Peter L. Bernstein
Encyclopedia
Peter Lewyn Bernstein was an American
financial historian, economist and educator whose development and refinement of the efficient-market hypothesis made him one of the country's best known authorities in popularizing and presenting investment economics to the general public.
, Peter Bernstein was the son of financial consultant Allen Bernstein and his wife, Irma Lewyn. His primary education was at the Ethical Culture School where, in first grade, he became a lifelong friend of another renowned economics historian, Robert Heilbroner
, with whom he later attended Horace Mann School
and Harvard College
, from which both received, in 1940, bachelors degrees in economics. Following Harvard, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated magna cum laude, came service as a member of the research staff at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York
and, in a civilian capacity, at the Office of Strategic Services
in Washington. In the aftermath of the December 7, 1941 Pearl Harbor attack, he joined the Air Force and rose to the rank of captain, assigned to the Office of Strategic Services
in the European theater
.
and a five-year stint in commercial banking, Bernstein took over, at family insistence, the management of his late father's wealth management
firm, Bernstein-Macaulay Inc., where he personally managed billions of dollars of individual and institutional portfolios. The assets under his management had grown more than tenfold by the time the firm was sold in 1967 and he resigned in 1973 to launch Peter L. Bernstein, Inc. and, a year later, to become the first editor of the Journal of Portfolio Management
, a widely-read scholarly financial publication for investment managers and academics. He continued as consulting editor of the Journal and served on the advisory panel of Robert D. Arnott
's investment management firm, Research Affiliates.
A longtime resident of Manhattan
, Peter Bernstein was 90 years old when he died of pneumonia
at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Hospital, after having broken a hip. His first wife, Shirley, died in 1971 and he is survived by his second wife, Barbara, whom he married in 1972.
, Financial Analysts Journal
and, in the popular press, The New York Times
, The Wall Street Journal
, Worth magazine
and Bloomberg
, among others, and has contributed to collections of articles published by Perseus
and FT Mastering, among others.
Against The Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk, was published by John Wiley & Sons
in September 1996 and won the Edwin G. Booz
Prize for the most insightful, innovative management book published in 1996. In 1998, it was awarded the Clarence Arthur Kelp/Elizur Wright
Memorial Award from The American Risk and Insurance Association (ARIA) as an outstanding original contribution to the literature of risk and insurance. The book has sold over 500,000 copies worldwide.
In 1992 Capital Ideas: The Improbable Origins of Modern Wall Street was published by The Free Press
in Canada and Maxwell Macmillan International
in the USA and has since become a worldwide guide to modern investment theories and practices. Capital Ideas Evolving, the follow-up to this seminal work, was published in May 2007 by John Wiley and Sons.
Streetwise: The Best of The Journal of Portfolio Management, edited by Peter L. Bernstein and Frank J. Fabozzi
, was published in 1997 by Princeton University Press
.
Earlier books include A Primer on Money, Banking and Gold (Random House
1965), as well as Economist on Wall Street (Macmillan
1970), and The Price of Prosperity (Doubleday
, 1962), in addition to two books on government finance co-authored with Robert Heilbroner
.
Bernstein’s other books are The Power of Gold: The History of an Obsession, published in the fall of 2000 by John Wiley and Sons, Wedding of the Waters: The Erie Canal and the Making of a Great Nation, published in 2005 by W.W. Norton & Co.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
financial historian, economist and educator whose development and refinement of the efficient-market hypothesis made him one of the country's best known authorities in popularizing and presenting investment economics to the general public.
Education and military service during World War II
A native of New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, Peter Bernstein was the son of financial consultant Allen Bernstein and his wife, Irma Lewyn. His primary education was at the Ethical Culture School where, in first grade, he became a lifelong friend of another renowned economics historian, Robert Heilbroner
Robert Heilbroner
Robert L. Heilbroner was an American economist and historian of economic thought. The author of some twenty books, Heilbroner was best known for The Worldly Philosophers , a survey of the lives and contributions of famous economists, notably Adam Smith, Karl Marx, and John Maynard...
, with whom he later attended Horace Mann School
Horace Mann School
Horace Mann School is an independent college preparatory school in New York City, New York, United States founded in 1887 known for its rigorous course of studies. Horace Mann is a member of the Ivy Preparatory School League, educating students from all across the New York tri-state area from...
and Harvard College
Harvard College
Harvard College, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is one of two schools within Harvard University granting undergraduate degrees...
