He was raised in a conservative roman catholic blue-collar environment.
Since an early age he was fascinated with the world of luxury. In
his teens, Dietmar started the "Club de Vincent"
to visualize his greater vision. The club was named after the street on which he grew up.
Also in his teens, he
started a few rock bands and a small music magazine.
At age
15, Dietmar became interested in fashion and he entered a 3-year
apprenticeship at the fashion house of
Brühl & Söhne in
Graz,
Austria.
Under the leadership of Emilio Valentini―"one of the greatest
salesman ever" ... according to Dietmar―and the mentorship of
the honorable
Komm.Rat Konsul Kurt David Brühl, he learned sales, marketing and fashion design.
During this time,
he also
took an interest in architecture as he began creating designs for
elaborate luxury homes. In 1978, he created his first artworks. Over the years, Dietmar started a couple of
small fashion companies with the brand names Michele Doré and Camargue Couture.
After reading Marc
Gordon's book "Millionaire in 91 Days", Dietmar
became interested in the stock market. For the next three years he
studied the stock market and was drawing stock charts for companies that were listed on the
Wiener Börse
(Vienna
Stock Exchange, photo) and the
NYSE
(New
York Stock Exchange).
In
the spring of 1980, Dietmar purchased a roundtrip ticket to
New York
and after a 24-hour trip he landed in
Las Vegas. Ever since he was a little boy, he wanted to visit
the
U.S.Dietmar has often said, "I was born in the wrong
country; I should have been born in the U.S." After playing roulette
in
Venice, Italy and
in
Campione d'Italia at age 18, he was disappointed that
Las Vegas had a
minimum age requirement of 21 for gambling. Instead of gambling, he
met folks from
Texas and he became a born-again
Christian a few months later. In the summer of 1981, Dietmar returned to
Austria and
settled in
Vienna. On his 21st birthday
he went once again
into a Casino, the
"Circle" on Kärntnerstrasse in
Vienna, and within
less than half an hour he had won enough money to pay off his debts.
The 80's were a time of studying the Bible.
Together with a friend,
Dietmar established an evangelical church in
Vienna,
Austria.
Today, this church is called
CIG
(Christliche
Internationale Gemeinde),
but Dietmar is no longer associated with this church. During the 80's, Dietmar
also experimented with various businesses. He introduced a
concept for a modern-day lottery system to the
Österreichische Glückspielmonopolverwaltung(today this entity is called
Österreichische Lotterien).
He derived this lottery system from the game of Keno.
In 1983, he also adopted a modified version of the
AutoTrader magazine for
the
Austrian
marketplace which he called
"Auto-Börse."
After driving an airport shuttle bus for a few months he became an assistant manager in one of
Austria's largest new fashion outlets, Furore in Mode.
In the autumn of 1987 he started his first official merchandise trading
company, Handelshaus D. Scherf. At first, the
company sold promotional $1 watches, but after an extended trip to
South
Korea, the one-man
operation became almost instantly one of the largest merchandise brokers
for stuffed toys in Austria. "It was all about
handshakes and a man's word, no contracts, and we just had to
trust God to get paid―we had no choice,"Dietmar recalls about such early beginnings.
For many years, Dietmar shared his vision for a discount stock
brokerage service, but he only found closed doors. In 1988,
inspired by the movie
Wall Street, he finally found a solution to implement his
idea. Dietmar used
$15,000 of his own money and
started Europe's first Discount Stock Brokerage firm from his small apartment
in Vienna, Austria.
He teamed up with a small private
bank, Bankhaus Feichtner, which was owned by the largest bank in
Austria, P.S.K.(Österr. Postsparkasse which in turn was owned by the Austrian Postal
Service). The bank was eager to relaunch their dormant securities business
and turning to Dietmar's discount stock brokerage startup was the
ideal conduit to do so.
The discount
stock brokerage was an instant success and generated over $100
million in trading revenues within the first year followed by another $100
million within the next six months. Dietmar himself
traded stocks on the
Vienna Stock Exchange
generating capital gains of over 1,000% from March 1989 through March
1990. "In September 1989 our client base went from 600 to 6,000 in just
one month,"Dietmar recalls, "... and all the
phone calls, faxes, etc. I had to do by myself, ... it was a lot
of work." His weekly stock market newsletter
Scherf Report Newsletter was a one-page summary of headline news and
stock tips which was mailed and faxed every Friday evening.
Dietmar was also instrumental in the creation of the world's first
ETF, the Feichtner Basket, which was issued in the fall of 1989.
One of the greatest financial highlights
back then was his repeated recommendation in his newsletter to buy
Dell Computer
(DELL)
starting in Autumn of 1990 and throughout 1991.
DELL
shares appreciated by almost 100,000% from 1990 through 1998 (each $1,000 dollars invested turned
into a million bucks).
Dietmar
sold his company in Austria in 1990. In the same year he moved his young
family to the
U.S. First they lived in
Bel Air,
Maryland
for six years. Right away in the
U.S., he started a number of
businesses
including a publishing company, a mortgage bank and as a car enthusiast
also a luxury automobile dealership.
In
1993, through some unfortunate circumstances Dietmar was faced
with some difficult business challenges. He
didn't give up though and he quickly reorganized his privately held
company. At the end of
1996, Dietmar's company was proud to show three years of
consecutive revenue growth of 272% (1994), 310% (1995) and
390% for 1996.
