Master's Biographies

Peter Lynch

1944 – · Fidelity Magellan · invest in what you know

Peter Lynch

He turned a small fund into a legend by buying what he could see and understand.

Peter Lynch ran Fidelity's Magellan Fund for thirteen years and compounded it at almost thirty percent a year — one of the greatest runs any fund manager has ever recorded. He did it not with secret formulas but with curiosity, legwork, and common sense.

His advice to ordinary investors was disarmingly simple: invest in what you know, look for the "ten-baggers" hiding in plain sight, and remember that the company behind the stock is what really matters.

1944

Born near Boston

Peter Lynch was born in 1944 and grew up outside Boston. His father died when Peter was ten, and the family's finances grew tight — pushing the boy to work young and to take the world of money seriously.

1955

Lessons from the caddyshack

Caddying at an exclusive golf club, Lynch carried the bags of executives and investors and listened as they talked about stocks. It was, he later said, a better education in markets than any classroom — and one of the players ran Fidelity.

1966

An intern at Fidelity

While studying at Boston College, Lynch landed a coveted internship at Fidelity Investments. His first analyst's report, on an air-cargo company, did well — and convinced him that diligent, first-hand research could find winners others missed.

1968

Wharton, the Army, and back

He earned an MBA from the Wharton School and served in the Army, then returned to Fidelity, joining as a full-time analyst in 1969 and steadily building a reputation for thorough, sceptical, shoe-leather research.

1977

Taking over Magellan

Lynch was handed the Magellan Fund, then a small and obscure vehicle of around eighteen million dollars. He set about visiting companies, kicking the tyres, and buying businesses he genuinely understood — sometimes hundreds at a time.

1980s

Invest in what you know

Lynch popularised the idea that everyday observation — a busy shop, a product your family loves — could lead to great investments long before Wall Street caught on. He coined the "ten-bagger," the stock that returns ten times your money, and preached patience to hold it.

Peter Lynch

1989

One Up on Wall Street

He distilled his philosophy into One Up on Wall Street, followed by Beating the Street — books that taught a generation of amateurs that they could, with homework and discipline, beat the professionals at their own game.

1990

Walking away at the top

By 1990 Magellan had grown to some fourteen billion dollars, and Lynch's record stood at roughly twenty-nine percent a year over thirteen years. At forty-six, with nothing left to prove and a family to be present for, he retired from running the fund.

1990s –

A second life in giving

Lynch turned to mentoring Fidelity's analysts and to philanthropy, channelling much of his fortune through the Lynch Foundation toward education, medicine and his native Boston. He remained the patient, plain-spoken advocate of the long-term investor.

“Know what you own, and know why you own it.”

— Peter Lynch