The beauty of a financial institution is that there are a lot of ways to go to hell in a bucket. You can push credit too far, do a dumb acquisition, leverage yourself excessively - it's not just derivatives [that can bring about your downfall].

The only intelligence investing is value investing...to acquire more than one is paying for.

Even in pure mathematics they can't remove all paradox, and the rest of us should also recognize we are going to have to endure a lot of paradox, like it or not.

Obviously, consideration of costs is key, including opportunity costs. Of course capital isn't free. It's easy to figure out your cost of borrowing, but theorists went bonkers on the cost of equity capital. They say that if you're generating a 100% return on capital, then you shouldn't invest in something that generates an 80% return on capital. It's crazy.

We have the same problem as everyone else: It's very hard to predict the future.

In my whole life, I have known no wise people who didn't read all the time - none ... ZERO.

Everybody engaged in complex work needs colleagues. Just the discipline of having to put your thoughts in order with somebody else is a very useful thing.”