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Quote Authors

Arnold Van Den Berg, Arthur Rock, Benjamin Graham, Bernard Baruch, Bill Miller, Charles Ellis, Charlie Munger, Chuck Akre, Daniel Kahneman, David Abrams, David Swensen, Dean LeBaron, Dean Williams, Edward Thorp, Edwin Lefevre, Fred Schwed Jr, Henry Singleton, Hetty Green, Howard Marks, Joel Greenblatt, John Bogle, John Kenneth Galbraith, John Maynard Keynes, John Neff, John Stuart Mill, John Templeton, Lou Simpson, Marty Whitman, Meir Statman, Michael Price, Mohnish Pabrai, Myron Scholes, Paul Tudor Jones, Peter Bernstein, Peter Lynch, Philip Carret, Philip Fisher, Richard Thaler, Robert Kirby, Robert Shiller, Seth Klarman, Stanley Druckenmiller, T. Rowe Price, Walter Schloss, Warren Buffett,

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There are two principal mistakes that nearly all amateurs in the stock market make. The first is to have an inexact knowledge of the securities in which one is dealing, to know too little about a company's management, its earnings, and prospects for future growth. The second mistake is to trade beyond one's financial resources, to try to run up a fortune on a shoestring.
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Bernard Baruch
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The stockholder wants both income and appreciation, but in general the more he gets of one the less he realizes of the other.
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Benjamin Graham
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We live in a society that changes, so you can't be too strict about the rules you had 40 or 50 years ago. You can't buy stocks on the basis you did then.
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Walter Schloss
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If you’re going to invest in stocks for the long term, or real estate, of course, there are going to be periods when there's a lot of agony and other periods when there's a boom. I think you just have to learn to live through them.
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Charlie Munger
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If you’re investing with a long time horizon, having an equity bias makes sense; stocks go up in the long run.
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David Swensen
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The opportunity’s greatest where assets are least efficiently priced.
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David Swensen
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If you talk to a businessman, a businessman is going to feed the winners and kill the losers. But in the investment world, when you've got a winner you should be suspicious about what's next. And if you've got a loser, you should be hopeful -- although not naively hopeful.
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David Swensen
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With a casual attempt to beat the market, you're going to fail.
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David Swensen
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Investing is not a discipline based on absolutes or precise mathematics. There simply aren't enough data points available to work out the exact odds.
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Mohnish Pabrai
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You know, we make mistakes. Some go from 12 to 10 and we sell them. Some go from 20 to nothing. In a 10-year period, you are going to have one or two that go from 20 to nothing. If you have more, it is bad.
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Michael Price
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I have learned that the great opportunities are the places that have been neglected, where other people are not looking.
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John Templeton
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The very best investors are the ones who invest according to their own psyche. You find that their investment styles are consistent with their personalities, their intellects, their approaches to work. It’s not somebody else’s style; it’s their own, and it’s deeply ingrained.
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Dean LeBaron
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There is a considerable tendency for common stock investors to do the greater part of their buying, both of "good" and "bad" securities, at high levels of the market. They are equally inclined to do the greater part of their selling at low levels of the market, a procedure which is not conducive to successful results.
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Benjamin Graham
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Intelligent speculators and investors who do not play the market feverishly do not need to spend the day beside a ticker or before a quotation board.
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Edwin Lefevre
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All successful investment involves trying to get into something where it’s worth more than you’re paying.
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Charlie Munger
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If you want to succeed in investments, start early and try hard and keep doing it. All success comes that way, by and large.
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Charlie Munger
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I think you have to be an undying optimist, and perhaps a Pollyanna to enjoy and to be successful at managing common stock portfolios over a long period of time.
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Robert Kirby
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To beat the market is not easy. In addition to a good investment manager, the investor needs perspective, patience, and courage -- qualities that do not abound in today’s intensely competitive world.
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Robert Kirby
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The investment counsel business, as it is traditionally practiced, and probably as it should be practiced, is a simple process of making sure that clients never have so much risk exposure that their capital or standard of living can be impaired by some specific negative surprise.
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Robert Kirby
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When picking a list of growth stocks for long-term investment, broad diversification of the risk is the first and most important principle to follow. No one can look ahead five or ten years and say what is the most promising industry or the best stock to own.
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T. Rowe Price
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Investors should seek a company that can lower the cost of production and develop an expanding market without materially reducing the return on capital invested in the business.
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T. Rowe Price
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There are two sound reasons for investing in common stocks -- growth of income and growth of principal.
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T. Rowe Price
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In planning an investment program, it is extremely important that the investor, before purchasing any securities, should ask himself, "What is my objective?"
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T. Rowe Price
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The three main objectives of investors are: (1) Capital conservation, or stability of market value of invested principal; (2) Liberal income at a fixed rate; and (3) Capital growth.
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T. Rowe Price
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Once a business is well established, the greatest opportunity for gain is afforded during the period of growth in earning power. The risk factor increases when maturity is reached and decadence begins.
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T. Rowe Price
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In any diversified portfolio, there will be both winners and losers, and the consideration that should determine which you should sell, if any, is certainly not the price at which you bought it originally.
