When Somebody Makes It Very Easy For You To Do It By Saying You Don't Really Have To Put Up My Money, You Can Lie About Your Income A Little, Or We'll Give You 100 Percent Mortgage, You're Going To Do It, Because Everybody That's Done It Has Been Proven Right. You Have Social Tools, And You're Going To Feel Like An Idiot If You Didn't Do It, Because The House Cost More.

-Warren Buffett

Please Wait....
Translating....

When Somebody Makes It

Warren Buffett

Topic

Lying

Giving

House

More From Warren Buffett

If You Expect To Continue To Purchase Stocks Throughout Your Life, You Should Welcome Price Declines As A Way To Add Stocks More Cheaply To Your Portfolio.

Add

Investing

Way

The Rich Are Always Going To Say That, You Know, Just Give Us More Money And We'll Go Out And Spend More And Then It Will All Trickle Down To The Rest Of You. But That Has Not Worked The Last 10 Years, And I Hope The American Public Is Catching On.

Hope

Money

Catching On

I Think Any Time You Couple The Term "wall Street" With "bailout" Or Something Like That, You Know - I Don't Like What's Going On In Wall Street.

Wall

Couple

Thinking

When They Get Their Ego Involved, People Do Things They Shouldn't Do.

People

Ego

Investing

I Think What People Understand There Probably - Well, They Were Hoping The Private Sector Would Do It [rescuing Aig ].

Thinking

People

Wells

It's The Deleveraging That's Going On Right Now That Has Caused The Credit Crisis.

Credit

Crisis

Right Now

The Best Asset Is Your Own Self. You Can Become To An Enormous Degree The Person You Want To Be

Self

Degrees

Want

Occasionally, A Man Must Rise Above Principles.

Men

Principles

Rise Above

It's Us Fun Being A Horse When The Tractor Comes Along, Or The Blacksmith When The Car Comes Along.

Horse

Fun

Car

My Father Was The Best Person I've Ever Known.

Inspirational

Motivational

Father

So Some Guy May Know How To Make Money In Cocoa Beans, But I Don't So I Just Let Him Have That. But It's Got To Be Something I Understand. It's Got To Be A Business With Fundamentally Good Economics. It's Got To Be A Management That I Like And Trust And Admire. And It's Got To Be A Price That Makes Sense.

Guy

May

Management

Managers And Investors Alike Must Understand That Accounting Numbers Are The Beginning, Not The End, Of Business Valuation.

Numbers

Ends

Billionaire

Whether We’re Talking About Socks Or Stocks, I Like Buying Quality Merchandise When It Is Marked Down.

Investing Money

Talking

Quality

Cash, Though, Is To A Business As Oxygen Is To An Individual: Never Thought About When It Is Present, The Only Thing In Mind When It Is Absent... When Bills Come Due, Only Cash Is Legal Tender. Don't Leave Home Without It.

Home

Oxygen

Mind

If You Are A Professional And Have Confidence, Then I Would Advocate Lots Of Concentration.

Concentration

Have Confidence

Ifs

If The World Couldn't See Your Results, Would You Rather Be Thought Of As The World's Greatest Investor But In Reality Have The World's Worst Record? Or Be Thought Of As The World's Worst Investor When You Were Actually The Best?

Reality

Records

World

We Like To Buy Businesses, But We Don't Like To Sell Them.

Investing

Sells

Tell Me Your Heroes And I'll Tell You How Your Life Will End Up

Sports

Hero

Ends

For Example: (1) As If Governed By Newton's First Law Of Motion, An Institution Will Resist Any Change In Its Current Direction; (2) Just As Work Expands To Fill Available Time, Corporate Projects Or Acquisitions Will Materialize To Soak Up Available Funds; (3) Any Business Craving Of The Leader, However Foolish, Will Be Quickly Supported By Detailed Rate-of-return And Strategic Studies Prepared By His Troops; And (4) The Behavior Of Peer Companies, Whether They Are Expanding, Acquiring, Setting Executive Compensation Or Whatever, Will Be Mindlessly Imitated.

Law

Leader

Peers

My Rather Puritanical View Is That Any Investment Manager, Whether Operating As Broker, Investment Counselor Of A Trust Department, Investment Company, Etc., Should Be Willing To State Unequivocally What He Is Going To Attempt To Accomplish And How He Proposes To Measure The Extent To Which He Gets The Job Done.

Jobs

Views

Done

If I Subscribed To The Efficient Market Theory I Would Still Be Delivering Papers

Paper

Theory

Stills

I Buy Expensive Suits - They Just Look Cheap On Me.

Inspirational

Funny

Sarcastic

... Not Doing What We Love In The Name Of Greed Is Very Poor Management Of Our Lives.

Life

Investment Success

Names

It's Not Debt Per Say That Overwhelms An Individual Corporation Or Country. Rather It Is A Continuous Increase In Debt In Relation To Income That Causes Trouble.

