A Quote by Enrico Bombieri

Bombieri's Law: of Finance: Profits are on paper, losses are in cash

Enrico Bombieri

Quote Topics

Cash Finance Law Losses Paper Profits

Quote Author

Enrico Bombieri
Italian - Mathematician
Born: November 26, 1940

If large financial institutions can break the law and accumulate million in profits - and, if they get caught, settle by paying out of those profits - they do not have much incentive to follow the law.

Elizabeth Warren

In many ways, large profits are even more insidious than large losses in terms of emotional destabilization. I think it's important not to be emotionally attached to large profits. I've certainly made some of my worst trades after long periods of winning. When you're on a big winning streak, there's a temptation to think that you're doing something special, which will allow you to continue to propel yourself upward. You start to think that you can afford to make shoddy decisions. You can imagine what happens next. As a general rule, losses make you strong and profits make you weak.

William Eckhardt

Large profits are even more insidious than large losses in terms of emotional destabilization. I think it's important not to be emotionally attached to large profits. I've certainly made some of my worst investments after long periods of winning.

William Eckhardt

In a crisis, stocks of financial companies are great investments, because the tide is bound to turn. Massive losses on bad loans and soured investments are irrelevant to value; improving trends and future prospects are what matter, regardless of whether profits will have to be used to cover loan losses and equity shortfalls for years to come.

Seth Klarman

There are more ways than one to measure profits and losses.

Randy Pausch

Success means making profits and avoiding losses.

Martin Zweig

We're essentially continuing a system where profits are privatized and...losses socialized.

Nouriel Roubini

It is not about bits, bytes and protocols, but profits, losses and margins.

Lou Gerstner

One common adage...that is completely wrongheaded is: You can't go broke taking profits. That's precisely how many traders do go broke. While amateurs go broke by taking large losses, professionals go broke by taking small profits.

William Eckhardt

There is always risk involved. You can't be a capitalist only when there are investment profits but then a socialist when you experience losses.

Cristina Kirchner

How grateful I am for the law of tithing. It is the Lord's law of finance.

Gordon B. Hinckley

Do not accept principal risk while investing short-term cash: the greedy effort to earn a few extra basis points of yield inevitably leads to the incurrence of greater risk, which increases the likelihood of losses and severe illiquidity at precisely the moment when cash is needed to cover expenses, to meet commitments, or to make compelling long-term investments.

Seth Klarman

It was obvious that their profits were simply cash borrowed from destiny with some random payback time.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Government buffer-stock schemes are rife with politics, and instead of generating profits from buying low and selling high, they tend to generate losses.