Genres: Business, Investing, Nonfiction, Finance, Quotations

Rating: 3/5

Recommend to: Entrepreneurs, Investors, Business owners

Number of pages: 192 pages

THOUGHTS ABOUT THE BOOK:

What is the secret of Warren Buffett’s success? That was on my mind when I saw this book. If by reading this book I get a chance to see just a little bit in how Warren is making his decision about investments and about running businesses then it is worth my time. And I guess you are also wondering if the book is worth your time. Right?

Well, it depends on what you want from it. If you are looking for hidden knowledge or secrets that have not been revealed anywhere else you will not find that in this book. A lot of what I have read in this book I have heard or read somewhere else. And to be honest you will not find any complex or special techniques on assessing value of companies, investing or anything associated with that. You will get advice to accumulate knowledge, find mentors and strategies that you feel safe and willing to use. The book is a collection of Warrens quotes and the author’s explanation of those quotes.

Warrens mentor was Benjamin Graham which greatly influenced him with the book “The Intelligent Investor“. One of the more important advice/quotes Warren made is when he said to never invest in businesses that you don’t understand and that can not be run by anyone. Because someday a fool might run a business you invested in. Warren (Mary) points out in the book that stockbrokers make money on commission, and that by diversifying stocks is a sign of not knowing what you are doing – “diversification is a protection against ignorance”. His point is that you can not keep track of what is going on in 50, 60 or more companies that you might be invested in. His philosophy is to pick a couple of sure winners and keep an eye on them. Sure winners are companies that are simple to run, their products are in everyday use and are not dependent on continuous investing of capital. What do you use every day and have been using daily and has not changed in years and will probably not change in the future years? Warren searches for long-term value in companies, so that even if the stock market would close for a couple of years he would be fine with it. His style of investing is totally different than what we see in the movies – Wall Street, The Wolf of Wall Street, Boiler room, and for a person like me and maybe you who is not in the stock market 24/7 a much wiser investing strategy. Maybe.

You can find out more about Warren Buffet here: Forbes.com

MY NOTES FROM THE BOOK:

• Never be afraid to ask for too much when selling or offer too little when buying.
• It is easier to stay out of trouble than it is to get out of trouble.
• Wall Street is the only place that people ride to in a Rolls-Royce to get advice from those who take the subway.
• Definition of success – it is being loved by the people you hope love you.
• There is plenty of money to be made in the center of the court. There is no need to play around the edges – reputation before greed.
• It’s not necessary to do extraordinary things to get extraordinary results.
• Be comfortable standing alone.
• Conviction is based on what you know will happen. Faith is based on what you hope will happen. To make money in the investment game you need to have conviction, which means you need to know what you are doing.
• There is a huge difference between the business that grows and requires lots of capital to do so and the business that grows and doesn’t require capital. If a business needs lots of capital to grow, it will never make you rich, and if it doesn’t need lots of capital to grow, it won’t ever leave you poor.
• You don’t have to make money back the same way you lost it.
• You get rich off investments not by following the herd, but by identifying stocks that Wall Street doesn’t want today, but will be dying for tomorrow.
• You want to learn from experience, but you want to learn from other people’s experience when you can.
• Experience is the best teacher, but it can be expensive if you are learning from your own mistakes. It is better to learn from the mistakes of others.
• You need to study not only what to do, but what not to do.
• Fix a potential problem before it becomes a problem.
• People are what they are being paid to be – no more, no less.
• Sometimes what you don’t do is just as important as what you do.
• If you let yourself be undisciplined on the small things, you will probably be undisciplined on the large things as well.
• There is nothing like writing to force you to think and get your thoughts straight. If you can’t write about it, you haven’t really thought about it.
• 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.
• The most important thing to do if you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging.
• The CEO who misleads others in public may eventually mislead himself in private.
• If you don’t make mistakes, you can’t make decisions. Some people can make decisions and some people can’t. The ones who can will lead, and the ones who can’t will follow. Part of making decisions is making mistakes.
• If you don’t like leading you can always follow.
• If you can’t be your own boss at work. you should at least try to be your own boss in life.
• What we learn from history is that people don’t learn from history.
• No matter how great the talent and or effort, some things just take time.
• I look for businesses in which I think I can predict what they’re going to look like in ten to fifteen years’ time. Take Wrigley’s chewing gum. I don’t think the internet is going to change how people chew gum.
• When investing focus on determining the long-term economic value of the company.
• Money only makes you more of what you already are.

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Thank you for your time. I hope you have found this book review helpful.