Charlie Munger Quotes - Page 5

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• We get these questions a lot from the enterprising young. It's a very intelligent question: You look at some old guy who's rich and you ask, 'How can I become like you, except faster?'
  Spend each day trying to be a little wiser than you were when you woke up. Discharge your duties faithfully and well. Step by step you get ahead, but not necessarily in fast spurts. But you build discipline by preparing for fast spurts... Slug it out one inch at a time, day by day, at the end of the day -- if you live long enough -- most people get what they deserve.

  Charlie Munger

  Intelligent, Discipline, Long

  13 Copy quote

• It's stupid the way people extrapolate the past -- and not slightly stupid, but massively stupid.

  Charlie Munger

  Stupid, Past, People

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• Obviously, consideration of costs is key, including opportunity costs. Of course capital isn't free. It's easy to figure out your cost of borrowing, but theorists went bonkers on the cost of equity capital. They say that if you're generating a 100% return on capital, then you shouldn't invest in something that generates an 80% return on capital. It's crazy.

  Charlie Munger

  Crazy, Opportunity, Keys

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• Over the very long term, history shows that the chances of any business surviving in a manner agreeable to a company's owners are slim at best.

  Charlie Munger

  Long, Slim, Chance

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• Our success has come from the lack of oversight we've provided, and our success will continue to be from a lack of oversight. But if you're going to provide minimal oversight, you have to buy carefully. It's a different model from GE's. GE's works - it's just very different from ours.

  Charlie Munger

  Different, Working It, Oversight

  "Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor". Book by Tren Griffin, September 15, 2015.

  11 Copy quote

• The liabilities are always 100 percent good. It's the assets you have to worry about.

  Charlie Munger

  Worry, Assets, Liability

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• A lot of our respected financial institutions are just casinos in drag.

  Charlie Munger

  Casinos, Financial, Institutions

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• Well, the questioner came from Singapore, which has perhaps the best economic record in the history of developing an economy. And therefore he referred to 15 percent per annum as modest. It's not modest, it's arrogant.

  Charlie Munger

  Records, Arrogant, Economic

  "1997 Annual Meeting". buffett.cnbc.com. May 5, 1997.

  15 Copy quote

• Is there such thing as a cheerful pessimist? That's what I am.

  Charlie Munger

  Cheerful, Pessimist

  12 Copy quote

• We have to have a special insight, or we'll put it in the 'too tough' basket. All of you have to look for a special area of competency and focus on that.

  Charlie Munger

  Focus, Special, Investing

  14 Copy quote

• There must be some wisdom in the folk saying: Its the strong swimmers who drown.

  Charlie Munger

  Strong, Swimmer, Folks

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• If the value of a company doesn't just scream out at you, it's too close.

  Charlie Munger

  Scream, Company, Ifs

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• Step by step you get ahead, but rarely in fast spurts.

  Charlie Munger

  Steps, Get Ahead

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• Opportunity cost is a huge filter in life. If you've got two suitors who are really eager to have you and one is way the hell better than the other, you do not have to spend much time with the other. And that's the way we filter out buying opportunities.

  Charlie Munger

  Opportunity, Two, Filters

  "Afternoon Session - 1997 Meeting". buffett.cnbc.com. May 5, 1997.

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• People calculate too much and think too little.

  Charlie Munger

  Thinking, People, Investing

  9 Copy quote

• For society, the Internet is wonderful, but for capitalists, it will be a net negative. It will increase efficiency, but lots of things increase efficiency without increasing profits. It is way more likely to make American businesses less profitable than more profitable. This is perfectly obvious, but very little understood.

  Charlie Munger

  Negative, Littles, Way

  Charlie Munger's comments on the impact of technology and the Internet at the 2000 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting, www.fool.com. May 1, 2000.

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• I do not think you can trust bankers to control themselves. They are like heroin addicts.

  Charlie Munger

  Thinking, Bankers, Banking

  "Berkshire's Munger: High-Frequency Trading 'Basically Evil'". www.cnbc.com. May 3, 2013.

  28 Copy quote

• If you get into the mental habit of relating what you're reading to the basic structure of the underlying ideas being demonstrated, you gradually accumulate some wisdom.

  Charlie Munger

  Reading, Ideas, Habit

  12 Copy quote

• We regard using [a stock's] volatility as a measure of risk is nuts. Risk to us is 1) the risk of permanent loss of capital, or 2) the risk of inadequate return. Some great businesses have very volatile returns - for example, See's [a candy company owned by Berkshire] usually loses money in two quarters of each year - and some terrible businesses can have steady results.

  Charlie Munger

  Loss, Years, Nuts

  Charlie Munger's comments on risk at the 2001 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting, www.tilsonfunds.com. April 28, 2001.

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• In engineering, people have a big margin of safety. But in the financial world, people don't give a damn about safety. They let it balloon and balloon and balloon. It's aided by false accounting.

  Charlie Munger

  Engineering, People, Safety

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• Those who keep learning, will keep rising in life

  Charlie Munger

  Rising, Keep Learning

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• 'Crowd folly', the tendency of humans, under some circumstances, to resemble lemmings, explains much foolish thinking of brilliant men and much foolish behavior - like investment management practices of many foundations represented here today. It is sad that today each institutional investor apparently fears most of all that its investment practices will be different from practices of the rest of the crowd.

  Charlie Munger

  Men, Thinking, Practice

  "Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor". Book by Tren Griffin, September 15, 2015.

  18 Copy quote

• As I talk about strengths and weaknesses in academic economics, one interesting fact you are entitled to know is that I never took a course in economics. And with this striking lack of credentials, you may wonder why I have the chutzpah to be up here giving this talk. The answer is I have a black belt in chutzpah. I was born with it.

  Charlie Munger

  Interesting, Giving, Black

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• ...People need to ask, "How do I play the hand that has been dealt me?" The world is not going to give you extra return just because you want it. You have to be very shrewd and hard working to get a little extra. It's so much easier to reduce your wants. There are a lot of smart people and a lot of them cheat, so it's not easy to win.

  Charlie Munger

  Smart, Hard Work, Winning

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• It's not a competency if you don't know the edge of it.

  Charlie Munger

  Knows, Ifs, Edges

  BRK Annual Meeting, Morning Session, buffett.cnbc.com. May 6, 2006.

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