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27 August 2026

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Interview Series eBook, investing insights from global experts

Extract of Graham Hand's introduction

During 2019, Firstlinks embarked on a series of interviews to learn more about the investment techniques of many of Australia's leading asset managers. Investors should know the people they trust their money with.

We realised these discussions were a rich store of knowledge, and we have compiled them into a free ebook.

But we also recognised some of the best interviews came as early as 2013 in meetings with global experts, some of the most famous people in wealth management.

So it’s fitting that we should start the Interview Series with Nobel Laureate, Harry Markowitz, who was born in 1927 and is now 92 years-of-age. Markowitz was only 22 when he realised that an efficient portfolio should maximise the expected return on assets for a given level of risk. Although a theoretical framework, his Modern Portfolio Theory has been taught to investors for almost 70 years. Like most of the best insights, it is a simple idea, focussing on risk and return trade-offs.

Markowitz told me he started in securities analysis by accident.

“I was a PhD candidate at the University of Chicago and had to choose a topic, so I went to see my supervisor, Professor Jacob Marschak. He was busy so I sat in this ante room, and another man was there who was a broker. He suggested a dissertation on the stock market. That's the best advice a broker has ever given me.”

In the 30 interviews in this ebook, we uncover many of the secrets that investment managers have taken decades to learn. We feature globally renowned experts such as Burton Malkiel, Sir Michael Hintze, Professor Elroy Dimson, Robert Kitces and Nobel Laureate Robert Merton, as well as high-profile local fund managers covering every asset class.

We can all benefit from this vast experience. As Markowitz said, paraphrasing Sir Isaac Newton, “I saw so far because I stood on the shoulders of giants.”

 


Managing Editor Graham Hand with Harry Markowitz (left), Nobel Laureate and father of Modern Portfolio Theory, and Burton Malkiel (right), author of global bestseller, ‘A Random Walk Down Wall Street’ in San Diego, USA in 2013.

 

For all readers of Firstlinks, there's no catch, no hidden charges, no need to sign up. 

Click here to download the free Interview Series ebook

 

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