Country

Income

Investing

Although We Deal With Probabilities And Expectations, The Actual Results Can Deviate Substantially From Such Expectations, Particularly On A Short-term Basis.

Expectations

Results

Term

Money To Some Extent Sometimes Let You Be In More Interesting Environments. But It Can't Change How Many People Love You Or How Healthy You Are.

Love You

People

Interesting

Someone Is Sitting In The Shade Today Because Someone Planted A Tree A Long Time Ago.

Inspirational

Life

Motivational

The Only Way To Be Loved Is To Be Loveable, Which Really Irritates Me.

Way

Of The Billionaires I Have Known, Money Just Brings Out The Basic Traits In Them. If They Were Jerks Before They Had Money, They Are Simply Jerks With A Billion Dollars.

Money

Business

Dollars

Look For 3 Things In A Person. Intelligence, Energy, & Integrity. If They Don't Have The Last One, Don't Even Bother With The First Two.

Integrity

Two

Energy

As Far As You Are Concerned, The Stock Market Does Not Exist. Ignore It.

Doe

Investing

Concerned

[gold] Gets Dug Out Of The Ground In Africa, Or Someplace. Then We Melt It Down, Dig Another Hole, Bury It Again And Pay People To Stand Around Guarding It. It Has No Utility. Anyone Watching From Mars Would Be Scratching Their Head.

People

Gold

Would Be

The Best Investment You Can Make Is In Yourself.

Inspirational

Investment Success

Entrepreneur

If You’re In The Luckiest One Per Cent Of Humanity, You Owe It To The Rest Of Humanity To Think About The Other 99 Per Cent.

Life

Thinking

Helping Others

Remember That The Stock Market Is Manic-depressive.

Investing

Remember

Depressive

Games Are Won By Players Who Focus On The Playing Field -- Not By Those Whose Eyes Are Glued To The Scoreboard.

Eye

Player

Games

The Investor Of Today Does Not Profit From Yesterday's Growth.

War

Past

Investing Money

I Have Pledged - To You, The Rating Agencies And Myself - To Always Run Berkshire With More Than Ample Cash. We Never Want To Count On The Kindness Of Strangers In Order To Meet Tomorrow's Obligations. When Forced To Choose, I Will Not Trade Even A Night's Sleep For The Chance Of Extra Profits.

Running

Kindness

Business

That Which Is Not Worth Doing At All Is Not Worth Doing Well.

Wells

The Strategy We've Adopted Precludes Our Following Standard Diversification Dogma. Many Pundits Would Therefore Say The Strategy Must Be Riskier Than That Employed By More Conventional Investors. We Disagree. We Believe That A Policy Of Portfolio Concentration May Well Decrease Risk If It Raises, As It Should, Both The Intensity With Which An Investor Thinks About A Business And The Comfort-level He Must Feel With Its Economic Characteristics Before Buying Into It.

Business

Believe

Thinking

The Wise Man Once Said Invest Young

Wise

Men

Said

Investing In Yourself Is The Best Thing You Can Do. If You've Got Talents, No One Can Take Them From You.

Investing

Talent

Best Things

If This Is A War, My Side Has The Nuclear Bomb. We Have K Street. We Have Wall Street. Debbie Doesn't Have Anybody. I Want A Government That Is Responsive To The People Who Got The Short Straw In Life.

Wall

Fear

War

If We Have A Strength, It Is In Recognizing When We Are Operating Well Within Our Circle Of Competence And When We Are Approaching The Perimeter.

Circles

Competence

Wells

There Are 309 Million People Out There That Are Trying To Improve Their Lot In Life. And We've Got A System That Allows Them To Do It.

People

Trying

Millions

When You Build A Bridge, You Insist That It Can Carry 30,000 Pounds, But You Only Drive 10,000-pound Trucks Across It. And That Same Principle Works In Investing.

Bridges

Principles

Investing

An Investor Needs To Do Very Few Things Right As Long As He Or She Avoids Big Mistakes.

Mistake

Long

Needs

I Mean, Hank Paulson Is In There [ Treasury] At The Wrong Time, Probably Shouldn't Have Taken The Job. He's A Friend Of Mine. But He Knows Markets, He Knows Corporations' Work, He Knows Money, And He's Got The Interests Of The Country At Heart.

Country

Jobs

Taken

The Only Way To Get Love Is To Be Lovable. It's Very Irritating If You Have A Lot Of Money. You'd Like To Think You Could Write A Check: "i'll Buy A Million Dollars' Worth Of Love." But It Doesn't Work That Way. The More You Give Love Away, The More You Get.

Writing

Love Is

Thinking

We Make Investment Decisions Based On Our Evaluation Of The Most Profitable Combination Of Probabilities.

Decision

Evaluation

Investment

Our Goal Is To Find An Outstanding Business At A Sensible Price, Not A Mediocre Business At A Bargain Price.

Goal

Outstanding

Mediocre

I Choose To Work With Every Single Person That I Work With. That Ends Up Being The Most Important Factor. I Don't Interact With People I Don't Like Or Admire. That's The Key. It's Like Marrying.

