All the diversification you need

If you can identify six wonderful businesses, that is all the diversification you need, and you’re going to make a lot of money, and I will guarantee you that going into a seventh one rather than putting more money in your first one is a terrible mistake.

Tweeting

It personally gives me an edge when other people are not paying attention to reading and thinking, and are instead on their phones. It means that I gain knowledge from reading a few 10-K’s while others are tweeting what they had for breakfast.

The spell of academics

Most institutional investors in the early 1970s, on the other hand, regarded business value as of only minor relevance when they were deciding prices at which they would buy or sell. This now seems hard to believe. However, these institutions were then under the spell of academics at prestigious business schools who were preaching a newly-fashioned theory : the stock market was totally efficient, and therefore calculations of business value – and even thought, itself – were of no more importance in investment activities. (we are enormously indebted to these academics : what could be more advantageous in an intellectual contest – whether it be bridge, chess, or stock selection – than to have opponents who have been taught that thinking is a waste of energy?)

Just sit and think

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. I do it because I like this kind of life.

Journalists

The smarter the journalists are, the better off society is. For to a degree, people read the press to inform themselves – and the better the teacher, the better the student body.

Accounting numbers

It’s simply to say that managers and investors alike must understand that accounting numbers are the beginning, not the end, of business valuation.