, from which both received, in 1940, bachelors degrees in economics. Following Harvard, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated magna cum laude, came service as a member of the research staff at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York
Federal Reserve Bank of New York
The Federal Reserve Bank of New York is one of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks of the United States. It is located at 33 Liberty Street, New York, NY. It is responsible for the Second District of the Federal Reserve System, which encompasses New York state, the 12 northern counties of New Jersey,...
and, in a civilian capacity, at the Office of Strategic Services
Office of Strategic Services
The Office of Strategic Services was a United States intelligence agency formed during World War II. It was the wartime intelligence agency, and it was a predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency...
in Washington. In the aftermath of the December 7, 1941 Pearl Harbor attack, he joined the Air Force and rose to the rank of captain, assigned to the Office of Strategic Services
Office of Strategic Services
The Office of Strategic Services was a United States intelligence agency formed during World War II. It was the wartime intelligence agency, and it was a predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency...
in the European theater
European Theatre of World War II
The European Theatre of World War II was a huge area of heavy fighting across Europe from Germany's invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939 until the end of the war with the German unconditional surrender on May 8, 1945...
.
As investment manager
In 1951, after teaching economics at Williams CollegeWilliams College
Williams College is a private liberal arts college located in Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States. It was established in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim Williams. Originally a men's college, Williams became co-educational in 1970. Fraternities were also phased out during this...
and a five-year stint in commercial banking, Bernstein took over, at family insistence, the management of his late father's wealth management
Wealth management
Wealth management is an investment advisory discipline that incorporates financial planning, investment portfolio management and a number of aggregated financial services...
firm, Bernstein-Macaulay Inc., where he personally managed billions of dollars of individual and institutional portfolios. The assets under his management had grown more than tenfold by the time the firm was sold in 1967 and he resigned in 1973 to launch Peter L. Bernstein, Inc. and, a year later, to become the first editor of the Journal of Portfolio Management
Journal of Portfolio Management
The Journal of Portfolio Management is a quarterly academic journal covering asset allocation, performance measurement, market trends, risk management, and portfolio optimization. The journal was established in 1974 by Peter L. Bernstein. The current editor-in-chief is Frank J...
, a widely-read scholarly financial publication for investment managers and academics. He continued as consulting editor of the Journal and served on the advisory panel of Robert D. Arnott
Robert D. Arnott
Robert D. Arnott is an American entrepreneur, investor, editor and writer who focuses on articles about quantitative investing. He is the father of Richard Wiles-Arnott, Sydney Arnott, and Robin Arnott. He edited the CFA Institute's Financial Analysts Journal from 2002–2006, and has edited three...
's investment management firm, Research Affiliates.
Career as educator and lecturer
Bernstein served for many years on the Visiting Committee to the Economics Department at Harvard University, as a Trustee and member of the Finance Committee of the College Retirement Equities Fund (CREF), and as a Trustee of the Investment Management Workshop sponsored by the Association for Investment Management & Research (AIMR), and had been lecturing widely throughout the United States and abroad on risk management, asset allocation, portfolio strategy, and market history.A longtime resident of Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
, Peter Bernstein was 90 years old when he died of pneumonia
Pneumonia
Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung—especially affecting the microscopic air sacs —associated with fever, chest symptoms, and a lack of air space on a chest X-ray. Pneumonia is typically caused by an infection but there are a number of other causes...
at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Hospital, after having broken a hip. His first wife, Shirley, died in 1971 and he is survived by his second wife, Barbara, whom he married in 1972.
Works
Bernstein was the author of ten books in economics and finance as well as countless articles in professional journals such as Harvard Business ReviewHarvard Business Review
Harvard Business Review is a general management magazine published since 1922 by Harvard Business School Publishing, owned by the Harvard Business School. A monthly research-based magazine written for business practitioners, it claims a high ranking business readership among academics, executives,...
, Financial Analysts Journal
CFA Institute
CFA Institute is headquartered in the United States of America at Charlottesville, Virginia, with offices in Hong Kong and London. Formerly known as the Association for Investment Management and Research , CFA Institute awards the Chartered Financial Analyst designation...
and, in the popular press, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
, Worth magazine
Worth (magazine)
Worth is an American wealth management magazine for high net worth individuals. It is published on a bi-monthly basis and circulated to over 110,000 recipients.-History:Worth was founded in 1992 as a wealth management magazine for high net worth individuals...
and Bloomberg
Bloomberg L.P.
Bloomberg L.P. is an American privately held financial software, media, and data company. Bloomberg makes up one third of the $16 billion global financial data market with estimated revenue of $6.9 billion. Bloomberg L.P...