Keys

People

Important

There Are Certain Things That Cannot Be Adequately Explained To A Virgin Either By Words Or Pictures.

One Line

One Liner

Certain

Nothing Sedates Rationality Like Large Doses Of Effortless Money.

Investing Money

Buffets

Rationality

What We Learn From History Is That People Don't Learn From History.

Learning

People

History

I Bought A Company In The Mid-90s Called Dexter Shoe And Paid $400 Million For It. And It Went To Zero. And I Gave About $400 Million Worth Of Berkshire Stock, Which Is Probably Now Worth $400 Billion. But I've Made Lots Of Dumb Decisions. That's Part Of The Game.

Zero

Games

Shoes

We Do Not View The Company Itself As The Ultimate Owner Of Our Business Assets But Instead View The Company As A Conduit Through Which Our Shareholders Own Assets.

Views

Investing

Owners

The Dumbest Reason In The World To Buy A Stock Is Because It's Going Up.

World

Reason

Do What You Love And Work For Whom You Admire The Most, And You've Given Yourself The Best Chance In Life You Can.

Chance

Given

Admire

I Think You Should Read Everything You Can. In My Case, By The Age Of 10, I'd Read Every Book In The Omaha Public Library About Investing, Some Twice. You Need To Fill Your Mind With Various Competing Thoughts And Decide Which Make Sense.

Book

Thinking

Mind

The Fact That People Will Be Full Of Greed, Fear, Or Folly Is Predictable. The Sequence Is Not Predictable.

People

Greed

Investing

We Look For Things I Can Understand. A Lot Of Businesses I Don't Understand.

Looks

I Can

I Think The Fdic Was One Of The Great Inventions Of The American.

Thinking

Great Inventions

Invention

Be Fearful When There Is Greed And Be Greedy When There Is Fear.

Greed

Greedy

Fearful

The Nature Of Democracy Is Such That When There's - There'll Be Revulsion, Obviously, Towards - That's Never Going To Happen Again.

Democracy

Revulsion

Happens

Is Management Rational?

Investing

Management

Rational

I Don't Need 15 Houses. Owning Real Estate Doesn't Mean Much To Me. I Don't Like To Think About Things Like That. I Don't Need 12 Boats, Or Even The World's Largest Boat With A Crew Of 80. I'd Have To Take Care Of Them, To Worry About Them. I Get A Lot More Fun Out Of Life Without All The Bells And Whistles.

Fun

Real

Mean

I'm Always Interested In Understanding The Math Of Things And Understanding As Much As I Can About All Aspects Of Business. And What I Learn Today May Be Useful To Me Two Years From Now. That's Really The Wonderful Thing About Investments Is Your Knowledge Is Cumulative.

Math

Years

Two

At This Point, When Treasury Bills, Seven Day Treasury Bills At 1/20th Of One Percent, It's Not Because People Want To Earn 1/20th Of One Percent, It's Because They Trust The Fact The Treasury Will Give It Back To Them Next Week.

Next Week

People

Giving

I Would Say The Biggest Single Cause Was We Had An Incredible Residential Real Estate Bubble.

Real

Causes

Incredibles

I Look At Everything. That's My Job. I Really Do, Every Day. I Think About Everything.

Jobs

Thinking

Looks

The One Piece Of Advice I Can Give You Is, Do What Turns You On. Do Something That If You Had All The Money In The World, You’d Still Be Doing It. You’ve Got To Have A Reason To Jump Out Of Bed In The Morning.

Morning

Giving

Advice

It's Far Better To Buy A Wonderful Company At A Fair Price Than A Fair Company At A Wonderful Price.

Business

War

Investing Money

What Motivates Most Gold Purchasers Is Their Belief That The Ranks Of The Fearful Will Grow ... As 'bandwagon' Investors Join Any Party, They Create Their Own Truth - For A While.

Party

Gold

Belief

Beware Of Geeks Bearing Formulas.

Saving

Investing

Geek

I Mean, You Can Explain The Fact That These Are Depressed Prices, You Know. We Think These Assets Are Going To Be Worth A Lot More. And I Think That Case Can Be Made In Certain Situations. But I Think To Just Say, You Know, We're Going To Say A Dollar Of Cash Is Worth $2 All Of A Sudden, It Isn't Worth $2. It's Worth A Dollar Today.

Mean

Thinking

Dollars

Making Money Isn't The Backbone Of Our Guiding Purpose; It Is The By-product Of Our Guiding Purpose.

Purpose

Making Money

Backbone

In That, We Agreed With Andrew Carnegie, Who Said That Huge Fortunes That Flow In Large Part From Society Should In Large Part Be Returned To Society. In My Case, The Ability To Allocate Capital Would Have Had Little Utility Unless I Lived In A Rich, Populous Country In Which Enormous Quantities Of Marketable Securities Were Traded And Were Sometimes Ridiculously Mispriced. And Fortunately For Me, That Describes The U.s. In The Second Half Of The Last Century.

