You have to let the big ones make up for your mistakes.

The biggest winners are surprises to me, and takeovers are even more surprising. It takes years, not months, to produce big results.

When even the analysts are bored, it's time to start buying.

Hold no more stocks than you can remain informed on.

A price drop in a good stock is only a tragedy if you sell at that price and never buy more. To me, a price drop is an opportunity to load up on bargains from among your worst performers and your laggards that show promise. If you can't convince yourself "When I'm down 25 percent, I'm a buyer" and banish forever the fatal thought "When I'm down 25 percent, I'm a seller," then you'll never make a decent profit in stocks.

You just don't know when you can find the bottom.

What makes stocks valuable in the long run isn't the market. It's the profitability of the shares in the companies you own. As corporate profits increase, corporations become more valuable and sooner or later, their shares will sell for a higher price.