John Rogers’ 40-year career at Ariel Investments is one marked by steady and stable performance, fueled by an eye for bargains in times of turmoil. The Ariel Fund that Rogers has managed since its inception in 1986 has racked up returns of almost 11% a year, according to Morningstar. The fund is up about 12% this year. The 65-year-old investor founded Chicago-based Ariel in 1983, and is now the chairman and co-CEO at the firm along with Mellody Hobson. Ariel managed $16.2 billion at the end of 2022. The Princeton grad is a value investor, who follows Warren Buffett’s style of investing. He believes that value investing is making a comeback after growth stocks enjoyed a dominant decade during the last bull market. Rogers is known for taking advantage of market downturns to hunt for bargains, including the pandemic sell-off. Some of his top holdings today continue to be stocks that are tied to a return to normalcy and a rebound in economic activity, such as Royal Caribbean , Madison Square Garden Entertainment and Boyd Gaming Corp. The widely-followed investor correctly predicted the sharp rise in inflation last year, and called for a rally in equities in 2023 as the Federal Reserve managed to engineer a slowdown in price pressures.
