Dr Merv Lincoln was having lunch with an engineering friend who couldn’t understand why accountants didn’t predict the risk of a business failing like engineers could predict the risk of a bridge failing. Surely, the health of a business was in its numbers. It couldn’t be that hard to create a formula to analyse those numbers.
Turns out it was quite hard. Six years and a PhD later, Merv had developed a methodology that indicated the health of any business with a high degree of accuracy by analysing its numbers.
The strength of Merv Lincoln’s methodology was immediately apparent, with leading financial institutions wanting to invest in Merv’s analysis of the numbers after he was awarded his doctorate. But the power of this approach was only unlocked after a dinner with his son Tim, the computer analyst, who developed the technology that enabled the methodology to be applied quickly, making the most of time-sensitive financial statements to the market.
Today, that technology has been optimised to become the basis of all the investment analysis for Lincoln Indicators’ managed funds business – funds with long term success and stability that have outperformed most of the market in good times and bad. That technology – and the investment insights it generates – are also available directly to you through our proprietary share market research platform, Stock Doctor – Australia’s premier DIY share market research membership platform.
From very humble beginnings Dr. Merv Lincoln went on to become a world class 1500m and 1-mile distance athlete competing in the 1956 Melbourne and 1960 Rome Olympics and 1958 Commonwealth Games where he won a silver medal behind the great Herb Elliott. Merv was the 2nd Australian, to John Landy, and 11th in the world to break the 4-minute mile barrier during a halcyon era for Australian athletics.
Following his retirement from Athletics in 1960, Merv pursued a career as a Management Accountant and later joined the Economics and Finance faculty at the University of Melbourne in 1963 where he was senior lecturer for some 21 years. During this time, he completed his PhD titled ‘The Usefulness of Accounting Ratios to Describe Levels of Financial Risk’. He was awarded his doctorate in 1983.
Tim is one of Australia’s most experienced financial professionals, helping to empower self-directed investors for over three decades.
Tim co-founded Lincoln Indicators in 1991, teaming up with his father Dr. Merv Lincoln to computerise and commercialise Dr. Lincoln’s PhD thesis, ‘The Usefulness of Accounting Ratios to Describe Levels of Insolvency Risk’. Their vision was to create software solutions that via the analysis of financial accounts, would calculate the Financial Health of stock exchange listed companies.
To discuss the future of your investments in detail, book in a free consultation with a Lincoln representative.
To discuss the future of your investments in detail, book in a free consultation with a Lincoln financial expert.
