The very nature of finance is that it cannot be profitable unless it is significantly leveraged... and as long as there is debt, there can be failure and contagion.

You can't have the capitalist system if an increasing number of people think it is unjust.

Amateurs want to be right. Professionals want to make money.

Regulation of derivatives transactions that are privately negotiated by professionals is unnecessary.

Indeed, better risk management may be the only truly necessary element of success in banking.

Excessive optimism sows the seeds of its own reversal.

Even though some down payments are borrowed, it would take a large, and historically most unusual, fall in home prices to wipe out a significant part of home equity. Many of those who purchased their residence more than a year ago have equity buffers in their homes adequate to withstand any price decline other than a very deep one.