INSIGHTS OF GREAT INVESTORS INVESTING PHILOSOPHIES, PRINCIPLES AND MINDSETS NO RIGHT TIME TO START YOUR JOURNEY TO ABUNDANCE "The Best Time To Plant A Tree Was 20 Years Ago. The Second Best Time Is Now".

“You must never delude yourself into thinking that you’re investing when you’re speculating.”

“A stock is not just a ticker symbol or an electronic blip; it is an ownership interest in an actual business, with an underlying value that does not depend on its share price.”

“An investment operation is one which, upon thorough analysis, promises safety of principal and an adequate return. Operations not meeting these requirements are speculative.”

“Buy when most people, including experts, are pessimistic, and sell when they are actively optimistic.” 

“The true investor will do better if he forgets about the stock market and pays attention to his dividend returns and to the operation results of his companies.” 

“Basically, price fluctuations have only one significant meaning for the true investor. They provide him with an opportunity to buy wisely when prices fall sharply and to sell wisely when they advance a great deal.”

“To have a true investment, there must be a true margin of safety. And a true margin of safety is one that can be demonstrated by figures, by persuasive reasoning, and by reference to a body of actual experience.”

“The market is a pendulum that forever swings between unsustainable optimism (which makes stocks too expensive) and unjustified pessimism (which makes them too cheap). The intelligent investor is a realist who sells to optimists and buys from pessimists.” 

“The investor who permits himself to be stampeded or unduly worried by unjustified market declines in his holdings is perversely transforming his basic advantage into a basic disadvantage. That man would be better off if his stocks had no market quotation at all, for he would then be spared the mental anguish caused him by other persons’ mistakes of judgment.”

“The best way to measure your investing success is not by whether you’re beating the market but by whether you’ve put in place a financial plan and a behavioral discipline that are likely to get you where you want to go.”

“Only buy something that you’d be perfectly happy to hold if the market shut down for 10 years.”  

 “Our favorite holding period is forever.” 

“I will tell you how to become rich. Close the doors. Be fearful when others are greedy. Be greedy when others are fearful.”

“It’s far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price, than a fair company at a wonderful price.”

“Never depend on a single income. Make an investment to create a second source.” 

“Risk comes from not knowing what you are doing.”  

“Never invest in a business you cannot understand.”

“The most important investment you can make is in yourself.”

“No matter how great the talent or efforts, some things just take time. You can’t produce a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnant.”

“Don’t pass up something that’s attractive today because you think you will find something better tomorrow.” 

“Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.” 

“Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.” 

“Rule No. 1 is never lose money. Rule No. 2 is never forget Rule No. 1.” 

“The most important quality for an investor is temperament, not intellect.”  

“Investing is not a game where the guy with the 160 IQ beats the guy with 130 IQ.” 

“The best chance to deploy capital is when things are going down.” 

“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.” 

“Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.”  

“Successful investing is about owning businesses and reaping the huge rewards provided by the dividends and earnings growth of our nation’s, and, for that matter, the world’s corporations.” 

“In the long run, investing is not about markets at all. Investing is about enjoying the returns earned by businesses.” 

“Speculation leads you the wrong way. It allows you to put your emotions first, whereas investment gets emotions out of the picture.” 

“The true investor will do better if he forgets about the stock market and pays attention to his dividend returns and to the operating results of his companies.”  

“Investing is not nearly as difficult as it looks. Successful investing involves doing a few things right and avoiding serious mistakes.” 

“The historical data support one conclusion with unusual force. To invest with success, you must be a long-term investor.” 

“Your success in investing will depend in part on your character and guts, and in part on your ability to realize at the height of ebullience and the depth of despair alike that this too shall pass.” 

“The mistakes we make as investors is when the market’s going up, we think it’s going to go up forever. When the market goes down, we think it’s going to go down forever. Neither of those things actually happen. Doesn’t do anything forever. It’s by the moment.” 

“The winning formula for success in investing is owning the entire stock market through an index fund, and then doing nothing. Just stay the course.” 

“If the data do not prove that indexing wins, well, the data are wrong.” 

“Owning the stock market over the long term is a winner’s game, but attempting to beat the market is a loser’s game.” 

“If you have trouble imagining a 20% loss in the stock market, you shouldn’t be in stocks.” 

