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

Proper accounting is like engineering. You need a margin of safety. Thank God we don't design bridges and airplanes the way we do accounting.

Acknowledging what you don't know is the dawning of wisdom.

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.

What do you want to avoid? Such an easy answer: sloth and unreliability. If you're unreliable it doesn't matter what your virtues are. You're going to crater immediately. Doing what you have faithfully engaged to do should be an automatic part of your conduct. You want to avoid sloth and unreliability.

I think we have lost our way when people like the [board of] governors and the CEO of the NYSE fail to realize they have a duty to the rest of us to act as exemplars... You do not want your first-grade school teacher to be fornicating on the floor or drinking booze in the classroom; similarly you do not want your stock exchange to be setting the wrong moral example.

If you have competence, you know the edge. It wouldnt be a competence if you didnt know where the boundaries lie. Asking whether youve passed the boundary is a question that almost answers itself.