Brian Rogers, 52, is the chief investment officer and chairman of the board of T. Rowe Price, based in Owings Mills. Last week the investment firm reported record revenues, net income, earnings per share and $400 billion in assets under management.
What does the market look like right now?
We started the year with a lot of volatility, with the housing, subprime mortgage and banking crises. At the same time, we?ve had a helpful Fed and [interest] rates coming down. Now everyone?s thoughts are, are we in a recession, and when will we come out?
When will we?
Our suspicion is that we?ll get to the third or fourth quarter and people will start looking ahead to 2008 and saying, “We?ve been too cautious.” As far as our company is concerned, we?re very strong, we have a good balance sheet. I?d say the market outlook is uncertain, but it always is. I think we?ll look back at [the March 16 sale of] Bear Stearns as a watershed moment.
They were a fairly well-established Wall Street firm. Did that surprise you?
I?m surprised they got into the trouble they did, but it shows how volatile [investor] confidence is. When you get into a confidence issue, it can be much more of a problem than financial issues.
Do you see T. Rowe Price making any major acquisitions this year?
There will invariably be acquisitions in the future. [But] I think we all here have an allergy to transformative acquisitions, the kind of things that totally change the complexion of a company. But we?re always on the lookout for smaller pieces of business, hopefully at a good price.