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Daniel Kahneman
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When deciding to sell, people have control over whether to give themselves pleasure or give themselves pain, and they tend to give themselves pleasure. In other words, they tend to sell winners and hang on to losers. It turns out to be a bad idea.
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Daniel Kahneman
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It turns out that when people have to sell a stock from their portfolio, they are not rational between winners and losers. People tend to sell winners and hang on to their losers. The psychology of that is quite straightforward.
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Daniel Kahneman
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Individual investors tend to churn their accounts, they tend to trade too much, and that they trade too much seems to be due to over-confidence. They believe they know something that they do not know and this is one essential characteristic of human beings, which makes them different from rational beings.
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Daniel Kahneman
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There are people that own electronic stocks that don't know the difference between an EEPROM and the senior prom and they're trying to buy stocks.
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Peter Lynch
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Almost everybody on this planet has the brain power to make money in the stock market. The question is whether you have the stomach for it and whether you're willing to do a little bit of work? Those are the key elements.
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Peter Lynch
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People are very careful with their money. When they buy a refrigerator, they do some work. When they buy an apartment or rent an apartment, they’re careful. For some reason, when it comes to stocks, they just go coo-coo. They don't do any work at all.
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Peter Lynch
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You only need one or two good stocks a decade. You don't need a lot of action.
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Peter Lynch
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You lose money fast in the stock market. You can't make it fast.
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Peter Lynch
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Attempting to guess short-term swings in individual stocks, the stock market or the economy is not likely to produce consistently good results. Short-term developments are too unpredictable.
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Lou Simpson
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One lesson I have learned is to make fewer decisions. Sometimes the best thing to do is to do nothing. The hardest thing to do is to sit with cash. It is very boring.
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Lou Simpson
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We are sort of the polar opposites of a lot of investors. We do a lot of thinking and not a lot of acting. A lot of investors do a lot of acting, and not a lot of thinking.
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Lou Simpson
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The more you trade, the harder it is to add value because you’re absorbing a lot of transaction costs, not to mention taxes.
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Lou Simpson
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Large losses are forever - in investing, in teenage driving, and in fidelity. If you avoid large losses with a strong defense, the winnings will have every opportunity to take care of themselves. And large losses are almost always caused by trying to get too much by taking too much risk.
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Charles Ellis
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Tradition, sentiment, vague generalizations, unsubstantiated rumors, can never be made the basis of sound investment or intelligent speculation. Now and then large profits are realized on no better foundation -- merely proving that sometimes luck laughs at logic.
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Benjamin Graham
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I think great investors to some extent are like great chess players. They’re almost born to be investors.
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Charlie Munger
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Good investing requires a weird combination of patience and aggression. And not many people have it.
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Charlie Munger
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I have made bad business decisions. You can’t live a successful life without doing some difficult things that go wrong. That’s just the nature of the game.
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Charlie Munger
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I think people have the theory that any intelligent, hard-working person can get to be a great investor. I think any intelligent person can get to be pretty good as an investor and avoid certain obvious traps. But I don't think everybody can be a great investor.
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Charlie Munger
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I'm constantly making mistakes where I can, in retrospect, realize that I should have decided differently. And I think that that is inevitable because it's difficult to be a good investor.
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Charlie Munger
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I don’t think the objective of investment should ever be to take a risk in order to get a return. I think the objective of shrewd investment should be to find opportunities which offer a larger return than the average, combined with adequate safety.
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Benjamin Graham
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The only sound distinction in investment policies for one type of investor or another is based not on his financial position but on his financial competence and financial preparation.
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Benjamin Graham
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To me, the primary task in investing is to test and then retest some more the parameters and paradigms that appear to govern daily events. Betting against them is dangerous when they look solid, but accepting them without question is the most dangerous step of all.
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Peter Bernstein
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Liquidity is a concern of the short-term investor and a minor matter for the long-term investor.
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Peter Bernstein
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Worldly wisdom teaches that it is better for reputation to fail conventionally than to succeed unconventionally.
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John Maynard Keynes
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Businessmen play a mixed game of skill and chance, the average results of which to the players are not known by those who take a hand.
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John Maynard Keynes
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The actual results of an investment over a long term of years very seldom agree with the initial expectation.
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John Maynard Keynes
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Just because something is cheap does not mean it is not going to go down.
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Warren Buffett
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There is nothing at all conservative, in my opinion, about speculating as to just how high a multiplier a greedy and capricious public will put on earnings.
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Warren Buffett
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Investment decisions should be made on the basis of the most probable compounding of after-tax net worth with minimum risk.
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Warren Buffett
