Gerald Tsai, Jr. (March 10, 1929-July 9, 2008)-Chinese-born and oft-married mutual fund manager and financial wizard, who created performance mutual funds in the 1950s and turned a canning products company into the finance company now known as Primerica.
Family, Career, and Personal Highlights
Spouse (s): Loretta Young, Marlyn Chase, Cynthia Ann Ekberg and Nancy Raeburn (he was briefly engaged to Sharon Bush, ex-wife of Neil Bush, brother of President George W. Bush)
Children: Christopher, Veronica and Gerald
Father: Gerald Tsai Sr.
Mother : Ruth Tsai
Place of
Birth:
Shanghai, China
Education:
College: Wesleyan University (one semester) , Boston University, BA- Economics and MA-Economics
Professional
Career
1951: Bache & Company (securities analyst)
1952: Fidelity Management and Research Company (securities analyst)
1963–Promoted to Vice-President of Fidelity
1980s: Head of American Can Company (which later became Primerica)
1993: Delta Life Corporation (Chief Executive)
Links and Resources
Gerald Tsai Jr., a fund manager and financier who pioneered the
creation of performance funds in the 1950s and ’60s and later turned a
canning company into the financial services giant Primerica, died
Wednesday in Manhattan. He was 79.
The cause was multiple organ failure, said his son Christopher.
undefined and a subsidiary Mr. Tsai once led eventually became building blocks of Citigroup. But Mr. Tsai was perhaps most famous for his skill in building mutual funds.
He
was not yet 30 when he started Fidelity Investments’ first aggressive
growth fund in 1958, riding it to great success and a large personal
fortune. Mr. Tsai spurred the popularity of “momentum investing,” as
his funds swiftly moved money from one hot growth stock to another. He
joined the Fidelity Management and Research Company in 1952 as a
security analyst and, six years later, at the age of 29, started the
company’s first aggressive growth fund. By 1963, he was an executive
vice president.
At Fidelity, Mr. Tsai “showed himself to be a
shrewd and decisive picker of stocks for short-term appreciation,” John
Brooks wrote in the book “The Go-Go Years: The Drama and Crashing
Finale of Wall Street’s Bullish 60s” in 1973. “So swift and nimble in
getting into and out of specific stocks that his relations with them,
far from resembling a marriage or even a companionate marriage, were
more often like that of a roué with a chorus line.”
Mr. Tsai’s
skills as the manager of performance-oriented mutual funds became
legendary. In 1965, with the encouragement of his mother, Ruth, Mr.
Tsai established the Manhattan Fund, a mutual fund that won him
widespread attention. When the fund first offered shares, a modest
offering of 2.5 million shares quickly ballooned to a total of 27
million, bringing the fund $247 million in capital and representing
what was at the time the biggest offering in investment company history.
Mr. Tsai knew when to buy, and more importantly, when to sell. In 1968, he sold the fund to the CNA Financial Corporation,
just as its stellar success — and the bull market that it rode — were
starting to wane. Reports at the time said he walked away $30 million
richer.
In the 1980s, Mr. Tsai injected energy into the
American Can Company, a container production and food packaging
business, which was starting to shift toward the more lucrative
financial-services sector. American Can in 1982 bought the Associated
Madison Companies, a life insurance company where Mr. Tsai had been
chairman; he was named executive vice president of financial services.
By 1987, when the company changed its name to Primerica to reflect its
financial focus, Mr. Tsai was the chief executive, making him the first
Chinese-American to lead a Dow Jones industrials company.
A year later, Primerica and Commercial Credit Group, headed by Sanford I. Weill
and including the firm that later became known as Citi Smith Barney,
were combined in a $1.65 billion deal. Mr. Tsai remained the largest
shareholder but handed day-to-day management to Mr. Weill.
In 1993, he re-entered the insurance industry, becoming the chief executive of the Delta Life Corporation.
Gerald
Tsai Jr. was born on March 10, 1929, in Shanghai, and moved to the
United States 18 years later. He spent one semester at Wesleyan University before transferring to Boston University,
where he received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in economics. He
quickly put them to use, becoming a securities analyst at Bache &
Company in 1951, before joining Fidelity one year later.
His
marriages to Loretta Young, Marlyn Chase, Cynthia Ann Ekberg and Nancy
Raeburn ended in divorce. Besides Christopher, he is survived by two
other children, Veronica and Gerald, and five grandchildren. In 2006,
Mr. Tsai became engaged to marry Sharon Bush, the former wife of
President George W. Bush’s brother Neil, but the marriage was called off in January.
Christopher
said Mr. Tsai shared his enthusiasm for the stock market with his
children. He encouraged Christopher to learn about the markets at an
early age, prompting him to start investing at 12.
“He loved doing transactions.” Christopher said. “He loved the excitement of it.”
