MutualFundWire.com: Whitman Chats with Forbes

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Monday, April 13, 2009

Whitman Chats with Forbes

Third Avenue Management founder and co-chief investment officer Marty Whitman spoke to Forbes editor-in-chief Steve Forbes in an interview published Monday. Whitman discussed regulation, credit worthiness, Hong Kong blue chips and a slew of other subjects.

Asked to draw a comparison between this downturn and the previous ones, he said:

And it turned out it's really much worse, and in many senses, much better. From the top down, from the macro view, things could not suck more than they do suck. From a bottom-up point of view, there have never been, in my lifetime, as attractive securities as are available today at the price as you can get them.

And I approach the thing, given these tremendously attractive securities available, I don't want to be a person who lived in 1932 and sold General Electric common because the outlook for 1933 was bad or uncertain. I think then was a time to buy General Electric. And today is the time to buy a large gambit of securities, buy them for cash.