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It is obvious that a variation of merely a few percentage points has an enormous effect on the success of a compounding (investment) program. It is also obvious that this effect mushrooms as the period lengthens.
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Warren Buffett
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Our business is making excellent purchases -- not making extraordinary sales.
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Warren Buffett
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More investment sins are probably committed by otherwise quite intelligent people because of "tax considerations" than from any other cause.
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Warren Buffett
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The addition of the one-hundredth stock simply can't reduce the potential variance in portfolio performance sufficiently to compensate for the negative effect its inclusion has on the overall portfolio expectation.
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Warren Buffett
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I believe the investor operates at a distinct advantage when he is aware of what path his thought process is following.
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Warren Buffett
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We don't buy and sell stocks based upon what other people think the stock market is going to do (I never have an opinion) but rather upon what we think the company is going to do.
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Warren Buffett
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The course of the stock market will determine, to a great degree, when we will be right, but the accuracy of our analysis of the company will largely determine whether we will be right. In other words, we tend to concentrate on what should happen, not when it should happen.
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Warren Buffett
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Our investments are simply not aware that it takes 365 ¼ days for the earth to make it around the sun.
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Warren Buffett
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We live in an investment world, populated not by those who must be logically persuaded to believe, but by the hopeful, credulous and greedy, grasping for an excuse to believe.
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Warren Buffett
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My approach to bonds is pretty much like my approach to stocks. If I can't understand something, I tend to forget it.
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Warren Buffett
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The road to successful investing is paved with independence of spirit, decisiveness, and the courage of one's convictions.
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Peter Bernstein
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Suppose you bought a stock cheap when it was a relatively obscure situation, and then a half-dozen Wall Street firms started cheering for the stock at the same time. I'd get concerned and think about selling. I don't like bandwagons. I'd rather do my own thing.
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Philip Carret
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The very top officers of a company ought to have the equivalent of one year's salary invested in the company. If they can't demonstrate such faith in their own ability, why should I?
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Philip Carret
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We don't invest for income. If you invest soundly for growth, the income follows.
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Philip Carret
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I'm an optimist, both as a person and an investor. It's a big mistake to be pessimistic as long as we have a viable civilization which is reasonably well managed.
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Philip Carret
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If a company has a sound balance sheet with minimal long-term debt, good growth prospects and responsible management, then the stock should be interesting.
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Philip Carret
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It makes no sense for individual investors to jump in and out of the market. People who trade in that way rarely die rich, whereas the patient investor often does.
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Philip Carret
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I have a very simple strategy. I buy good companies at attractive prices. Then I sit on them.
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Philip Carret
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It's extremely difficult to figure out when to sell anything. So I'd rather have the stock taken away from me in a merger or a buyout. It's much easier.
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Philip Carret
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It's my job to find unusual companies and then judge whether the price they're selling at is too high.
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Philip Fisher
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If you are in the right companies, the potential rise can be so enormous that everything else is secondary.
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Philip Fisher
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I have stressed management, but even so, I haven't stressed it enough. It is the most important ingredient.
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Philip Fisher
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My stocks sometimes get overpriced, but in the long run this kind of company, if you can find it, will outperform the market and the economy. The worst thing you can do is try to catch the swings, sell out too soon and be afraid to buy back in.
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Philip Fisher
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The big profits I have made were through very long planning, waiting and watching.
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Philip Fisher
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Buy slowly stocks of companies that will capitalize on the problems of scarcity and social need. Companies with excellent management.
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Philip Fisher
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I think it is more conservative in the long run to be in a company that is really progressing and really has an edge.
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Philip Fisher
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I am vitally interested in companies that are going to survive, but I don't think a big cap company is necessarily one that will.
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Philip Fisher
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I want companies that welcome dissent, rather than stifle it, that don't penalize people who criticize what management is doing.
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Philip Fisher
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My business is to find unusual companies and judge whether the price is too high.
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Philip Fisher
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The products or services that have wide, sustainable moats around them are the ones that deliver rewards to investors.
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Warren Buffett
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You want to be greedy when others are fearful. You want to be fearful when others are greedy. It's that simple.
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Warren Buffett
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To some degree, I'm betting on the continuation of what is now. I'm not betting it will continue exactly, but I'm betting against dramatic discontinuities.
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Warren Buffett
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We don't go into companies with the thought of effecting a lot of change. That doesn't work any better in investments than it does in marriages.
