A Man You Need to Know
By Dr. Steve Sjuggerud
December 15, 2006
“Thank you Rick, for giving us a corporate strategy and writing us a save-the-company check.”
Bob Quartermain was on stage at the Fairmont in Vancouver, speaking to a roomful of folks that had flown in from around the world to celebrate with him. The celebration was for the 60-year anniversary of his company, Silver Standard.
Bob heads up Silver Standard, which has a market value of around $2 billion today. But back in the early 1990s, the company’s market value had dropped down to closer to $2 million, and it was on the brink of going out of business.
That’s when Rick Rule and Bob Quartermain got together.
My quote at the beginning is just a paraphrase of what Bob said on stage at the gala. But it’s the right idea. Rick Rule had the guts to step in and write a big check to own shares of Silver Standard when nobody else would. He continued to give them the money to operate, when quite simply nobody else would.
This week, geologist Matt Badiali and I have worked our way around Vancouver, hustling from meeting to meeting, always seemingly 10 minutes behind schedule.
I believe we met the best and brightest (and more importantly, the most honest) of Vancouver on this trip. Rick has been our guide.
We visited so many companies that, quite honestly, the names started to run together. But I believe it was the guys at Almaden Minerals, which has been around since 1986 and has a market cap of around $100 million, who also thanked Rick. In telling us their story, they told us that sometime around 2000, Rick got them a save-the-company-type check as well.
Silver Standard in the early 1990s... Almaden in the early 2000s... Rick Rule stepping in and finding financing for “the good guys” in Vancouver when nobody else would seemed to be a recurring theme of this trip.
My opinion of Rick has changed. Before the trip, I thought Rick was a broker and a very smart investor.
Now, I realize calling Rick a broker is like calling John Lennon a singer. It misses the point entirely.
Rick knows geology, he knows finance, and apparently many times in the last few decades, he’s taken a calculated risk on mining firms in Vancouver like the ones above. Now that commodities are hot again, the checks Rick wrote five years ago make him look brilliant.
Now I don’t believe these are personal checks from Rick. The money is more likely customer’s money. Having now toured Vancouver with Rick, and seeing the impact he has personally made on so many different businesses here, I really can’t imagine how much money he has made for the customers of his brokerage firm. I’m sure he’s had some real duds, too. But over a long period of time, I’ll bet his results are exceptional.
I will tell you now, I manage my own money... I don’t use any money managers or own any conventional mutual funds. I do this because I believe I can do better on my own.
But when I get home from Vancouver, I’m personally transferring some money over to Rick Rule to invest for me.
Now this is speculative stuff out here. So I told Rick, “this is money that I don’t need to see for 10 years...” I just want to give Rick time to let it do what it will do.
I have run across a lot of smart investors in my career. And Rick is right up there at the top of the list.
Actions speak louder than words, they say. Well, this is the first money manager that I’m sending my money to. Doesn’t that say something?
You can do the same, actually... Rick’s brokerage firm is Global Resource Investments (www.gril.net), based in Carlsbad, California. To contact Rick and his team, call (800)-477-7853 (outside of the U.S., 760-943-3939).
The last thing I’ll say is that Rick is humble about all this. I’ve known who he was – a broker – for 14 years now. He never pursued me, so I just started to really get to know him in the last few years and started recommending him to my subscribers. After this trip, I now understand that Rick is an exceptional investor. I just wish it hadn’t taken me so long to figure it out...
I’m going to open an account with his brokerage firm for some speculative money when I get home from Vancouver. You should consider doing the same...
Good investing,
Steve
