In my life there are not that many questions I can't properly deal with using my $40 adding machine and dog-eared compound interest table.

It's not supposed to be easy. Anyone who finds it easy is stupid.

You're looking for a mispriced gamble. That's what investing is. And you have to know enough to know whether the gamble is mispriced. That's value investing.

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.

I have a black belt in chutzpah. I was born with it. Some people, like some of the women I know, have a black belt in spending. They were born with that. But what they gave me was a black belt in chutzpah.

We regard using [a stock's] volatility as a measure of risk is nuts. Risk to us is 1) the risk of permanent loss of capital, or 2) the risk of inadequate return. Some great businesses have very volatile returns - for example, See's [a candy company owned by Berkshire] usually loses money in two quarters of each year - and some terrible businesses can have steady results.

Any year that you don't destroy one of your best-loved ideas is probably a wasted year