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Warren Buffett
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I want to be in businesses so good that even a dummy can make money.
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Warren Buffett
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I feel the same way about managing that I do about investing: It's just not necessary to do extraordinary things to get extraordinary results.
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Warren Buffett
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You need a temperament that neither derives great pleasure from being with the crowd or against the crowd because this is not a business where you take polls, it's a business where you think.
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Warren Buffett
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The first rule of an investment is: Don’t lose. And the second rule of investment is: Don't forget the first rule. And that's all the rules there are.
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Warren Buffett
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The tour we've taken through the last century proves that market irrationality of an extreme kind periodically erupts -- and compellingly suggests that investors wanting to do well had better learn how to deal with the next outbreak.
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Warren Buffett
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Don't think for a moment that small investors are the only ones guilty of too much attention to the rear-view mirror.
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Warren Buffett
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Investing is laying out money today to receive more money tomorrow.
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Warren Buffett
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The key to investing is not assessing how much an industry is going to affect society, or how much it will grow, but rather determining the competitive advantage of any given company and, above all, the durability of that advantage.
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Warren Buffett
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I am a better investor because I am a businessman, and a better businessman because I am an investor.
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Warren Buffett
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Diversification is protection against ignorance, but if you don’t feel ignorant, the need for it goes down drastically.
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Warren Buffett
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Uncertainty actually is the friend of the buyer of long-term values.
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Warren Buffett
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Almost all of the big, great ideas in business are very simple.
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Warren Buffett
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It is extraordinary to me that the idea of buying dollar bills for 40 cents takes immediately with people or doesn't take at all.
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Warren Buffett
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Size is the anchor of performance.
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Warren Buffett
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You’re not buying a stock, you’re buying part ownership in a business. You will do well if the business does well. And if you didn't pay a totally silly price.
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Warren Buffett
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In the stock market, you don’t base your decisions on what the markets are doing, but on what you think is rational.
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Warren Buffett
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Beating the market averages, after paying substantial costs and fees, is an against-the-odds game; yet a few people can do it, particularly those who view it as a game full of craziness with an occasional mispriced something or other.
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Charlie Munger
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When people are desperately trying to sell, I buy. When people are desperately trying to buy, I sell. It has worked out very well over the years.
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John Templeton
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If you just buy businesses that your idiot nephew can run, you're going to do all right.
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Warren Buffett
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Absence of change is how you get rich in investing.
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Warren Buffett
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The best kind of business to be in is something where you sell something that costs a penny and sells for a dollar and is habit forming.
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Warren Buffett
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If you really know businesses, you probably shouldn’t own more than six of them. If you can identify six wonderful businesses, that is all the diversification you need and you’re going to make a lot of money.
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Warren Buffett
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What you really want to do in investments is figure out what’s important and knowable. If it's unimportant or unknowable, you forget about it.
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Warren Buffett
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Wall Street makes its money on activity. You make your money on inactivity.
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Warren Buffett
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If you are not a professional investor, if your goal is not to manage money in such a way so you get a significantly better return than the world, then I believe in extreme diversification.
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Warren Buffett
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Financial markets are a kind of time machine that allows selling investors to compress the future into the present and buying investors to stretch the present into the future.
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Peter Bernstein
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Rational investors will part with their cash only when they believe they are properly compensated for the loss of liquidity and the pain of disquietude.
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Peter Bernstein
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I think there’s a tendency in the modern world of people wanting their money to be working hard, and I joke that our money is like a couch potato by comparison.
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Seth Klarman
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Investors who find an overly narrow niche to inhabit, prosper for a time but then usually stagnate. Those who move on when the world changes at least have the chance to adapt successfully.
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Seth Klarman
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Your wealth is in many ways dependent on what other people will pay for your assets.
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Peter Bernstein
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The first thing I heard when I got in the business, not from my mentor, was bulls make money, bears make money, and pigs get slaughtered. I'm here to tell you I was a pig. And I strongly believe the only way to make long-term returns in our business that are superior is by being a pig.
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Stanley Druckenmiller
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I am convinced that an individual investor with sound principles, and soundly advised, can do distinctly better over the long pull than a large institution.
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Benjamin Graham
