The Most Important Thing

The Most Important Thing Is … Recognizing Risk

In short, in bull markets—usually when things have been going well for a while—people tend to say, “Risk is my friend. The more risk I take, the greater my return will be. I’d like more risk, please.”

So a prime element in risk creation is a belief that risk is low, perhaps even gone altogether. That belief drives up prices and leads to the embrace of risky actions despite the lowness of prospective returns.

The point is, people usually expect the future to be like the past and underestimate the potential for change.

No, I’m sure “risk” is— first and foremost— the likelihood of losing money

The correct formulation is that in order to attract capital, riskier investments have to offer the prospect of higher returns, or higher promised returns, or higher expected returns. But there’s absolutely nothing to say those higher prospective returns have to materialize.

But riskier investments absolutely cannot be counted on to deliver higher returns. Why not? It’s simple: if riskier investments reliably produced higher returns, they wouldn’t be riskier!

Risk means more things can happen than will happen

The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent

Buying something for less than its value. In my opinion, this is what it’s all about—the most dependable way to make money. Buying at a discount from intrinsic value and having the asset’s price move toward its value doesn’t require serendipity; it just requires that market participants wake up to reality. When the market’s functioning properly, value exerts a magnetic pull on price