Over these years, I have irrevocably transferred a significant part of the shareholding in Wipro, amounting to 39% of the shares of Wipro, to a trust.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The success of Wipro has made me a wealthy person.
Our people get profit-sharing checks. I got a report the other day that says that 84 percent of our people participate in our stock purchase program, where they can buy stock at a 15 percent discount.
The importance of this success of Wipro has become manifold more, because it's the success of Wipro that enables the possibility of making a difference to some of the most disadvantaged people in the world.
Income-producing unit trusts are brilliant because if you can accept capital values will be volatile for a while, your dividend income will always be higher than what you get in the bank.
I called my business manager in California and said, 'Sell all of my stock' - what little of it I had - and it's the only smart financial move I ever made.
Wipro Arabia is a joint venture company with Dar Al Riyadh, a well-diversified group in Saudi Arabia.
I helped start a ceramics company called CPS Technologies. We took it public in 1987 at $12 a share. Three months later, there was this horrible cliff: Black Monday. Fidelity had bought 15 percent of our stock, and their algorithm caused them to dump it all onto the market that day. We dropped from $12 to $2.
My wealth is reflected in the price of Severstal, and the number of shares I have in my possession doesn't have any impact on the company.
One hundred percent of our earnings are reinvested in the company, and a great deal of that goes to research.
I'm not a trust-fund type.