure coming in to

the charity launch with Warren Buffett

that I changed the fee structure and I

never realized f first of all that was a

benefit for me of the launch that I bid

on but then living in that fee structure

is a completely different way of running

money when you know that you're not

making money off your investors you make

money with your investors. Anyway,

there's an amazing man called Steve

Clappam who's going to ask a question,

the only question because we're short on

time. I need you to know Steve. I

enjoyed so much being on your podcast. I

need to invite you on mine. I haven't

yet, but I will. He's the author of a

wonderful book. He's also a huge

advocate of financial literacy.

Everybody here needs to sign up and take

his courses. I've told Shantel that

every analyst of mine should take his

courses. I don't know what has happened

to that. But anyway, I give you Steve

Clappam with a question to Ard Doll.

Phil, I feel like I should make a speech

after that. And you know, I was going to

honor the no solicitation, but thank you

for that, guys. You're not allowed to

solicitate solicit, but I'm allowed to

call out what you do and solicit for

you. That's totally fine. But Ardol, I

just wanted to to say I mean, thank you

for the support of FT Flick. As you

know, I'm one of their one of their big

supporters.

um can you just tell the room what why

financial literacy is important for you?

So I think when I look at my own journey

and I look at those of the the my peers

around me, those of different levels and

varying levels of success, one of the

things they often have in common is

financial literacy from an early age. In

the UK where we're from, it's not taught

in schools. It's not taught as part of a

normal or regular curriculum. And

actually one of the things that

everybody has in common is that

everybody has to exist in today's

society. And I think if you don't get

the basics of that right, you can hinder

yourself throughout the remainder of

your life. And when we discuss

compounding, especially in an audience

like this, we all understand the

benefits of compounding, not just money,

but also knowledge. But we also

understand negative compounding from

paying high interest rates on credit

cards and borrowings that we can't

afford. We understand both aspects of

it. And I think that that's why that

knowledge from an early age can set us

on the right course for compounding

positively when we move forward. Thanks.

And I just the people in this room are

all financially literate. They probably

don't get this but my great friend

Russell Napier who's a financial

historian. He has a charity in the UK

and he has been doing financial literacy

education in Scotland before FT flick

started and he said he told me he went

to the lecture where the teacher was

teaching the students about financial

literacy and the first thing she said

was you mustn't take a credit card from

a store and the entire room turned

around and he looked at this little girl

in the corner who worked I think it was

for Zara and Of course, she was on

commission to sell the kids credit

cards, store credit cards. Afterwards,

Russell said he he had he saw the two

girls chatting to each other and one

said to the other said, "No, mine's

better than yours. Mine's 32.9% and

yours is only 31." That's the problem

that we need to address. Thank you very

much. Thank you, Steve. Thank you, Ar.

That's Thank you for coming.

[Music]