Country

Enormous Quantities

Society

Never Risk What You Have And Need For What We Don't Have And Don't Need.

Risk

Needs

Never Give Up Searching For The Job That You're Passionate About.

Jobs

Giving Up

Doing What You Love

Buy Companies With Strong Histories Of Profitability And With A Dominant Business Franchise.

Strong

Investing

Company

For Some Reason, People Take Their Cues From Price Action Rather Than From Values. What Doesn't Work Is When You Start Doing Things That You Don't Understand Or Because They Worked Last Week For Somebody Else. The Dumbest Reason In The World To Buy A Stock Is Because It's Going Up.

People

Investing

World

... It's Important To Have The Right Monetary Policy. It's Important For, To Have The Right Fiscal Policy. But It's Nowhere Near As Important As Just The Normal Regenerative Capacity Of American Capitalism.

Important

Fiscal Policy

Investing

The Best Thing That Happens To Us Is When A Great Company Gets Into Temporary Trouble...we Want To Buy Them When They're On The Operating Table.

Business

Investing Money

Tables

If You Owe Money, You Can't Pay Them Out. You Just Pay For Everything, You Do Smart Things, You Eventually Get Very Rich.

Smart

Pay

Rich

Charlie And I Decided Long Ago That In An Investment Lifetime, It's Too Hard To Make Hundreds Of Smart Decisions. That Judgment Became Ever More Compelling As Berkshire's Capital Mushroomed And The Universe Of Investments That Could Significantly Affect Our Results Shrank Dramatically. Therefore, We Adopted A Strategy That Required Our Being Smart And Not Too Smart At That, Only A Very Few Times. Indeed, We Now Settle For One Good Idea A Year.

Mistake

Smart

Long Ago

The Stock Market Is A No-called-strike Game. You Don’t Have To Swing At Everything – You Can Wait For Your Pitch.

Swings

Games

Waiting

The Best Business Returns Are Usually Achieved By Companies That Are Doing Something Quite Similar Today To What They Were Doing Five Or Ten Years Ago.

Years

Investing

Today

But 300 Million Americans, Their Lending Institutions, Their Government, Their Media, All Believed That House Prices Were Going To Go Up Consistently. And That Got Billed Into A $20 Trillion Residential Home Market. Lending Was Done Based On It, And Everybody Did A Lot Of Foolish Things.

Home

Government

Media

Consciously Paying More For A Stock Than Its Calculated Value - In The Hope That It Can Soon Be Sold For A Still-higher Price - Should Be Labelled Speculation

Should

Speculation

Higher

Activity Is The Enemy Of Investment Returns.

Enemy

Investing

Return

Investors Should Remember That Excitement And Expenses Are Their Enemies.

Investing Money

Investment Success

Enemy

I Think It Will Get Moving Faster. I Mean Once You Get It Off The - Once Credit Flows - Now The Recession Is Going To Get Worse.

Moving

Mean

Thinking

We Will Reject Interesting Opportunities Rather Than Over-leverage Our Balance Sheet.

Opportunity

Interesting

Balance

Be Fearful When The Markets Get Greedy, Be Greedy When The Markets Get Fearful.

Greedy

Fearful

The Important Thing Is To Keep Playing, To Play Against Weak Opponents And To Play For Big Stakes.

Play

Important

Investing

We Don't Read Other People's Opinions. We Want To Get The Facts, And Then Think.

Thinking

People

Want

You Have To Understand Accounting And You Have To Understand The Nuances Of Accounting. It's The Language Of Business And It's An Imperfect Language, But Unless You Are Willing To Put In The Effort To Learn Accounting - How To Read And Interpret Financial Statements - You Really Shouldn't Select Stocks Yourself

Effort

Nuance

Imperfect

Asset Values And Earning Power Are The Dominant Factors Affecting The Valuation Of A Controlling Interest In A Business. Market Price, Which Governs Valuation Of Minority Interest Positions, Is Of Little Or No Importance In Valuing A Controlling Interest.

Minorities

Littles

Earning

... But The Important Thing Is That When You Do Find One Where You Really Do Know What You Are Doing, You Must Buy In Quantity.... Charlie And I Have Made A Dozen Or So Very Big Decisions Relative To Net Worth, Although Not As Big As They Should Have Been. And In Each Of Those, We've Known That We Were Almost Certain To Be Right Going In.

Should Have

Decision

Important

Returns Decrease As Motion Increases.

Return

Increase

Decrease

We Really Can Say No In 10 Seconds Or So To 90%+ Of All The Things That Come Along Simply Because We Have These Filters.

Filters

Investing

Seconds

Life Is Like A Snowball. The Important Thing Is Finding Wet Snow And A Really Long Hill.

Long

Snow

Important

That's The Reality Of What They're Going To Sell Them To The Treasury For.

Reality

Treasury

Sells

You Don't Ever Ask A Barber Whether You Need A Haircut.

Funny

Humor

Needs

If You Want To Shoot Rare, Fast-moving Elephants, You Should Always Carry A Loaded Gun.

