Quotes

It is easy, of course, to pick out good companies, companies that are better than other companies. But that is not the same thing as picking out good stocks to buy at their current prices.

If you have an opinion about the level of prices, it should be an opinion based upon your concept of the values of securities in relation to price, rather than on any prophecy or expectation of changes or of the continuance of a given moment.

I am skeptical about stock market forecasting by anybody, and particularly by bankers.

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.

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.

Please do not forget that as the common stock level advances, the advantages of common stocks appear to be more attractive and the basic need for owning them becomes more persuasive in everybody’s reasoning. Yet in fact, common stocks undoubtedly become riskier as the price advances, and thus the risk increases as the widespread acceptance of common stock develops.

It may be a fair generalization to assert that the top levels of most "normal" bull markets are characterized by a tendency to equate stock risks with bond risks.

Liquidity does not exist unless someone else is willing to give you cash in exchange for the piece of paper you want to sell.

The more irreversible the decisions, the more expensive the consequences of being wrong.

The history of markets is one of overreaction in both directions.

Volatility matters, because it defines the uncertainty of the price at which an asset will be liquidated.

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.