“It will also tell you how easy it is to do just that. Simply buy the entire stock market. Then, once you have bought your stocks, get out of the casino and stay out. Just hold the market portfolio forever. And that’s what the index fund does. This investment philosophy is not only simple and elegant. The arithmetic on which it is based is irrefutable. But it is not easy to follow its discipline.” 

“I believe deeply and profoundly that speculation is a loser’s game.” 

“Over the short run, however, the fundamentals are often overwhelmed by the deafening noise of speculation, the price at which the stock market values each dollar of earnings.” 

 “Before costs, beating the market is a zero-sum game. After costs, it is a loser’s game.” 

“There's no shame in losing money on a stock. Everybody does it. What is shameful is to hold on to a stock, or worse, to buy more of it when the fundamentals are deteriorating.” 

“The worst thing you can do is invest in companies you know nothing about. Unfortunately, buying stocks on ignorance is still a popular American pastime.” 

“Equity mutual funds are the perfect solution for people who want to own stocks without doing their own research.” 

“There is always something to worry about. Avoid weekend thinking and ignoring the latest dire predictions of the newscasters. Sell a stock because the company's fundamentals deteriorate, not because the sky is falling.”

“Go for a business that any idiot can run - because sooner or later, any idiot probably is going to run it.”

“In the long run, a portfolio of well chosen stocks and/or equity mutual funds will always outperform a portfolio of bonds or a money-market account. In the long run, a portfolio of poorly chosen stocks won't outperform the money left under the mattress.”

“ Average investors can become experts in their own field and can pick winning stocks as effectively as Wall Street professionals by doing just a little research.” 

“Time is on your side when you own shares of superior companies.” 

“ If you hope to have more money tomorrow than you have today, you've got to put a chunk of your assets into stocks. Sooner or later, a portfolio of stocks or stock mutual funds will turn out to be a lot more valuable than a portfolio of bonds or CDs or money-market funds.” 

“If you don't study any companies, you have the same success buying stocks as you do in a poker game if you bet without looking at your cards.” 

“ Your investor's edge is not something you get from Wall Street experts. It's something you already have. You can outperform the experts if you use your edge by investing in companies or industries you already understand.” 

“I think you have to learn that there's a company behind every stock, and that there's only one real reason why stocks go up. Companies go from doing poorly to doing well or small companies grow to large companies.”

“When stocks are attractive, you buy them. Sure, they can go lower. I've bought stocks at $12 that went to $2, but then they later went to $30. You just don't know when you can find the bottom.”

“The real key to making money in stocks is not to get scared out of them.”

“All you need for a lifetime of successful investing is a few big winners, and the pluses from those will overwhelm the minuses from the stocks that don't work out.”

“The best stock to buy is the one you already own.”

“Searching for companies is like looking for grubs under rocks: if you turn over 10 rocks, you'll likely find one grub; if you turn over 20 rocks you'll find two.”

“Behind every stock is a company. Find out what it's doing.”

“Although it's easy to forget sometimes, a share is not a lottery ticket... it's part-ownership of a business.”

“A stock market decline is as routine as a January blizzard in Colorado. If you're prepared, it can't hurt you. A decline is a great opportunity to pick up the bargains left behind by investors who are fleeing the storm in panic.”

“If you're prepared to invest in a company, then you ought to be able to explain why in simple language that a fifth grader could understand, and quickly enough so the fifth grader won't get bored.” 

“ If you can't find any companies that you think are attractive, put your money in the bank until you discover some.”  

“People who want to know how stocks fared on any given day ask, 'Where did the Dow close?' I'm more interested in how many stocks went up versus how many went down. These so-called advance/decline numbers paint a more realistic picture.”  

“Bull markets are born in pessimism, grow on skepticism, mature on optimism and die on euphoria”. 

“Buy stocks for less than they are worth and hold them – as long as it takes for the market to appreciate how undervalued they are.” 

“For all long-term investors, there is only one objective - maximum total real return after taxes” 

“If you buy the same securities everyone else is buying, you will have the same results as everyone else.” 

“There’s only one reason a share goes to a bargain price: Because other people are selling. There is no other reason. To get a bargain price, you’ve got to look for where the public is most frightened and pessimistic.” 

“Looking for a good investment is nothing more than looking for a good bargain.” 

