Warren Buffet turned 92 on August 30, 2022. He has a net worth of over a hundred billion dollars, and also known for his simple lifestyle. He bought a five-bedroom house in 1958 and has been living there ever since. Expenditure on his lifestyle is minimal too. At this age the best quote attributed to him is: “If you get to my age in life and nobody thinks well of you, I don’t care how big your bank account is, your life is a disaster. Basically, when you get to my age, you’ll really measure your success in life by how many of the people you want to have love you actually do love you.”
Presented here are some of his investing lessons
“Never lose money, that’s Rule No. 1. And the second rule is ‘Never forget rule No.1.’”
“Never invest in a business you cannot understand.”
“The three most important words in investing are margin of safety. It’s far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price, than a fair company at a wonderful price. For the investor, a too-high purchase price for the stock of an excellent company can undo the effects of a subsequent decade of favorable business developments.”
“If a business does well, the stock eventually follows. For the investor, a too-high purchase price for the stock of an excellent company can undo the effects of a subsequent decade of favorable business developments. All there is to investing is picking good stocks at good times and staying with them as long as they remain good companies.”
“I never attempt to make money on the stock market. I buy on the assumption that they’d close the market the next day and not reopen it for 10 years. Successful investing takes time, discipline and patience. No matter how great the talent or effort, some things just take time: You can’t produce a baby in 1 month by getting nine women pregnant.”
“Calling someone who trades actively in the market an investor is like calling someone who repeatedly engages in one-night stands a romantic.”
“If you aren’t thinking about owning a stock for 10 years, don’t even think about owning it for 10 minutes. Do not take yearly results too seriously. Instead, focus on four or five-year averages. Time is the friend of the wonderful company, the enemy of the mediocre.”
“The most important quality for an investor is temperament, not intellect. You need a temperament that neither derives great pleasure from being with the crowd or against the crowd.”
“Success in investing doesn’t correlate with IQ … what you need is the temperament to control the urges that get other people into trouble in investing. You don’t need to be a rocket scientist. Investing is not a game where the guy with the 160 IQ beats the guy with 130 IQ.”
“The stock market is a no-called-strike game. You don’t have to swing at everything — you can wait for your pitch.”
“Buy a stock the way you would buy a house. Understand and like it such that you’d be content to own it in the absence of any market.”
“Diversification is protection against ignorance. It makes little sense if you know what you are doing. Wide diversification is only required when investors do not understand what they are doing.”
“Opportunities come infrequently. When it rains gold, put out the bucket, not the thimble.”
“Whether we’re talking about socks or stocks, I like buying quality merchandise when it is marked down. 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.”
“Speculation is most dangerous when it looks easiest. Most people get interested in stocks when everyone else is. The time to get interested is when no one else is. You can’t buy what is popular and do well. Keep things simple and don’t swing for the fences. When promised quick profits, respond with a quick “no.”
“If past history was all that is needed to play the game of money, the richest people would be librarians. The investor of today does not profit from yesterday’s growth.”
“We simply attempt to be fearful when others are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful.”
“It’s better to hang out with people better than you. Pick out associates whose behavior is better than yours and you’ll drift in that direction.”
“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.”
“I always knew I was going to be rich. I don’t think I ever doubted it for a minute.”
“Wall Street is the only place that people ride to in a Rolls Royce to get advice from those who take the subway.”
“Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago. If you’re in the luckiest 1% of humanity, you owe it to the rest of humanity to think about the other 99%.”
“The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything. You’ve gotta keep control of your time, and you can’t unless you say no. You can’t let people set your agenda in life.”
“In the world of business, the people who are most successful are those who are doing what they love.”
“The most important investment you can make is in yourself. Read 500 pages like this every day. That’s how knowledge works. It builds up, like compound interest. All of you can do it, but I guarantee not many of you will do it.”
“I insist on a lot of time being spent, almost every day, to just sit and think. That is very uncommon in American business. I read and think. So I do more reading and thinking, and make less impulse decisions than most people in business.”
“Imagine that you had a car and that was the only car you’d have for your entire lifetime. Of course, you’d care for it well, changing the oil more frequently than necessary, driving carefully, etc. Now, consider that you only have one mind and one body. …Prepare them for life, care for them. You can enhance your mind over time. A person’s main asset is themselves, so preserve and enhance yourself.”
“Over the long term, the stock market news will be good. In the 20th century, the United States endured two world wars and other traumatic and expensive military conflicts; the Depression; a dozen or so recessions and financial panics; oil shocks; a fly epidemic…. and the resignation of a disgraced president. Yet the Dow rose from 66 to 11,497.”
“I call investing the greatest business in the world … because you never have to swing. You stand at the plate; the pitcher throws you General Motors at 47! U.S. Steel at 39! And nobody calls a strike on you. There’s no penalty except opportunity lost… All day you wait for the pitch you like; then when the fielders are asleep, you step up and hit it.” There are no strikes for not swinging.