Moving

Gun

Elephants

There Is Seldom Just One Cockroach In The Kitchen. You Know, You Turn On The Light And, All Of Sudden, They All Start Scurrying Around.

Light

Kitchen

Cockroaches

A Pin Lies In Wait For Every Bubble. And When The Two Eventually Meet, A New Wave Of Investors Learns Some Very Old Lessons: First, Many In Wall Street (a Community In Which Quality Control Is Not Prized) Will Sell Investors Anything They Will Buy. Second, Speculation Is Most Dangerous When It Looks Easiest.

Wall

Lying

Knowledge

When We Went Crazy, And We Did Go Crazy On Residential Real Estate, It Set Things In Motion That Just - The Dominoes Started Toppling.

Crazy

Real

Estates

You're Dealing With A Lot Of Silly People In The Marketplace; It's Like A Great Big Casino And Everyone Else Is Boozing. If You Can Stick With Pepsi, You Should Be Ok.

Silly

Investing Money

People

We're Still In A Recession. We're Not Gonna Be Out Of It For A While, But We Will Get Out.

Stills

Recessions

If, When Making A Stock Investment, You're Not Considering Holding It At Least Ten Years, Don't Waste More Than Ten Minutes Considering It.

Years

Waste

Investment

It Makes No Difference To A Widow With Her Savings In A 5 Percent Passbook Account Whether She Pays 100 Percent Income Tax On Her Interest Income During A Period Of Zero Inflation Or Pays No Income Tax During Years Of 5 Percent Inflation. Either Way, She Is 'taxed' In A Manner That Leaves Her No Real Income Whatsoever. Any Money She Spends Comes Right Out Of Capital. She Would Find Outrageous A 100 Percent Income Tax But Doesn't Seem To Notice That 5 Percent Inflation Is The Economic Equivalent.

Zero

Real

Years

Focus Alone Is Not Enough; Putting In The Time To Commit Is Also Crucial To Achieve Success.

Focus

Enough

Achieve

Investors Should Remember That Excitement And Expenses Are Their Enemies. And If They Insist On Trying To Time Their Participation In Equities, They Should Try To Be Fearful When Others Are Greedy And Greedy Only When Others Are Fearful.

Business

Investing Money

Enemy

The Idea That You Try To Time Purchases Based On What You Think Business Is Going To Do In The Next Year Or Two, I Think That's The Greatest Mistake That Investors Make Because It's Always Uncertain. People Say It's A Time Of Uncertainty. It Was Uncertain On September 10th, 2001, People Just Didn't Know It. It's Uncertain Every Single Day. So Take Uncertainty As Part Of Being Involved In Investment At All. But Uncertainty Can Be Your Friend. I Mean, When People Are Scared, They Pay Less For Things. We Try To Price. We Don't Try To Time At All.

Mistake

Mean

Thinking

I Think The Rest Of The Country Should Be Paying Less, The 95 Percent That [barack] Obama Talks About Or Maybe Even A Little Higher Than That.

Country

Thinking

Littles

In Our View, Derivatives Are Financial Weapons Of Mass Destruction Carrying Dangers That, While Latent, Are Potentially Lethal.

Business

Mass Destruction

Views

Chains Of Habit Are Too Light To Be Felt Until They Are Too Heavy To Be Broken.

Inspirational

Broken Heart

Faith

Market Price, While Used Exclusively To Value Our Investments In Minority Positions, Is Not A Relevant Factor When Applied To Our Controlling Interests.

Minorities

Investment

Used

... The Best Way To Own Common Stocks Is Through An Index Fund.

Active Management

Way

Common

A Great Investment Opportunity Occurs When A Marvelous Business Encounters A One-time Huge, But Solvable Problem.

Opportunity

Encounters

Investing

I Think The Most Important Factor In Getting Out Of The Recession Actually Is Just The Regenerative Capacity Of - Of American Capitalism.

Thinking

Important

Capacity

The Future Is Never Clear; You Pay A Very High Price In The Stock Market For A Cheery Consensus. Uncertainty Actually Is The Friend Of The Buyer Of Long-term Values.

Long

Pay

Buyers

There Is No Substitute For A Local Newspaper That Is Doing Its Job.

Jobs

Newspapers

Substitutes

When We Really Sit Back With A Smile On Our Face Is When We Run Into A Situation We Can Understand, Where The Facts Are Ascertainable And Clear, And The Course Of Action Obvious.

Running

Faces

Facts

With Housing It's Something Even More Dramatic Than That, Because Most People Aspire To Own Their Own Home.if You Really Think That Houses Prices Are Going To Go Up Next Year And The Year After, You Feel If I Don't Buy It This Year, I'm Going To Have To Buy It Next Year.that's Not True Of An Internet Stock. But It's True Of A Home.

Home

Thinking

Years

You're Neither Right Nor Wrong Because Other People Agree With You. You're Right Because Your Facts Are Right And Your Reasoning Is Right - That's The Only Thing That Makes You Right. And If Your Facts And Reasoning Are Right, You Don't Have To Worry About Anybody Else.