“To buy when others are despondently selling and to sell when others are avidly buying requires the greatest of fortitude and pays the greatest ultimate rewards.” 

“There is money to be made in those strange animals, options and futures. But, by and large, these are techniques for traders and speculators, not for investors.” 

“No matter how careful you are, you can neither predict nor control the future. A hurricane or earthquake, a strike at a supplier, an unexpected technological advance by a competitor, or a government-ordered product recall—any one of these can cost a company millions of dollars. Then, too, what looked like such a well-managed company may turn out to have serious internal problems that weren’t apparent when you bought the stock.” 

“The stock market and the economy do not always march in lock step. Bear markets do not always coincide with recessions, and an overall decline in corporate earnings does not always cause a simultaneous decline in stock prices. 

“Whenever you purchase a large amount of future earning power for a low price, you have made a good investment. The only way to accomplish this is to buy when others are selling. Investors often struggle with this concept; it is not easy to act contrary to popular opinion.” 

“The time of maximum pessimism is the best time to buy, and the time of maximum optimism is the best time to sell.” 

 “When buying stocks, search for bargains among quality stocks. Quality is a company strongly entrenched as the sales leader in a growing market. Quality is a company that’s the technological leader in a field that depends on technical innovation. Quality is a strong management team with a proven track record. Quality is a well-capitalized company that is among the first into a new market. Quality is a well known trusted brand for a high-profit-margin consumer product.” 

“Heed the words of the great pioneer of stock analysis Benjamin Graham: “Buy when most people…including experts…are pessimistic, and sell when they are actively optimistic.” 

 “Success in the stock market is based on the principle of buying low and selling high. Granted, one can make money by reversing the order – selling high and then buying low.” 

“Chances are if you buy what everyone is buying you will do so only after it is already overpriced.” 

“Divide the total value of a company by the number of shares the company has distributed. This calculation will give you the true value of a company’s stock, and if the market price is lower, then it’s a bargain. . . .” 

“Invest for maximum total REAL return. This means the return on invested dollars after taxes and after inflation. This is the only rational objective for most long-term investors. Any investment strategy that fails to recognize the insidious effect of taxes and inflation fails to recognize the true nature of the investment environment and thus is severely handicapped.” 

“People will tell you: Investigate before you invest. Listen to them. Study companies to learn what makes them successful.” 

“Forgive yourself for your errors. Don’t become discouraged, and certainly don’t try to recoup your losses by taking bigger risks. Instead, turn each mistake into a learning experience. Determine exactly what went wrong and how you can avoid the same mistake in the future.” 

“There are many investing methods available, but I have had the most success when purchasing stocks priced far too low in relation to their intrinsic worth.” 

“One principle that I have used throughout my career is to invest at the point of maximum pessimism. That is, the time to be most optimistic is at the point of maximum pessimism.” 

“There are two sound reasons for investing in common stocks - growth of income and growth of principal”. 

“No mathematical formula or yardstick alone can be relied on for identifying growth stocks or for detecting when their earnings reach maturity.” 

“ It is better to be early than too late in recognizing the passing of one era, the waning of old investment favorites and the advent of a new era affording new opportunities for the investor.” 

“ No one can see ahead three years, let alone five or ten. Competition, new inventions - all kinds of things - can change the situation in twelve months.” 

“ Change is the investor's only certainty.” 

“The growth stock theory of investing requires patience, but is less stressful than trading, generally has less risk, and reduces brokerage commissions and income taxes.” 

“Growth stocks' can be defined as shares in business enterprises which have demonstrated favorable underlying long-term growth in earnings and which, after careful research study, give indications of continued secular growth in the future” 

“While the trend in profit margins is one of the most important factors to consider, it is not always the company which reports the higher profit margin that proves to be the better growth stock.” 

“In planning an investment program, it is extremely important that the investor, before purchasing any securities, should ask himself, 'What is my objective?'.” 

 “A ton of regret never makes an ounce of difference.” 

“ If you stay half-alert, you can pick the spectacular performers right from your place of business or out of the neighborhood shopping mall, and long before Wall Street discovers them.” 

“Earnings of most corporations pass through a life cycle which, like the human cycle, has three important phases -- growth, maturity, and decadence.” 

“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.”