Chairman of the NCB Financial Group, Michael Lee-Chin has touted the benefits of investing especially during a slump in order to build wealth over time.

Assuring potential local investors that there was no time to waste, he noted that “the time value of money gained by the right decision today is significant”.

He was addressing the recent Re-Align Business and Investment Conference held by Entrepreneurial Partners at the AC Hotel in Kingston under the theme ‘Removing the Barriers’.

In underlining his point, Lee-Chin quoted from the legendary multi-billionaire investor Warren Buffett who noted that “to invest successfully over a lifetime does not require a stratospheric IQ, unusual business insights, or inside information. What’s needed is a sound intellectual framework for making decisions and the ability to keep emotions from corroding that framework.”

Giving a breakdown of the time-line gains in NCB investments, Lee-Chin showed how a J$1 million investment would deliver exponential returns from 10 to 40 years at an interest rate of 11.40 per cent.

For 10 years the investment would yield $2,943,418; 20 years, $8,663,708; 30 years, $25,500,913; and in 40 years, $75,059,840.

“Total rate of return over a long period of time makes an exponential difference,” Lee-Chin noted, citing Albert Einstein’s pronouncement that “compound interest is the 8th wonder of the world”.

He urged investors to take advantage of the current slowdown in Jamaica’s stock market as crises have proven to be the best time to invest, noting that Jamaica has many sound companies.

“Crisis equals danger plus opportunity. Don’t forget that,” he noted.

The billionaire banker who successfully leveraged Canadian wealth management and mutual fund company AIC from less than CAD$1 million in assets when he purchased it in 1987, to achieve over CAD$10 billion by 2002, gave the assembled large and SME businesspersons, professionals and top business students from the Jose Marti High School key pointers on achieving wealth, while urging prospective investors to live by the three Ps, Predict, Plan and Persevere.

He revealed his three-step formula for success which included: “Securing access, most often through education; develop and stick to a sound intellectual framework that is absolute, not relative; and control your emotions. Be disciplined.”

He further recommended Warren Buffett’s advice to “identify a role model, get the recipe and, follow the recipe faithfully,” noting that too many businesses were becoming commoditised and that led to stagnation.

In his presentation to the gathering, founder and chairman of Entrepreneurial Partners, Garfield Daley addressed the role of his company in facilitating the development of Micro, Small and Medium (MSME) scale entities which were often hobbled by a lack of managerial skills and good governance practices, although many Jamaican’s had been “bitten by the entrepreneurial bug” which was positive.
He highlighted Jamaica’s history of producing innovative entrepreneurs in industry, finance and other sectors, noting that at various stages Jamaica had led the Caribbean in these areas.

“Jamaica had the largest insurance company in the region, Mutual Life, we produced Desnoes and Geddes and a world class brand, Red Stripe beer, Life of Jamaica (LOJ) driven by Danny Williams and many others,” Daley said.

“We produced Michael Lee-Chin, the first black billionaire in Canada, and chairman of the NCB Group and Jamaica, at one point Jamaica had the leading stock exchange in the world headed by Dr Marlene Street Forrest,” he continued. “We need to rekindle these big ideas and through our quest towards the re-alignment of businesses we are assisting companies to scale up and to take advantage of the $750 million available today through the Jamaican Stock Exchange and other sources.”