, among others, and has contributed to collections of articles published by Perseus
Perseus Books Group
Perseus Books Group is an American publishing company founded in 1996 by investor Frank Pearl. It was named Publisher of the Year in 2007 by Publishers Weekly magazine for its role in taking on publishers formerly distributed by Publishers Group West and acquiring Avalon Publishing Group.In January...
and FT Mastering, among others.
Against The Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk, was published by John Wiley & Sons
John Wiley & Sons
John Wiley & Sons, Inc., also referred to as Wiley, is a global publishing company that specializes in academic publishing and markets its products to professionals and consumers, students and instructors in higher education, and researchers and practitioners in scientific, technical, medical, and...
in September 1996 and won the Edwin G. Booz
Edwin G. Booz
Edwin G. Booz founded the consulting firm Booz Allen & Hamilton, the predecessor of both Booz Allen Hamilton - which focuses on government contracting - and Booz & Company, a commercial management-consulting firm....
Prize for the most insightful, innovative management book published in 1996. In 1998, it was awarded the Clarence Arthur Kelp/Elizur Wright
Elizur Wright
Elizur Wright was an American mathematician and abolitionist. He is sometimes described as the "father of life insurance" for his pioneering work on actuarial tables...
Memorial Award from The American Risk and Insurance Association (ARIA) as an outstanding original contribution to the literature of risk and insurance. The book has sold over 500,000 copies worldwide.
In 1992 Capital Ideas: The Improbable Origins of Modern Wall Street was published by The Free Press
Free Press (publisher)
Free Press is a book publishing imprint of Simon and Schuster. It was founded by Jeremiah Kaplan and Charles Liebman in 1947 and was devoted to sociology and religion titles. It was headquartered in Glencoe, Illinois, where it was known as The Free Press of Glencoe...
in Canada and Maxwell Macmillan International
Macmillan Publishers (United States)
Macmillan Publishers USA, also known as Macmillan Publishing, is a privately held American publishing company owned by the Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It has offices in 41 countries worldwide and operates in more than 30 others....
in the USA and has since become a worldwide guide to modern investment theories and practices. Capital Ideas Evolving, the follow-up to this seminal work, was published in May 2007 by John Wiley and Sons.
Streetwise: The Best of The Journal of Portfolio Management, edited by Peter L. Bernstein and Frank J. Fabozzi
Frank J. Fabozzi
Frank J. Fabozzi is Professor of Finance at EDHEC Business School, one of Europe’s leading business schools, and a Member of . He was previously a Professor in the Practice of Finance and Becton Fellow in the Yale School of Management...
, was published in 1997 by Princeton University Press
Princeton University Press
-Further reading:* "". Artforum International, 2005.-External links:* * * * *...
.
Earlier books include A Primer on Money, Banking and Gold (Random House
Random House
Random House, Inc. is the largest general-interest trade book publisher in the world. It has been owned since 1998 by the German private media corporation Bertelsmann and has become the umbrella brand for Bertelsmann book publishing. Random House also has a movie production arm, Random House Films,...
1965), as well as Economist on Wall Street (Macmillan
Macmillan Publishers
Macmillan Publishers Ltd, also known as The Macmillan Group, is a privately held international publishing company owned by Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It has offices in 41 countries worldwide and operates in more than thirty others.-History:...
1970), and The Price of Prosperity (Doubleday
Doubleday
-History:It was founded as Doubleday & McClure Company in 1897 by Frank Nelson Doubleday, who had formed a partnership with magazine publisher Samuel McClure. One of their first bestsellers was The Day's Work by Rudyard Kipling. Other authors published by the company in its early years include W....
, 1962), in addition to two books on government finance co-authored with Robert Heilbroner
Robert Heilbroner
Robert L. Heilbroner was an American economist and historian of economic thought. The author of some twenty books, Heilbroner was best known for The Worldly Philosophers , a survey of the lives and contributions of famous economists, notably Adam Smith, Karl Marx, and John Maynard...
.
Bernstein’s other books are The Power of Gold: The History of an Obsession, published in the fall of 2000 by John Wiley and Sons, Wedding of the Waters: The Erie Canal and the Making of a Great Nation, published in 2005 by W.W. Norton & Co.
Awards
Peter Bernstein received three major awards from the Association for Investment Management & Research (AIMR), the key organization for investment managers and analysts:- The Award for Professional Excellence, AIMR's highest award,
- The Graham & Dodd Award, given annually for the outstanding article in the Financial Analysts Journal for the previous year, and
- The James R. Vertin Award, recognizing individuals who have produced a body of research notable for its relevance and enduring value to investment professionals.