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If it's a choice between investing in a good company in a great industry, or a great company in a lousy industry, I'll take the great company in the lousy industry any day. Good management, a strong balance sheet, and a sensible plan of action will overcome many obstacles, but when you've got weak management, a weak balance sheet, and a misguided plan of action, the greatest industry in the world won't bail you out.
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Peter Lynch
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Buy only what you understand, believe in, and intend to stick with -- even when others are chasing the next miracle.
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Peter Lynch
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It is true that you don't go broke taking a profit, but that assumes you will make a profit on everything you do. It doesn't allow for the mistakes you're bound to make in the investment business.
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Philip Fisher
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You want to design a portfolio that will make the members of a household as happy as possible, but the problem is that people aren't very good at anticipating how they're going to react to various market outcomes.
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Richard Thaler
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Investors need to pick their poison: Either make more money when times are good and have a really ugly year every so often, or protect on the downside and don’t be at the party so long when things are good.
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Seth Klarman
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Avoiding round trips and short-term devastation enables you to be around for the long term.
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Seth Klarman
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The line I draw in the sand is that if an asset has cash flow or the likelihood of cash flow in the near term and is not purely dependent on what a future buyer might pay, then it’s an investment. If an asset’s value is totally dependent on the amount a future buyer might pay, then its purchase is speculation.
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Seth Klarman
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All investors need to learn how to be at peace with their decisions.
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Seth Klarman
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When the markets are fairly ebullient, investors tend to hold the least objectionable securities rather than the truly significant bargains.
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Seth Klarman
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Investing is buying a fractional interest in a business and buying debt claims on a business.
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Seth Klarman
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You will be right, over the course of many transactions, if your hypotheses are correct, your facts are correct, and your reasoning is correct.
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Warren Buffett
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One of the nice things about investing is there are many different disciplines that work. You should find one that you’re comfortable with.
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Seth Klarman
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Your own psychology can be your worst enemy as an investor.
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Seth Klarman
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I always thought if you looked at ten companies, you'd find one that's interesting, if you'd look at 20, you'd find two, or if you look at hundred you'll find ten. The person that turns over the most rocks wins the game.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Managers do not create large alphas by being conventional. They do so by taking the risk of being wrong and alone.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
The way to maximize outcome is to concentrate on process.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Investors should always keep in mind that the most important metric is not the returns achieved but the returns weighed against the risks incurred.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
It is crucial to have a strategy in place before problems hit, precisely because no one can accurately predict the future direction of the stock market or economy.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
The best investors do not target return; they focus first on risk, and only then decide whether the projected return justifies taking each particular risk.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
New financial products are typically created for sunny days and are almost never stress-tested for stormy weather.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Risk is not inherent in an investment; it is always relative to the price paid.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Nowhere does it say that investors should strive to make every last dollar of potential profit; consideration of risk must never take a backseat to return.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
You must always be prepared for the unexpected, including sudden, sharp downward swings in markets and the economy. Whatever adverse scenario you can contemplate, reality can be far worse.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Money flows, in effect, can render fundamental analysis futile in the short run, even while creating a compelling longer-term opportunity.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
The point of investing, after all, is not to have a great story to tell; the point of investing is to make money with limited risk.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
The tendency of investors to follow the market's momentum and bet on whatever has worked recently is accompanied by antipathy to whatever hasn't.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Being extremely early is tantamount to being wrong, so contrarians are well advised to develop an understanding of the psychology of the sellers.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Investors must never mistake an investment that is down in price for one that is bargain-priced; undervaluation is determined only by a security's price compared to its underlying value.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
We consider for each of our investments not only whether a security is undervalued but why it is undervalued. If the reason is that there are uninformed or emotional sellers, we become more comfortable.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
It is always easiest to run with the herd; at times, it can take a deep reservoir of courage and conviction to stand apart from it. Yet distancing yourself from the crowd is an essential component of long-term investment success.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
As an investor you never have perfect information, and the biggest profits are always available when competition and information are scarce.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
In investing, nothing is certain. The best investments we have ever made, that in retrospect seem like free money, seemed not at all that way when we made them.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Rather than own a little bit of everything, we have always tended to place our eggs in a few dozen baskets and watch them closely.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
The true investment challenge is to perform well in difficult times.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
People do not consciously choose to invest according to their emotions -- they simply cannot help it.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
There is no salve for the hungry investor like the immediate positive reinforcement that comes from making money instantaneously.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Higher risk investments often erode one's capital and produce lower returns -- the worst of all investment worlds. Higher-returns-for-higher-risks only applies on average and over time.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
I think investors always learn the lessons of the recent past. And that is the lesson.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
Everybody can talk about the problems, but very few investors act on them.
”

