This Day In Market History: Benjamin Graham Launches Investment Firm

Each day, Benzinga takes a look back at a notable market-related moment that occurred on this date.

What Happened? On this day in 1923, Benjamin Graham founded investment firm Grahar Corporation.

Where The Market Was: The Dow closed at around 89. The S&P 500 had not yet been created. Today, the Dow is trading at 30,569.37 and the S&P 500 is trading at 3,762.25.

What Else Was Going On In The World? In 1923, archaeologist Howard Carter opened King Tutankhamun's burial chamber in Egypt for the first time. Old Yankee Stadium held its first New York Yankee home game in the Bronx. A pair of leather men’s dress shoes cost $2.98.

Graham Goes Solo: Graham is often considered the “father of value investing,” and is one of the biggest influencers of modern-day value investors, such as former Graham student Warren Buffett.

Graham was born in London in 1894 but moved to New York when he was 9 years old. After graduating from Columbia, Graham started working on Wall Street for a firm called Newburger, Henderson and Loeb for the salary of $12 per week. By age 26, Graham was promoted to full partner, but he left the firm in 1923 to set up his own operation.

There is some debate as to whether or not the name “Grahar” was a typo of Graham’s last name, or a combination of Graham’s name and his partner’s last name, Harris.

Graham’s two books, “Security Analysis” and “The Intelligent Investor,” are still considered by many to be the Bibles of value investing principles. In the books and in his investing strategy, Graham focused on ideas such as investment psychology, buying and holding, fundamental analysis and contrarian investing.