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To: Ralph Kern who wrote (2609)6/8/2000 4:30:00 PM
From: Marshhawk  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 2769
 
As soon as he got a little cash, he would buy CTR stock. He felt it was a damn good buy. He bought on margin in the beginning-those were days when you only had to put up 10% of the stock price. As the stock price went up, his broker friends would say, "Tom, you ought to take some profits." And he'd come home indignant that someone was suggesting he should sell. More than once, this investment strategy, if it can be called that, looked like a big mistake. CTR nearly went broke in the recession of 1921 because Dad had expanded too rapidly. Only by heavy borrowing did he manage to keep the company and himself afloat. He had another close call during the depression. The company, by then known as IBM, weathered the initial crash well, but by 1932 Dad had to borrow on everything to keep up his margin payments. He told me that if the stock had gone down another 3 or 4 points, he would have been wiped out. There just wasn't any place left to go for money.

Though he never owned more than about 5% of the company, virtually his entire fortune was in IBM. If the company failed, he failed too.

Tom Watson on his father, basically the founder of IBM.