Prem Watsa – The Canadian Warren Buffett

Seeing how Prem Watsa is in the news  in India these days with respect of the sale of Thomas Cook India by its British parent,(http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/services/travel/toronto-based-fairbridge-capital-to-buy-thomas-cook-india-deal-estimated-at-rs-1000-crore/articleshow/13365646.cms)  ,now might be just the time to take a look at the life of this media shy individual.

Watsa is not very widely known outside of Canada, but is well regarded and followed in value investing circles. He has shown an incredibly prescient ability to analyze the financial markets. Some of his most famous calls include selling half his stocks before the 1987 crash and buying S&P puts before the index fell off a cliff in 2000. He also bet against the Japanese Nikkei but his biggest success came more recently during the 2008 sub-prime crisis when he bought credit default swaps on the premise that banks and financial institutions would struggle if a credit and liquidity crisis arose. Today, Watsa is the CEO and Chairman of Fairfax, which has a market cap of approximately $8.7 billion.Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited is a financial holding company based in Toronto, Ontario, which is engaged in property, casualty, and life insurance and reinsurance, investment management, and insurance claims management. He is also a member of the Advisory Board for the Richard Ivey School of Business-his alma mater, a member of the Board of Directors of the Royal Ontario Museum Foundation and as well as Chairman of the Investment Committee of St. Paul’s Anglican Church.Till recently he was also a non-executive director of ICICI Bank.Whatever I can  piece together of his story is pretty fascinating…. Read more of this post