Steve Kennedy is not a guy to get panicked easily. When the financial crisis hit in late 2008, this TowneBank advisor in Newport News, Va., was a symbol of calm in the storm, a reassuring force for anxious clients.

Kennedy attributes his ability to handle that crisis to his background as a U.S. Army sharpshooter in a unit of the Fourth Infantry Division, based in Colorado, an experience that he says gave him "discipline, mental toughness and the ability to keep your wits when all is going to hell around you."

But Kennedy, who enlisted in the Army straight out of high school, didn't just carry a gun. He also was a member of the division's Army band, where he played the French horn, which also taught him to be careful—albeit in a less stressful environment—as it's easy to hit a sour note on that instrument.

After being furloughed from the Army, Kennedy went through another kind of "basic training"—this one financial—when he joined Dean Witter 26 years ago. "I saw an ad showing a bunch of guys in pastel clothes on a golf course, and after three years of all that olive drab I had been wearing, I thought it looked pretty good," recalls Kennedy, who said he went through Dean Witter's on-the-job broker training program.

There he learned the ropes of being a broker and got his license. Later he became a financial advisor, working first at Sun Trust and then later at a credit union, before moving six years ago to TowneBank. "I went to TowneBank because I didn't like the programs at the big banks, with their centralized models, the pitting of trust departments against wealth management departments, and so on," says Kennedy. "I liked that Towne was a smaller community bank. I kicked the tires there and it really was independent. They bought my book, and I became a staff of one—very low maintenance."

Kennedy says that eventually between a quarter and a third of his clients came with him when he moved.

Kennedy has from the start been a discretionary money manager, actively managing his clients' assets. "A lot of my peers don't like that or aren't comfortable with the idea, but I like it," he says. "I like the challenge of you against Mr. Market." And he adds with that sense of confidence you might expect of an infantry veteran: "My competition doesn't know anything about market theory."

He says that 55% to 60% of his business is fee based.

Kennedy says he uses the Dorsey Wright approach in his investing. Dorsey Wright & Associates is a private investment advisory firm that uses a "point-and-figure" analytic approach to analyze investments, decide when to play offense or defense and assess the relative strengths of investments.

As Kennedy explains it, "I use trend following, relative strength and price. With this, I can put anybody's portfolio in my computer and tell where their strengths and weaknesses are." He adds, "I'm also very big on exit strategies. You know, nobody pays attention to when to get out of an investment."

As an example, he cites the cases of Apple and GE. Interviewed in early October, shortly after the death of Apple co—founder and CEO Steve Jobs, Kennedy said, "I can tell you that stock has been outperforming the market since March 10, 2004, and it's been outperforming its peers for seven years. That's a great trend. Would I buy it now? No, it's overextended at $400 a share. But I would hold it." When would he exit? "When it hits $352 a share." But what about the death of Jobs? "Jobs is the story," he said, "but he's just 20 percent of the story."

As for GE, he says, "Everyone tells me how they have GE shares, but it's been a real strong sell since Sept. 20, 2001. For 10 years, GE has underperformed the market, and it's been underperforming its peers for eight years. Technically the stock has nothing going for it. The stock is at 16, but I'd sell it now or soon. There are better places to invest your money."

He says, "I can do this kind of analysis using the Dorsey Wright approach with any stock or any bond—and I'm big on bonds, big on bond laddering. But I try not to buy bond funds."

Indeed, these days Kennedy says he is playing defense. "Playing defense is a big part of my world," he says. If I sell Apple or GE, I'm raising cash." It certainly worked for him in '08. Back then he had been moving his clients into cash, so that by the time the crisis hit the markets, they were insulated from the crash. "I didn't have any crystal ball," he admits, "but I saw that the risk profiles were out of whack."