Seth Klarman
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“
If the market's going wild and you want to be in it, you either have to lower your standards to stay in the game or you buy stuff which may not participate because it's not part of the game at that time.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
I like the idea of having a little action. That may not be good from a logical point of view, but it's good from an emotional point of view.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
Be careful of leverage. It can go against you.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
If you don't like to lose money and it affects your judgment, don't buy things that can go down a great deal.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
One of the things you learn in this business is humility because you see your mistakes the next day.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
The problem in investing, I think, is timing. You may be right. But in the long run, we're all dead. Even if you're right, if it takes 20 years to work out, it can be a disaster.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
If you don't understand a company, if you can't explain it to a 10-year-old in 2 minutes or less, don't own it.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
A lot of my stocks don't work. The beauty of the stock market is that if you are wrong, if you put $1,000 up, all you lose is $1,000. I have proven that many times.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
A lot of mutual fund managers don't know what they own. The odds are the best they have ever been for the individual.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
All you have to do, really, is find the best hundred stocks in the S&P 500 and find another few hundred outside the S&P 500, to beat the market.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
People spend all this time trying to figure out "What time of the year should I make an investment? When should I invest?" And it's such a waste of time. It's so futile.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
If you're in the market, you have to know there's going to be declines.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
In this business, if you're good, you're right six times out of ten. You're never going to be right nine times out of ten.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Diversification of risk matters not just defensively, but because it maximizes returns as well, because we expose ourselves to all of the opportunities that there may be out there.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
No matter how calm you are, no matter how long term an investor you are, no matter what your horizons, when the market is jumping around, you feel uncertainty in your gut and it's hard to resist that.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
The most important lesson an investor can learn is to be dispassionate when confronted by unexpected and unfavorable outcomes.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
Survival as an investor over that famous long course depends from the very first on recognition that we do not know what is going to happen. We can speculate or calculate or estimate, but we can never be certain.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
Unless you are that rarest of birds, someone who is cool under the rapid-fire, high-pressure decision making required to maximize your returns, let others take such risks, and allow your portfolio to plug along at a slower speed. In investing, tortoises tend to win far more often than hares over the turns of the market cycle.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
Volatility provokes the constant dread that some investors know more than we do, making us fearful of ignoring such powerful price movements.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
Many people pride themselves on being "long-term investors," but acting deliberately when prices are bouncing around is not so easy.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
Faith in the long run is the most powerful force that drives investment decisions.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
In the end, the value of your portfolio is not what somebody tells you is likely to happen over the long run but how much other investors out there are going to be willing to pay you for your assets.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
The fact is that strategies that perform sub-optimally under certain market conditions can work surprisingly well in others.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
What other people are doing in the market is not relevant to what you’re doing.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
When there's a war going on, don't buy the companies that are doing the fighting; buy the companies that sell the bullets.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
If you're lucky enough to have one golden egg in your portfolio, it may not matter if you have a couple of rotten ones in there with it.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
I can't say enough about the fact that earnings are the key to success in investing in stocks. No matter what happens to the market, the earnings will determine the results.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Anomalies are always to be found in the business situation.
”

