Quotes

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.

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.

The kind of executives who have a Buffet-like mindset and never get in trouble are a minority group, not a majority group.

I think all good investing is value investing, and it's just that some people look for values in strong companies and some look for values in weak companies, but every value investor tries to get more value than he pays for.

I didn't get rich by buying stocks at a high price-earnings multiple in the midst of crazy speculative booms, and I'm not going to change.

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.