QuestionerI'm curious about what you think is the best way to become a better investor.
WarrenWell, I think you should read everything you can. I can tell you, in my own case, I think by the time I was, well, I know by the time I was 10, I'd read every book in the Amma Public Library that had anything to do with investing, and many of them I'd read twice. So I don't think there's anything like reading, and not just as limited to investing at all, but you just got to fill up your mind with various, competing thoughts and sort them out as to what really makes sense over time. And then once you've done a lot of that, I think you have to jump in the water because investing on paper and doing, you know, and investing with real money, you know, is like the difference between reading a romance novel and doing something else. So I would, I, there is nothing like actually having a little experience. in investing. And you soon find out whether you like it. If you like it, if it turns you on, you know, you're probably going to do well on it. But, and the earlier you start the better in terms of reading. But, you know, I read a book at age 19 that formed my framework for thinking about investments ever since. I mean, what I am doing today at 76 is running things through the same thought pattern that I got from a book I read when I was 19. And I read all the other books, too, but if you, and you have to read a lot of them to know which ones really do jump out at you and which ideas jump out at you over time. So I would say that read and then on a small scale in a way that can't hurt you financially, do some of it yourself. Charlie?
CharlieWell, Sandy Goddisman, who is a Berkshire director, runs a large. and successful investment operation. And you can tell what he thinks causes people to learn to be good investors by noticing his employment practices. When a young man comes to Sandy, he asks a very simple question, no matter how young the man is. He says, what do you own and why do you own it? And if you haven't been interested enough in the subject to have that involvement already, why he'd rather you go somewhere else.