Finally in 1996, Dietmar moved with
his family to the Wild West, to
Las Vegas,
Nevada
which he has called his permanent earthly residence ever since.
Dietmar was
fascinated by
Las Vegas from the first time he visited
the desert town back in 1980.
In 1996, real estate was comparatively cheap in
Las Vegas
with many opportunities vs. the ever increasing home prices on the East
Coast.
Dietmar
had a vision for a super luxury resort, the
Cascada.
Although the resort's signature features were high cascading waterfalls, the
Cascada wouldn't be modeled after one of the
rather cheesy themed resorts found all over
Las Vegas
at that time. This hotel would be different as it would be stylish with
gold and copper reflective glass and with pinstriping, and it would consist of curved towers.
In short: this design was a unique
architectural statement.
Together with
award-winning architectural designer Kelly Everson, Dietmar
created the breathtaking
Cascada resort design and concept which
he introduced to the
public in 1997. While the actual
Cascada
was never built in
Las Vegas, a number of similar structures and significant elements derived
from Dietmar's
Cascada design and concept have been erected
and implemented
in Las Vegas resorts since the
turn of the new millennium.
One of Dietmar's superior expertise is the stock market. With now
over 35 years of experience and many years of a highly successful track record with
exceptional returns, investing and trading remains his primary business
discipline. While Dietmar developed the MimoMat high-frequency
trading strategy at the beginning of the new millennium, he later
developed a unique analysis program to discover high-growth stocks and pinpoint
the exact entry points within their upward cycle.
In the
Spring of 2009, he jumped into the beaten down financial stocks and into stocks of homebuilders. All of these stocks soared in
their stock price within just a short period of time after he
invested in these companies. In the quick rebound of the market,
Dietmar's portfolio skyrocketed by over 180% within just 2 months.
Starting in
August 2012, his precise stock picks became legendary like e.g. Netflix
and Facebook at very low entry points. Then in Spring 2013, Dietmar
discovered Tesla Motors and the stock soared by 381% within just one
year. Every year he's finding a few high-quality stocks with significant stock
price appreciation potential. This analysis model, which in essence is
based on comparative future potential market cap, has produced solid three-figure
returns year after year.
Dietmar's
original artworks have been selling since the mid
1980's. Prices for his artworks have significantly increased over time.
In 2013,hebegan a completely new art series of iconic art photographs. His artworks can be viewed online at the
Scherf Art Gallery
and at the
Saatchi Art Gallery.
His
artworks have been included in several special collections like his
artwork "Water"
e.g. in the
Saatchi Art Gallery "Inspired
by David Hockney" collection, and his "American
Icon" artwork was used by General Motors in the 2014 "GMC
Summer Heat" campaign. With the approach of 2015,
his new series of large iconic art photographs have now become very much
in demand all around the world as exceptional collectible artworks.
As music was always on his mind, Dietmar
created a music CD with the title
"Nice To Meet Ya!"(1994) with relaxing instrumental compositions. Today, songs from
this CD are still popular,
especially via digital downloads on e.g.
Apple iTunes,
etc.
As an
author, Dietmar
has written a number of books over the years. His book on the stock
market, "Short Term Trading: Key to instant and consistent success in
the Stock Market" became his first bestseller in its
original German
version in the late 80's. An English translation of this book was
released in late 1990. Then in the
late 90's his first hardcover book,
"I Love Me: Avoiding & Overcoming Depression"
became a very popular title on
Amazon.com
and throughout many bookstores. In 2000,
Dietmar's first novel, a riveting thriller about global nuclear
terrorism,
"The Consultant"
was published under his pen name
Alec Donzi.
It became a very hot title on
Amazon.com and at many bookstores
across the
U.S. Also,
Hollywood became interested in the motion-picture
rights for this novel, but so far no movie has been produced.
Aside from
books, Dietmar is also the author of thousands of articles from newsletters, blogs and research reports.
Over the years, Dietmar has
been actively involved in Christian
missionary work around the globe. Aside from being an integral part in
building local churches in
Vienna
(Austria),
Las Vegas
(Nevada,
USA) and
Eagle Mountain
(Utah,
USA), he
is also the founder of
HIS Embassy Christian Outreach.
This outreach is supporting
the distribution of the Word of God and it is also engaged in
delivering healthcare supplies and material needs to the needy around
the world.
In 2013,
Dietmar established the exciting
Mission Philippine Islands outreach
which has led to numerous mission endeavors in the Philippine Islands.
Since
the late 90's, Dietmar Scherf has been selected annually as a
distinguished member of the
Marquis(est. 1899)
Who'sWho
in the World,
Who'sWho in America,
Who'sWho in the West,
Who'sWho in Finance and
Industry.
Politically, he has served as an Honorary Chairman of the
Republican
Business Advisory Council. He also served the State of
Nevada as an honorary member on the
Presidential Business Commission. In
2005, he was selected for inclusion in the
Republican Presidential Honor Roll;
and in
2003, he was named Nevada's Businessman of the Year by the President's
Business Advisory Council of the National
Republican Congressional
Committee.
In addition,
Dietmar has served as a judge for prominent national and international
publishing competitions. Over the years, he has
also received a few honorary Doctorate degrees.
