Anthony Bolton left Cambridge University with a degree in engineering to start a career in the City. In 1979, aged 29, he was recruited by Fidelity, the international fund management group, as one of its first London-based investment managers, a move that proved to be the launch of a long and successful career as an investment manager. In surveys of professional investors, he is regularly voted the fund manager most respected by his peers. He still works with Fidelity, and enjoys spending his spare time on his charitable interests and composing classical music. Anthony Bolton is married with three children and lives in Sussex.

Jonathan Davis is one of the UK's leading writers on investment. A professionally qualified investor, he is the author of three books about investment, has written regular columns for the Financial Times and The Spectator, podcasts for the Money Makers website and is an adviser to investment companies. His website is at:[...]

CHAPTER ONE
Daring to be different: Three decades as a contrarian investor
By Anthony Bolton
How it all began
The Fidelity experience
The Special Situations fund
Ignoring the benchmark
Drama in the markets
The internet bubble
The changing investment scene
Broking and research
The secret of picking stocks
The size of the fund and its performance
The corporate governance front
Good and bad performance
Largest holdings
Something new: China
Splitting the Special Situations fund
Introducing Jorma Korhonen
The future
CHAPTER TWO
The professional's professional: The man and his funds
By Jonathan Davis
An orderly mind
Devoted to detail
A chance beginning
Developing a style
Starting out at Fidelity
One simple insight
The shares he likes
Casting the net wide
Prospering in Europe
Looking beyond the UK
Where the ideas come from
Using technical analysis
Coping with setbacks
The bull market and beyond
Into the limelight: the ITV saga
The battle intensifies
Entering the home straight
CHAPTER THREE
Assessing Anthony Bolton?s performance: How good has it been: and why?
By Jonathan Davis
Performance analysis and context
Fidelity Special Situations
Performance over different periods
Risk analysis
Style analysis
Performance of the European fund
Summary and conclusions
Interpreting the performance
How others see it
The qualities great investors need
The scale of the achievement
The importance of being a contrarian
CHAPTER FOUR
Implications for investors
(1) The lessons I have learnt
By Anthony Bolton
(2) Finding the next Bolton
By Jonathan Davis
APPENDICES
APPENDIX 1. Fidelity Special Situations: performance record
APPENDIX 2. How fund analysts see Anthony Bolton
(a) analysis by Alastair MacDougall, Head of Research,
WM Company
(b) Analysis by Lee Gardhouse, Fund of funds manager, Hargreaves Lansdown
(c) Analyst report on Fidelity Special Values, Close Winterflood Securities (September 2004)
(d) Standard & Poor's ratings report on Fidelity Special Situations (October 2004)
APPENDIX 3. Anthony Bolton's 10 largest holdings on an annual basis
APPENDIX 4. Fidelity's relationship with companies it invests in
APPENDIX 5. An example of Fidelity's in-house research: William Hill (spring 2003)
APPENDIX 6. Slides from Fidelity Special Values presentation: July 2006
APPENDIX 7. A lifetime of music: the eight records that Anthony Bolton would take to a desert island
APPENDIX 8. Pages from the first Fidelity Special Situations report to unitholders (October 1980)
Author's acknowledgements
Index