The month of May is American Jewish History Month, so for this entire month I will continue share the stories of important Jewish figures in American finance. Today, I will share the story of Irving Kahn, who was a value investor and the oldest living active investor at the time of his death at age 109.
Irving Kahn was born on December 19, 1905, in New York City. He attended the City College of New York and went on to serve as the second teaching assistant to Benjamin Graham at Columbia Business School. At the time, other notable students and/or teaching assistants to Graham included future Berkshire Hathaway chairman Warren Buffett and other legendary value investors.
Kahn was an early disciple of Benjamin Graham, who popularized the value investing methodology. He began his career in 1928 and continued to work until his death. He was chairman of Kahn Brothers Group, Inc., the privately owned investment advisory and broker-dealer firm that he founded with his sons, Thomas and Alan, in 1978.
Kahn was the oldest active money manager on Wall Street. He made his first trade—a short sale of a copper mining company—in the summer of 1929, months before the famous market crash in October of the same year.
Kahn was a Chartered Financial Analyst and among the first round of applicants to take the CFA exam. He was a founding member of the New York Society of Security Analysts and the Financial Analysts' Journal. He was the president of the New York City Job and Career Center and was a trustee emeritus of the Jewish Foundation for Education of Women.
In a magazine article in 2002, at the age of 96, he was quoted as saying: "I'm at the stage in life where I get a lot of pleasure out of finding a cheap stock," adding that his research still pushed him to work evenings and weekends. He died in February 2015 at the age 109.
Interestingly, Kahn, his sisters, and his brother were, collectively, the world's oldest living quartet of siblings. As I mentioned, Kahn himself lived to 109. His sister, Helen Reichert also died at age 109. The youngest sibling, Peter Keane, died at the age of 103. And Kahn's other sister, Lee died at the age of 101.
They were studied by Einstein's Institute for Aging Research for what contributed to their longevity. It’s noteworthy, that in Judaism one is blessed with a long life for respecting their parents. I imagine that was the key factor that contributed to the Kahn siblings longevity.