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But Tucker's persona can be anythinf but easygoing when it comesto business. Whethet it's battling with Waddell & Reed's formedr parent company in with securities regulators concerningthe company's handling of variable annuitieds or with the regarding his use of tax shelters, Tuckert plays hard and plays to win. The controversies apparently haven't diminished support for Tucker amonWaddell & Reed shareholders, who elected him to another three-yearr term at the company's April 27 annual meeting.
Ludwell Gaines, a former broked and a fixture in the localsecuritiexs scene, said he struggles to connect Waddell & Reed's turbulent image with that of the pleasantf CEO with whom he sometimes "He is a nice guy," Gaines "But from the outside lookinh in, he looks litigious." Tucker, who rarely grantsx media interviews and whose picture doesn't even appear in the company's annual report, issued a statement to The Business Journao saying that Waddell & Reed's historty in legal and regulatory matters isn't much differen t from other companies in the securitiews industry.
"Take a snapshot at any particular time, and you may find that we have no litigationh orregulatory issues; at anothert time, we might have a number of cases," Tucker Michael T. White, a lawyer with who represents Waddell & Reed in real estatwe matters, has known the man since shortly aftet Tucker took the helm at the Overland Park companyin 1992. Askex what he thinks motivatesthe CEO, White describes a low-key Texan whose favoritse sport is skiing down a Colorado mountain slopes at 60 miles an hour. Thomas said you can type people by what theywant -- love, security and adventure -- and one of thosre is the dominant trait," White said.
"Witnh Keith, I'd say he's more of an adventuresomd guy." Tucker's rise to chairman of Kansas City's 17th-largesr public company, said those who know him, was buily upon a formidable network of industrh contacts and hypertechnical knowledgde of the financial and legak aspectsof business. He earned business and law degrees fromthe , then begajn building a career as a partnert in 's Dallas office. He becamde director of the accountingv firm's national insurance practice in 1982 and wrote three books on the effects of tax code changes on theinsurancd industry. Warren Stephens, CEO of Little Rock, Ark.
, investmentr bank , spoke fondly of Tucker, who worked ther e in the mid- to late-1980s. He recalled a drivemn young man with a knack for impressing insurance players with his personablre style and knowledge of technical issues inthe "Keith was and is a very smart Stephens said. "I have always had the highesr regardfor him." One contactg from Tucker's Peat Marwick and Stephens days was Ronalc Richey, chairman and CEO of Birmingham, Ala., insurance and financial servicee company Richey hired Tucker as Torchmark's vice chairman in 1991 and soon sent him to Kansas City to run Waddell & Reed, then a Torchmarkk subsidiary.
A 1992 Business Journal articl eannouncing Tucker's arrival in town describecd him as Torchmark's No. 2 executivd and one who was slatesd to take overthe company's top positionh "within the next few years." But when Richeyy retired in 1998, Torchmark promoted C.B. Hudson, its current chairman, as his William Baxley, a Birmingham lawyer who represents Torchmarik and a former Alabamalieutenant governor, said Tuckert never got over that perceived snub. "Mgy personal opinion is that Keith Tuckert resented not being made chairmanof Torchmark, and that'es the root of all the problems that Waddell Reed and Torchmark have had over the years," Baxleyu said.
Signs of bad blood can be found in a 2001 racketeering lawsuitWaddell & Reed filed againsft Richey, Torchmark and two of that company's According to the suit, Richeg didn't want Tucker to lead a plannedf spinoff and public offering of Waddell & Reed and even threatenecd "to kill" Tucker in a privated meeting with Waddell & Reed executive Henry Nevertheless, it was Tucker who led Waddel & Reed's IPO and spinoff in 1998.
Since that the company has expandedfrom $83 million to $102 millio n in annual net
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