Philip Carret
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“
Finance has its anatomy and its physiology. The former is studied through the medium of balance sheets, the latter through income statements.
”

Philip Carret
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“
In finance, as in other fields, theory and practice sometimes differ.
”

Philip Carret
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“
Investing for the long run works only as long as people don't believe it.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
If you don't believe corporate profits will continue to rise, and you can't stomach a decline in the market, don't buy stocks or equity mutual funds.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
A correction is a wonderful opportunity to buy your favorite companies at a bargain price.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
If timing the market is such a great strategy, why haven't we seen the names of any market timers at the top of the Forbes list of richest Americans?
”

Peter Lynch
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“
As long as people are willing to pay foolish prices for things, no plan is foolproof.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Ultimately, to be an investor in stocks, you have to believe that American business has a decent future, as well as business worldwide, and that corporations will continue to increase their profits.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
As soon as you realize you can afford to wait out any correction, the calamity also becomes an opportunity to pick up bargains.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
I've never understood the apocalyptic theory of investing. If the world really does collapse, is it really going to do you any good to have a few Krugerrands in your pocket?
”

Peter Lynch
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“
There's no such thing as a worry-free investment. The trick is to separate the valid worries from the idle worries, and then check the worries against the facts.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Here's my investment motto of the month: It's the company, stupid.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
In my investing career, the best gains usually have come in the third or fourth year, not in the third or fourth week or the third or fourth month.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Just because the good news is already out doesn't mean it's too late to invest.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
If you cut enough losses, sooner or later there's nothing left to cut.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
The real problem is not finding a good fund manager, it's finding the right time horizon for your investing and what your temperament is for volatility.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Even in the highest grade securities, there is a certain inescapable speculative risk.
”

Philip Carret
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“
The average trader is naturally a chronic bull. It is human nature to prefer optimism to pessimism.
”

Philip Carret
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“
I've thought a lot of things when I'm managing money with great, great conviction, and a lot of times I'm wrong. And when you're betting the ranch and the circumstances change, you have to change, and that's how I've always managed money.
”

Stanley Druckenmiller
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There is no clear evidence from experience that the investment policy which is socially advantageous coincides with that which is most profitable.
”

John Maynard Keynes
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“
See the investment world as an ocean and buy where you get the most value for your money.
”

John Templeton
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“
I think a weakness of many people's approach to investment is that they try to be jacks of all trades and masters of none.
”

Philip Fisher
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“
We all know that the best rule for investors -- the clients of the investment business -- is, "Don't just do something -- stand there."
”

John Bogle
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“
Inefficiency doesn't make it easier for all investors to beat the market.
”

John Bogle
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“
When it comes to long-term investing, doing "less" is often "more."
”

Joel Greenblatt
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“
It's important to recognize that the riskiness of investing comes only partly from the things you invest in. A lot of the risk comes from the behavior of the participants.
”

Howard Marks
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“
Extrapolation is usually right, but not valuable, and predictions of deviation from trends are potentially profitable but rarely right. So far, macro-economic forecasting doesn't represent the path to superior investments.
”

Howard Marks
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“
There's no asset so good that it can't be overpriced and become a bad investment, and very few assets are so bad they can't be underpriced and be a good investment.
”

Howard Marks
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“
Almost any asset can be risky or safe, depending on how other investors treat it.
”

Howard Marks
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“
There's no such thing as superior investing without superior judgment.
”

Howard Marks
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“
Investing is a hard area for most people to figure out what to do.
”

Howard Marks
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“
I spend a great deal of my personal time trying to figure out one thing, which is, at a given point in time, how should you balance aggressiveness and defensiveness in your portfolio.
”

Howard Marks
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“
The reason for dwelling on the virtue of simple investment approaches is that complicated ones, which can't be explained simply, may be disguising a more basic defect. They may not make any sense.
”

Dean Williams
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Most financial principles and theories have a degree of good sense to them. It may be a large degree, but it never comes close to being absolute.
”

Fred Schwed Jr
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“
If you can invest your money under fair conditions, in fact under attractive specific conditions, I think one certainly should do so even if the market should go down further and even if the securities you buy may also go down after you buy them.
”