People

Worry

Investing

I Mean [franklin Delano] Roosevelt Didn't - You Know, When He Came In, He Didn't Print Any Money.

Mean

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

I Wouldn’t Mind Going To Jail If I Had Three Cellmates Who Played Bridge

Bridges

Jail

Mind

We Don't Have To Be Smarter Than The Rest. We Have To Be More Disciplined Than The Rest.

Intelligent

Successful Investing

Smarter

You Do Things When The Opportunities Come Along. I've Had Periods In My Life When I've Had A Bundle Of Ideas Come Along, And I've Had Long Dry Spells. If I Get An Idea Next Week, I'll Do Something. If Not, I Won't Do A Damn Thing.

War

Opportunity

Investing Money

Always Associate Yourself With People Who Are Better Than You.

Kayaking

People

Investing

Well, One Time Some Attractive Woman Sat Next To Charlie And Asked Him What He Owed His Success To, And, Unfortunately, She Insisted On A One Word Answer. He Had A Speech Prepared That Would Have Gone On For Several Hours. But When Forced To Boil It Down To One Word, He Said That Was "rational". You Know, He Comes Equipped For Rationality, And He Applies It In Business. He Doesn't Always Apply It Elsewhere, But He Applies It In Business And That Has Made Him A Huge Business Success.

Business Success

Gone

On His Giving Pledge Philanthropy: The Way I Got The Message Out Was To Get A Copy Of Forbes, Look Down That 400 List And Start Making Phone Calls! Bill And Melinda [gates] Did The Same Thing. So Keep Publishing The List So I Can Milk It.

Phones

Giving

Way

Buy A Business, Don't Rent Stocks.

Investing

It Is More Important To Say "no" To An Opportunity, Than To Say "yes".

Opportunity

Important

Investing

Anything Can Happen In Stock Markets And You Ought To Conduct Your Affairs So That If The Most Extraordinary Events Happen, That You're Still Around To Play The Next Day.

Play

Next Day

Events

With Each Investment You Make, You Should Have The Courage And The Conviction To Place At Least Ten Per Cent Of Your Net Worth In That Stock

Should Have

Investment

Conviction

Investors Should Be Skeptical Of History-based Models. Constructed By A Nerdy-sounding Priesthood Using Esoteric Terms Such As Beta, Gamma, Sigma And The Like, These Models Tend To Look Impressive. Too Often, Though, Investors Forget To Examine The Assumptions Behind The Models. Beware Of Geeks Bearing Formulas.

Looks

Esoteric

Geek

If You Are Not Willing To Own A Stock For 10 Years, Do Not Even Think About Owning It For 10 Minutes.

Thinking

Intelligent

Years

In Fact, In My Adult Lifetime, I Don't Think I've Ever Seen People As Fearful Economically As They Are Right Now.

Thinking

People

Adults

We Have Learned To Turn Out Lots Of Goods And Services, But We Haven't Learned As Well How To Have Everybody Share In The Bounty. The Obligation Of A Society As Prosperous As Ours Is To Figure Out How Nobody Gets Left Too Far Behind.

Figures

Obligation

The American Worker Is More Productive Than He's Ever Been.

Workers

American Workers

Productive

It Makes A Difference Who The Treasury Secretary Is.

Differences

Making A Difference

Treasury

Anything Can Happen Anytime In Markets. And No Advisor, Economist, Or Tv Commentator-and Definitely Not Charlie Nor I-can Tell You When Chaos Will Occur. Market Forecasters Will Fill Your Ear But Will Never Fill Your Wallet.

Investing

Ears

Tvs

Asking For Financial Advice From A Financial Planner Is Like Asking A Barber If You Need A Hair Cut.

Cutting

Hair

Advice

I Think People - What People Want To Do Is Make [economy] Get Worse.

Thinking

People

Want

Yeah, We Don't Consider Many Stupid Things. I Mean, We Get Rid Of 'em Fast...just Getting Rid Of The Nonsense -- Just Figuring Out That If People Call You And Say, 'i've Got This Great, Wonderful Idea', You Don't Spend 10 Minutes Once You Know In The First Sentence That It Isn't A Great, Wonderful Idea...don't Be Polite And Go Through The Whole Process.

Stupid

Mean

Ideas

Don't Pass Up Something That's Attractive Today Because You Think You Will Find Something Way More Attractive Tomorrow.

Thinking

Today

Way

The 19th Century Belonged To England, The 20th Century Belonged To The U.s., And The 21st Century Belongs To China. Invest Accordingly.

England

Century

China

The Same Things Happen To Quite An Extent Around The Globe. I Mean, The European Banks Were Doing What The American Banks Were.

Mean

Globes

Happens

The Stock Market Is A Wonderfully Efficient Mechanism For Transferring Wealth From The Impatient To The Patient.

Patient

Wealth

Efficient

They [goverment] Take From The Woman Who Comes In And Takes The Wastebaskets Out.

