Early Life and Education
David Gilbert Booth was born on December 2, 1946, in Lawrence, Kansas. He attended Lawrence High School before pursuing higher education at the University of Kansas, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts in Economics in 1968 and a Master of Science in Business in 1969. Booth then attended the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business, earning an MBA in 1971. It was during his time at the University of Chicago that he met Eugene Fama, a professor whose research would later heavily influence his career.
Rise to Success
After graduating from the University of Chicago, Booth began his career by helping create one of the world's first index funds at Wells Fargo in the 1970s. In 1981, Booth co-founded Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA) with Rex Sinquefield and Larry Klotz. DFA was founded to apply financial science methods to everyday investing, using research to build portfolios that target higher expected returns. Under Booth's leadership, Dimensional grew from a small business to a global investment manager with over 1,500 employees and approximately $915 billion in assets under management as of September 30, 2025. He served as CEO and Co-CEO until 2017 and now serves as Executive Chairman.
Key Business Strategies
Dimensional Fund Advisors' success is rooted in its commitment to applying academic research, especially the efficient market hypothesis, to investment strategies. They focus on factors like size, value, and profitability rather than stock-picking. This approach involves close collaborations with leading academics such as Eugene Fama and Kenneth French. The firm has a culture focused on learning, teamwork, innovation, and a dedication to client needs. DFA offers a range of equity and fixed-income strategies and has expanded into ETFs and institutional accounts.
Philanthropy
David Booth is a strong advocate for higher education and has a long record of philanthropic giving. He made a gift to the University of Chicago that the school valued at $300 million in 2008. In 2010, Booth purchased and donated James Naismith's original rules of basketball to the University of Kansas. He supported the Booth Center for Special Collections at Georgetown's Lauinger Library in 2014. In 2017, he provided a foundational gift to Kansas to kick off renovations at the football stadium. In 2019, he committed funds to the University of Texas at Austin to support scientific discovery through the construction of the Giant Magellan Telescope. In 2025, Booth pledged $300 million to the University of Kansas. Booth signed the Giving Pledge in May 2018, promising to dedicate half of his wealth to philanthropy.