Top 968 Quotes & Sayings by Warren Buffett - Page 15

I think people - what people want to do is make [economy] get worse.

It's going to be tough because the economy is going to be getting worse for a while. And it might fall off a cliff if this doesn't pass. But nobody will ever know that if it does.

I think the Congress will do the right thing. I think that they've - you know, they got into certain arguments and they start worrying about assessing blame, and there is a little demagoguery, but in the end, something this important, they'll do the right thing. So this really is an economic Pearl Harbor. That sounds melodramatic, but I've never used that phrase before. And this really is one.

I've argued with the senators and congressmen I've talked to. You don't want to be too little too late. If you buy them at the right price, you may be buying two trillion of face value.

In the end we must have people to match our principles, not the reverse.

It will be good for us in the long run, and I mean there are, you know, six and a half billion people in this world. And it's great for 300 million to keep enjoying more and more property, but I think it's terrific if, you know, the remainder do.

Accounting consequences do not influence our operating or capital-allocation decisions. When acquisition costs are similar, we much prefer to purchase $2 of earnings that is not reportable by us under standard accounting principles than to purchase $1 of earnings that is reportable.

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.

[The U.S. Treasury] can borrow basically unlimited amounts. They can stay there for years and years. These assets will be worth more money over time. So when Merrill Lynch sells a bunch of mortgage-related assets at 22 cents on the dollar like they did a month or so ago, the buyer goes - is going to make money, and he's going to make a lot more money if it happens to be an institution like the U.S. government which has very, very cheap borrowing costs.

I mean, you know, you're not going to change the human animal. And the human animal really doesn't get a lot smarter.

The U.S. Treasury has got borrowing costs like nobody else has.

When the president of the United States goes out at, you know, 8:00 o'clock in the morning and then his own party votes gets him 2 to 1 in the house, you know that somehow a message isn't getting out. It takes real leadership.

Wild swings in share prices have more to do with the "lemming- like" behaviour of institutional investors than with the aggregate returns of the company they own.

The latter qualification brings to mind a fellow who applied for a job and stated he had twenty years of experience-which was corrected by a former employer to read "one year's experience-twenty times.

If I got a chance to take one percent of the deal either way, I would make that bet.

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.

In our view, derivatives are financial weapons of mass destruction carrying dangers that, while latent, are potentially lethal.

If you can eliminate the government as a 39.6% partner, then you will be much better off.

The managers at fault periodically report on the lesson they have learned from the latest disappointment. They then usually seek out future lessons.

Resolution Trust Company was set up to liquidate a bunch of assets that the government had inherited because the savings and loans went broke.

I would say that life at 84, I am having as much fun as I've ever had in my life. I mean I get to do what I love every day with the people I love-and it just doesn't get any better than that.

In my view, [the trade deficit] will create political turmoil at some point...Pretty soon, I think there will be a big adjustment.

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.

People went crazy with tulip bulbs. They went crazy with the South Sea Bubble, they went crazy internet stocks, they went crazy with the uranium stocks back when I was first getting started.

We have embraced the 21st century by entering such cutting-edge industries as brick, carpet, insulation and paint. Try to control your excitement.

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.

I lose confidence in other people, all kinds of institutions.

If we start deciding, based on guesses or emotions, whether we will or won't participate in a business where we should have some long run edge, we're in trouble.

Earnings can be pliable as putty when a charlatan heads the company reporting them.

The good thing is, we have household formation in this country.

I asked him what he wanted to do for his career, and he replied that he wanted to go into a particular field, but thought he should work for McKinsey for a few years first to add to his resume. To me that's like saving sex for your old age. It makes no sense.

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.

Inflation could be a very - is a likely consequence out of what's going on now.

When 40 billion of treasury bills are sold like, seven day treasury bills, at a yield of 1/20th of one percent, that means the whole country is basically at the point virtually, or a lot of the country is at the point of putting the money under the mattress.

House prices just soared beyond - beyond reason in many places and they got financed in silly ways, and people lied about loans, all kinds of accesses entered into it. But that is what - that is the single biggest cause of why we're here.

Most investors, both institutional and individual, will find that the best way to own common stocks (shares') is through an index fund that charges minimal fees. Those following this path are sure to beat the net results (after fees and expenses) of the great majority of investment professionals.

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.

If you were at Lehman, the same thing happened. If you were at AIG, the shareholders are getting creamed on these things. And those shareholders are not just a bunch of big shots in Wall Street. Those are pension funds, and those are investors all over the country. I wouldn't worry too much about that. Justice won't be perfect on it.

I think confidence will come back.

I always say that in investing you want to buy stock in a company that has a business that's so good that an idiot can run it, because sooner or later one will. We have a country like that.

Having first rate people on the team is more important than designing hierarchies and clarifying who reports to whom.

It's class warfare, my class is winning, but they shouldn't be.

Fund consultants like to require style boxes such as "long-short," "macro," "international equities." At Berkshire our only style box is "smart."

A pin lies in wait for every bubble and when the two eventually meet, a new wave of investors learns some very old lessons.

Who would think of buying or selling a private business because of someone's guess on the stock market? The availability of a quotation for your business interest (stock) should always be an asset to be utilized if desired. If it gets silly enough in either direction, you take advantage of it. Its availability should never be turned into a livability whereby its periodic aberrations in turn formulate your judgements.

There is no question that an important service is provided to investors by investment companies, investment advisors, trust departments, etc. This service revolves around the attainment of adequate diversification, the preservation of a long-term outlook, the ease of handling investment decisions and mechanics, and most importantly, the avoidance of the patently inferior investment techniques which seem to entice some individuals.

I am not in the business of predicting general stock market of business fluctuations. If you think I can do this, or think it is essential to an investment program, you should not be in the partnership.

You don't want 300 million Americans putting their money under the mattress.

You get what I call the natural progression, the three Is. The innovators, the imitators, and the idiots.

I don't try and guess when to get in and out of the market. I have owned stocks consistently since 1942. I owned the - I was buying stocks the day before the election. I was buying the same stocks the day after election. And if Hillary had been elected, it would have been the same thing.

Our future rates of gain will fall far short of those achieved in the past. Berkshire's capital base is now simply too large to allow us to earn truly outsized returns. If you believe otherwise, you should consider a career in sales but avoid one in mathematics.

Market price, while used exclusively to value our investments in minority positions, is not a relevant factor when applied to our controlling interests.

I think that actually people in my situation should be paying more tax.

It's just that I landed up in a terrific capitalist system. One that pays people who allocate capital extraordinarily well. Intrinsically, I'm not worth as much as somebody who invents something that could improves people's life, or health or whatever.

The smarter the journalists are, the better off society is.

If some institution wants to sell you a billion dollars worth of mortgages, they might have to sell 100 million in the market, and then you'll buy the other 900 million on the same terms. Now, the very fact that this has been authorized or will be authorized, I hope, will firm up the market to some degree. And that's fine. But you don't want to have artificial prices being paid.

Equities will do well over time - you just have to avoid getting excited when other people are getting excited.

America should stand for more than just wealth.

There's nothing inappropriate about having debt in America. It's what helped us grow over time. And it's when debt gets out of control that you worry.

Government can't deliver a free lunch to the country as a whole. It can, however, determine who pays for lunch. And last week the Senate handed the bill to the wrong party... the poor and middle class.