Money Will Always Flow Toward Opportunity, And There Is An Abundance Of That In America.

Opportunity

America

Flow

Money Is Not Everything. Make Sure You Earn A Lot Before Speaking Such Nonsense.

Investing

Nonsense

The Secret Is To Find What You Love To Do.i Mean, I Tell The Students Look For The Job That You Would Take If You Didn't Need A Job. I Mean, It's That Simple. And I Was Lucky Enough To Find It Very Early In Life. And Then The Second Thing Is To Have People Around You That Make Feel Good Every Day, And Make You A Better Person Than You Otherwise Would Be.

Mean

Simple

People

I Believe The Chance Of Any Event Causing Berkshire To Experience Financial Problems Is Essentially Zero. We Will Always Be Prepared For The Thousand-year Flood; In Fact, If It Occurswe Will Be Selling Life Jackets To The Unprepared.

Zero

Believe

Years

There Is One Thing Of Which I Can Assure You. If Good Performance Of The Fund Is Even A Minor Objective, Any Portfolio Encompassing One Hundred Stocks (whether The Manager Is Handling One Thousand Dollars Or One Billion Dollars) Is Not Being Operated Logically. 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.

Expectations

Negative

Dollars

To Be Successful, You Should Concentrate On The World Of Companies, Not Arcane Accounting Mathematics.

Successful

World

Mathematics

If I Were The Treasury Secretary Or Head Of The Fed, You Know, I Would Try To Scare The Hell The Out Of The Private Sector And Say, You Better Save This Because You're Going Down With The Ship.

Trying

Scare

Ships

Never Depend On A Single Source Of Income.

Income

Source

Depends

Do Not Take Yearly Results Too Seriously. Instead, Focus On Four Or Five-year Averages.

Average

Years

Focus

Larger Sums May Be An Advantage At Some Cases And A Disadvantage At Others.

May

Advantage

Cases

I Mean, If Pearl Harbor Came Along, You Could Have Said The Planning Was Wrong By The Military Ahead Of Time Or Maybe The Battleships Shouldn't Have All Been In The Harbor And All That Kind Of Thing.

Military

Mean

Pearls

The Plan Itself Is Opportunism. There Is No Plan Before That.

Plans

Opportunism

It's Got To Be The Best Intellectual Exercise Out There. You're Seeing Through New Situations Every Ten Minutes. In The Stock Market You Don't Base Your Decisions On What The Market Is Doing, But On What You Think Is Rational. Bridge Is About Weighing Gain/loss Ratios. You're Doing Calculations All The Time.

Loss

Exercise

Thinking

The Capital Gains Tax Is 15 Percent Now. So I Sit There In My Office And I Make A Lot Of Money By Capital Gains, And I Pay 15 Percent, And I Pay No Payroll Tax On It.

Payroll Tax

Office

Gains

We Have Embraced The 21st Century By Entering Such Cutting-edge Industries As Brick, Carpet, Insulation And Paint. Try To Control Your Excitement.

Future

Cutting

Trying

I'll Tell You Why I Like The Cigarette Business. It Cost A Penny To Make. Sell It For A Dollar. It's Addictive. And There's A Fantastic Brand Loyalty.

Loyalty

Smoking

Dollars

Just Imagine Living On 21,000 A Year. I Mean You Have 20 Percent Of The Population Doing That. So You Don't Have To Worry About Guys Like Me.

Mean

Years

Worry

What's Nice About Investing Is You Don't Have To Swing At Every Pitch.

Business

Nice

Swings

Risk Is A Part Of God's Game, Alike For Men And Nations.

Men

Games

Risk

A Pack Of Lemmings Looks Like A Group Of Rugged Individualists Compared With Wall Street When It Gets A Concept In Its Teeth.

Wall

Business

Groups

Invest In As Much Of Yourself As You Can, You Are Your Own Biggest Asset By Far.

Money

Assets

To Win, The First Thing You Have To Do Is Not Lose.

Winning

Firsts

Loses

Can You Know You Can Have Institutions That Put Curbs On That In Various Ways, And Actually What The Banks, You Know, They Have Various Capital Ratios And That Sort Of Thing, But The Banks Got Around Them, I Mean, They Set Up Sieves And That Sort Of Thing Just To Get More Leverage. People Love Leverage When It's Working. I Mean, It's So Easy To Borrow Money From A Guy At X And Put It Out At X.

Mean

People

Guy

Learning How To Live Is Much More Important Than Learning How To Make A Living.

Inspirational Life

Important

The Woman That Comes In, Takes The Wastebasket Away, She's Paying 15.3 Or Whatever It Is On Payroll Tax Alone. I Mean It Is - I Never Had It So Good.

Mean

Payroll Tax

Taxes

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.

Keys

Investing

Durability

The Trick Is, When There Is Nothing To Do, Do Nothing.

Life

Generosity

Tricks

Read 500 Pages Every Day. That's How Knowledge Works. It Builds Up Like Compound Interest.

