|
Strong managers react fast
|
 |
October 22, 2001: 9:57 a.m. ET
Managers Ron Ognar, Dick Weiss and Tom Pence recall the aftermath of Sept. 11.
|
NEW YORK (CNNmoney) - At the Milwaukee-based Strong funds, many of the portfolio managers were off on research trips on Sept. 11.
Ron Ognar, who runs the Strong Growth Fund, was in Los Angeles at a conference on media stocks. Stranded until flights resumed, Ognar spent Thursday and Friday in the L.A. offices of William O'Neil & Co., an investment research firm. Combing through O'Neil's historical stock charts, he gleaned a sense of how the market has responded to past crises.
"It was a good thing they delayed the opening of the markets until Monday [Sept. 17]," recalls Ognar. "It gave us a chance to do our homework."
|
|
|
Ron Ognar | |
When he wasn't poring over stock charts, Ognar was on the phone to the nine analysts in his group, asking each to come up with three or four "best ideas."
His own watch list: GE (GE: down $0.04 to $37.21, Research, Estimates) , Kohl's, Home Depot (HD: up $0.23 to $40.64, Research, Estimates) and Sprint PCS (PCS: up $0.15 to $23.17, Research, Estimates) -- stocks that could benefit from lower interest rates, a need to rebuild and a rising demand for cell phones.
Ognar's colleague Dick Weiss was in San Francisco for a conference at Bank of America. Weiss, who runs Strong's Common Stock and Opportunity funds, was jolted awake at 6 a.m. by a call from his deputy, Ann Miletti. Still in bed, he turned the television on and saw the second tower explode.
| |
|
|
Dick Weiss | |
Weiss threw on his clothes, learned that the conference had been canceled and reserved a rental car. He and a handful of colleagues started driving back east, then detoured to Santa Barbara, where Weiss owns an avocado ranch with a high-speed modem.
Over the next two days, says Weiss, he decided that Americans would no longer be "as emotionally wrapped up in the stock market." And that, concluded Weiss, "puts the final nail in the coffin of New Era investing, where it didn't matter what your P/E was."
When Weiss got back to his office the next week, Weiss urged his staff to fly. "Fares are low," he told them matter-of-factly. But the investment conferences they had planned to attend were all canceled.
|
|
|
Tom Pence | |
For Tom Pence, manager of Strong's Discovery, Endeavor and Enterprise funds, keeping calm on Sept. 11 wasn't easy. When he heard that a plane had smashed into the Pentagon and that the Capitol might also be a target, "I was afraid," says Pence.
His brother Mike is a congressman from Indiana. Over his pager, Tom learned that his brother had been evacuated, along with other members of Congress, to a secure "command center" where cell phones worked poorly.
Throughout the day, Tom Pence used his pager to send his brother e-mail updates on what was happening. The fund manager later learned that Mike had been sharing these bulletins with congressional leaders like Tom Daschle and Tom DeLay. Congress has since issued pagers to its members.
By mid afternoon, Pence told his co-workers to "go out and do something physical" and come back an hour later in casual clothes. He and a colleague hit the gym, running and lifting weights. When they came back with clearer heads, Pence and his team began sorting their holdings into stocks they could be sure about and those they couldn't. One of their first decisions: Buy cell-phone and pager stocks. 
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
