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Warren Buffetts Next Door

  
  Education
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The book The Warren Buffetts Next Door: The World’s Greatest Investors You’ve Never Heard Of and What You Can Learn From Them by Matthew Schifrin is an interesting compilation of true stories about ‘average Joes’ who have made huge amounts of money in the stock market. Some use technical analysis, some use fundamental analysis, and some use gut feelings.

This book gives hope to every investor and trader. Each chapter covers a different person, describing what their occupation is, how old they are, their investment strategy, what broker they use, and what their favorite web sites and chat rooms are. Also, their best and worst picks, along with the long term track record. My favorite one is the Stock Angler in Chapter 9. The guy has a full time job, trades during the hour or two before he leaves for work, and has been able to achieve a 33% average annualized return since January 2003.

Every trader that is profiled provides an example of on of their successful trades, and shows how the decision was made to make the trade. I really like the last chapter which lists all the major investment websites which he calls Investor Incubators. You should read The Warren Buffetts Next Door for proof that you don’t have to be Warren Buffett, George Soros, T. Boone Pickens, or Carl Icahn to be a successful stock trader.

How two of history’s greatest investors deal with losses

  
  Education
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It’s been a tough month for investors. As of yesterday, roughly half of the stocks in the S&P 500 have fallen into bear markets, with declines greater than 20%. International stock markets have fallen dramatically, with the losses accelerating on the heels of the latest Asian currency “event”.

We’ve seen stuff like this before. There is a worthwhile lesson in considering how a pair of history’s greatest investors have dealt with this kind of thing in the past.

On the surface, Warren Buffett and David Tepper don’t have a lot in common. One runs a diversified conglomerate and reinvests the insurance premiums into both long-term common stock positions and outright acquisitions of great companies. The other manages a hedge fund and aggressively trades in the markets each day.

But they have something in common that is worth considering today: Both Warren Buffett and David Tepper know that volatility is where returns come from and the losses of today set up the outsized gains of tomorrow. They’ve “lost” some money on the way to earning tons of it.

In the summer of 1998, there was a currency crisis that originated in the far east and eventually wound its way around the globe, culminating in the devaluation of the ruble and the blow-up / bailout of the first systemically risky hedge fund in history, Long Term Capital. Both Buffett and Tepper took quite a beating during this so-called “Asian Contagion” event.

As Nick Murray explains, Warren Buffett was down quite a bit that summer.

$6,200,000,000

A very large sum of money, wouldn’t you say? Now what, you ask, does it represent?
It is roughly how much Warren Buffett’s personal shareholdings in his Berkshire Hathaway, Inc. declined in value between July 17 and August 31, 1998. And now for the six billion dollar question. During those forty-five days, how much money did Warren Buffett lose in the stock market? 
The answer is, of course, that he didn’t lose anything. Why? That’s simple: he didn’t sell.

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