Pages

Interest

Working It

We Rarely Use Much Debt And, When We Do, We Attempt To Structure It On A Long-term Fixed Rate Basis. We Will Reject Interesting Opportunities Rather Than Over-leverage Our Balance Sheet. This Conservatism Has Penalized Our Results But It Is The Only Behavior That Leaves Us Comfortable, Considering Our Fiduciary Obligations To Policyholders, Depositors, Lenders And The Many Equity Holders Who Have Committed Unusually Large Portions Of Their Net Worth To Our Care.

Opportunity

Interesting

Long

Never Invest In A Business You Can't Understand

Business

Investing

Buffets

Writing A Check Separates A Commitment From A Conversation.

Writing

Commitment

Checks

I Am A Huge Bull On This Country. We Will Not Have A Double-dip Recession At All. I See Our Businesses Coming Back Almost Across The Board.

Country

Boards

Double Standard

There Is Nothing Like Writing To Force You To Think And Get Your Thoughts Straight.

Writing

Thinking

Force

Risk Comes From Not Knowing What You're Doing.

Life

Business

War

Generally Speaking, Investing In Yourself Is The Best Thing You Can Do. Anything That Improves Your Own Talents; Nobody Can Tax It Or Take It Away From You. They Can Run Up Huge Deficits And The Dollar Can Become Worth Far Less. You Can Have All Kinds Of Things Happen. But If You’ve Got Talent Yourself, And You’ve Maximized Your Talent, You’ve Got A Tremendous Asset That Can Return Ten-fold.

Running

Dollars

Investing

The Power Of Unconditional Love. I Mean, There Is No Power On Earth Like Unconditional Love.

Mean

Unconditional Love

Earth

If You Understood A Business Perfectly And The Future Of The Business, You Would Need Very Little In The Way Of A Margin Of Safety. So, The More Vulnerable The Business Is, Assuming You Still Want To Invest In It, The Larger Margin Of Safety You'd Need. If You're Driving A Truck Across A Bridge That Says It Holds 10,000 Pounds And You've Got A 9,800 Pound Vehicle, If The Bridge Is 6 Inches Above The Crevice It Covers, You May Feel Okay, But If It's Over The Grand Canyon, You May Feel You Want A Little Larger Margin Of Safety.

Bridges

Safety

Needs

Let Only Individuals Contribute - With Sensible Limits Per Election. Otherwise, We Are Well On Our Way To Ensuring That A Government Of The Moneyed, By The Moneyed, And For The Moneyed Shall Not Perish From The Earth.

Government

Earth

Way

Asset-heavy Businesses Generally Earn Low Rates Of Return - Rates That Often Barely Provide Enough Capital To Fund The Inflationary Needs Of The Existing Business, With Nothing Left Over For Real Growth, For Distribution To Owners, Or For Acquisition Of New Businesses

Real

Growth

Return

It Takes 150 Years To Build An Investment Bank And Only Five Minutes To Convince You To Sell Me Preferred Stock In It At A 10% Interest Rate.

Years

Investment

Minutes

Earnings Can Be Pliable As Putty When A Charlatan Heads The Company Reporting Them.

Business

Decision

Earning

The Truth Is That I've Got All My Net Worth Safely In Berkshire And I Will Never Sell A Share So There Is No One More Concerned About What Happens After My Death Than I Am.

Truth Is

Concerned

So If You Are Evaluating Others (or Yourself!) In The Investment Field, Think Out Some Standards - Apply Them - Interpret Them.

Thinking

Fields

Investment

The Thing To Do Is To Keep Your Mind When The World Around You Is Losing Theirs.

Mind

Relax

World

There's Always A Mismatch. I Mean, You Know, As The Economy Evolves, It Reallocates Resources. Now, The Real Problem, In My View, Is - This Has Been - The Prosperity Has Been Unbelievable For The Extremely Rich People. If You Go To 1982, When Forbes Put On Their First 400 List, Those People Had $93 Billion. They Now They Have $2.4 Trillion, 25 For One. That Is - This Has Been A Prosperity That's Been Disproportionately Rewarding To The People On Top.

Real

Mean

People

As Of 1992, In Fact-though The Picture Would Have Improved Since Then-the Money That Had Been Made Since The Dawn Of Aviation By All Of This Country's Airline Companies Was Zero. Absolutely Zero.

Country

Zero

Airline Business

Understanding Quotes: Their Essence and Application

Quotes, or quotations, are powerful tools in communication, encapsulating ideas, emotions, and wisdom in concise expressions. They serve various purposes across different contexts, from academic writing to everyday conversation.

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.

2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.

2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.

2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.

3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.

3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.

3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.

4. Proper Usage of Quotes

4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.

4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.

4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).

5. Common Mistakes to Avoid

5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.

5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.

5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.

6. Quotes in Different Contexts

6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.

6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.

6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.

7. Punctuation and Formatting

Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:

Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.

Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.

Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.

8. Ethical Considerations

Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes

Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.

Conclusion

Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.

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