Investing: Six People Who Helped Shape a Tumultuous Decade

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Hype about the Internet caused investors to lose billions of dollars when the tech bubble burst in the following two years. But widespread use of the Internet and other technologies transformed the way markets worked. Individual investors got unprecedented access to the markets—and the financial info that is their lifeblood—through home Internet connections.

Case's current firm, Revolution LLC, did not respond to requests for comment.

6. John Bogle

Not every important figure of the decade played a direct role in the markets. Some had a more subtle influence, changing the way investors thought about the world.

John Bogle, the now-retired founder of Vanguard Group, has spent decades fighting for lower expenses for mutual fund investors. And his Vanguard Group helped create the low-cost, passively managed mutual fund, an approach that typically provides investors with returns that are better than those of high-cost managed funds.

"His influence has been felt more in the last 10 years," argues Tom McGuigan, principal at Burns Advisory Group. One reason: In the tough market conditions of this decade, investors started to notice how much of their savings were being siphoned off by the investment industry. "In the good markets of the late '90s, nobody cared," he says.

In an interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Bogle says his investment advice this decade "batted pretty close to 1,000." But on his other objective—changing the mutual fund industry—"I was an abject failure," he says. "Most of the things I said we should stop have actually gotten worse."

According to Morningstar (MORN), the average expense ratio for domestic stock funds has fallen from 1.38% in 2000 to 1.24%. That's still far above index fund expense ratios, typically well below 0.5%.

Such index funds have become a part of 401(k) plans demanded by savvy investors. During the whole decade, $188.4 billion flowed into low-cost U.S. stock index funds, according to Morningstar. However, almost $522 billion still flowed into higher-fee funds.

This month, Bogle issued a new version of his 1999 book, Common Sense on Mutual Funds, updated to reflect what has changed over the past decade.

Though he continues to warn about the ways that the mutual fund industry overcharges investors for subpar returns, the 80-year-old Bogle says his message is at least being heard by individual investors and financial advisers. "There is an awareness of" the importance of investing costs, Bogle says. "We're starting to get that."

If you're hunting for other key people of the decade, there are plenty of investing figures to choose from: Stephen Schwarzman, the co-founder of Blackstone Group (BX), was a driver of the decade's private equity boom. Apple (AAPL) Chief Executive Steve Jobs and Google (GOOG) founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin led two of the most important companies of the decade.

Leaders of financial firms were equally important, though far more troublesome to investors, including figures like Angelo Mozilo, the founder of mortgage giant Countrywide Financial.

Washington, D.C., also provided its share of influential figures. George W. Bush's eight-year Presidency had a profound effect on U.S. foreign policy, tax rates, market regulation, and the appointments of Federal Reserve officials. Along with Bush, current Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, former U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, and current Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner had crucial roles in the worst financial crisis in a lifetime.

Whose impact do you think we're exaggerating? Whose influence do you think we're missing? In the spirit of the giant water cooler that is the Internet, let us hear what you have to say in the reader discussion section below.

Steverman is a reporter for BusinessWeek's Investing channel.

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