Benjamin Graham
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If we assume that a very considerable amount of Wall Street activity must inevitably have elements of chance in it, then the sound idea would be to measure these chances as accurately as you can, and play the game in the direction of having the odds on your side.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
No method guarantees you're not going to lose your shirt. I've done that many times. I've had stocks go from $11 to seven cents.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
Let us define the speculator as one who seeks to profit from market movements, without primary regard to intrinsic values; the "prudent stock investor" as one who (a) buys only at prices amply supported by underlying value, and (b) who determinedly reduces his stock holdings when the market enters the speculative phase of a sustained advance.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
Participation in the stock market is not limited to the experienced, the conservative, nor even the intelligent. It is a game at which any number of people may play. And as the market level rises, the quantity of players grows rapidly and their quality diminishes somewhat in proportion.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
A common stock investor is one who regards his common stock holdings as a proprietary interest in various businesses, not as a series of quotations in a newspaper.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
The chief hazard of a careful common stock program is not that it may bring unexpected losses, but that its profits will turn the investor into a speculator greedy for quicker and bigger gains -- and therefore headed for ultimate disaster.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
It is an axiom of investment that securities should be purchased because the buyer believes in their soundness, and not because he needs a certain income.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
Investors venerate their old gods long after their divinity is departed.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
I am an exponent of the philosophy that the main objective of common stock investment should be pricing, not timing; and by pricing I mean the endeavor to buy securities at prices which are attractive, letting timing take care of itself.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
The investor must recognize that there are uncertain, and hence, speculative elements inherent in any policy he follows.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
Let us define the speculator as one who seeks to profit from market movements, without primary regard to intrinsic value; the prudent stock investor as one who (a) buys only at prices amply supported by underlying value, and (b) who determinedly reduces his stock holdings when the market enters the speculative phase of a sustained advance.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
These chaps start out reading Graham and Dodd and I'm sure most of them are quite impressed by it in business school. I take some malicious pleasure in saying it's the book on finance that's been read by more people and disregarded by more people than any other that I know of.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
Risk-taking is an inevitable ingredient in investing, and in life, but never take a risk you do not have to take.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
I view diversification not only as a survival strategy but as an aggressive strategy, because the next windfall might come from a surprising place.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
Survival is the only road to riches.
”

Peter Bernstein
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“
I think you have to invest in a way that's comfortable for you.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
I don't think investing is a science. I rather look at it as part art and part science with some boundaries.
”

Walter Schloss
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“
Stocks are not lottery tickets. There's a company behind every stock. If the company does well, the stock does well. It's not that complicated.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
If you can't explain to a 10-year-old in two minutes or less why you own a stock, you shouldn't own it.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
My system for over 30 years has been this: When stocks are attractive, you buy them.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
People who have made money in the stock market usually bought companies that have done well over time.
”

Peter Lynch
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“
The game of professional investment is intolerably boring and overexacting to anyone who is entirely exempt from the gambling instinct; whilst he who has it must pay to this propensity the appropriate toll.
”

John Maynard Keynes
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“
It appears that capital gains are one of the few remaining ways in which an enterprising American can build or augment a fortune.
”

John Templeton
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“
The secret to successful investing is relatively simple: Figure out the value of something and then pay a lot less.
”

Joel Greenblatt
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“
Whenever we consider an investment, we think just as much or more about what can go wrong as about what can go right, and we put the avoidance of losses on a high pedestal.
”

Howard Marks
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“
If a common stock is a good investment it is also a good speculation.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
There are inefficiencies in the market, but they're not easy to demonstrate, and I think that needs to be done before one shifts money in that direction.
”

Edward Thorp
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“
Shortsighted things that people sometimes do for their individual self-interest don't tend to work out well in the long run.
”

Edward Thorp
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“
Casino gambling with a system where you have the edge is a wonderful teacher for elementary money management.
”

Edward Thorp
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“
The whole trick of the game is to have a few times when you know that something is better than average and invest only where you have that extra knowledge.
”

Charlie Munger
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“
There are huge advantages for an individual to get into a position where you make a few great investments and just sit back. You're paying less to brokers. You're listening to less nonsense.
”

Charlie Munger
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“
Most of the destruction of investment value occurs in small, private anguishing experiences that are never discussed and never recorded, because people were doing things they never should have done.
”

Charles Ellis
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“
Benign neglect is the secret to long-term investing success.
”

Charles Ellis
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“
The problem of investment in common stocks is either to insulate yourselves from the speculative influences, or else to adjust your investment policy so that you can take advantage of the speculative fluctuations that are imposed upon the basic investment quality of common stocks.
”

Benjamin Graham
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“
The single most important thing to me in the stock market for anyone is to know what you own.
”

Peter Lynch
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