Think About It: Stock Market Quotes

For over ten years we have preached the the merits of the efficient markets hypothesis and why investors should use low-cost, tax-efficient, broadly diversified asset class funds in an asset allocation plan tailored to their unique concerns, goals and risk tolerance.  We believe this strategy is the optimal way to grow and protect wealth.  And many of the greatest minds in modern finance agree:

"It is nearly always unwise to act on insights that you think are your own but are in fact shared by millions of others."
--John Bogle, Founder of The Vanguard Group

"Most investors, both institutional and individual, will find that the best way to own common stocks is through an index fund that charges minimal fees."
--Warren Buffet

"Investors should remember that excitement and expenses are their enemies."
--Warren Buffet

"Again, the problem is not that investment research is not done well. The problem is that it is done so well by so many...that no single group of investors is likely to gain a regular and repetitive useful advantage over all other investors."
--Charles Ellis, Vanguard Director and author of "Winning the Loser's Game"

"I am no longer an advocate of elaborate techniques of security analysis in order to find superior value opportunities."
--Benjamin Graham, Warren Buffet’s mentor and "Father" of security analysis

"All the time and effort that people devote to picking the right fund, the hot hand, the great manager, have in most cases led to no advantage."
--Peter Lynch, author of "Beating the Street"

"Don't try to beat the market, and don't believe anyone who tells you they can—not a stock broker, a friend with a hot stock tip, or a financial magazine article touting the latest mutual fund."
--Burton Malkiel, Professor of Economics, Princeton University

"Don't try to beat the market. Put your savings into some indexed mutual funds, which will make you just as much money (if not more) at much less cost."
--William Sharpe, Professor of Finance, Stanford University, Nobel Prize in Economics

"Invest in index funds. Your odds of beating the market in an actively managed fund are less than 1 in 100."
--David Swensen, Chief Investment Officer, Yale Endowment Fund

"As a general rule of thumb, the more complexity that exists in a Wall Street creation, the faster and farther investors should run.”
--David Swensen

Quotes on the Lighter Side
"Every day, self-proclaimed stock market "experts" tell us why the market just went up or down, as if they really knew. So where were they yesterday?"
--Anonymous

"If stock market experts were so expert, they would be buying stock, not selling advice."
--Norman R. Augustine

"There are two kinds of investors, be they large or small: those who don't know where the market is headed, and those who don't know that they don't know. Then again, there is a third type of investor--the investment professional, who indeed knows that he or she doesn't know, but whose livelihood depends upon appearing to know."
--William Bernstein

"Prediction is very difficult, especially if it is about the future."
--Niels Bohr, 1922 Nobel Laureate

"I never attempt to make money on the stock market. I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five years."
--Warren Buffett

 "In the business world, the rearview mirror is always clearer than the windshield."
--Warren Buffett

"...there's no better advice on how to live longer than to quit smoking and buckle up when driving. The lesson: advice doesn't have to be complicated to be good."
--Charles Ellis

"One of the funny things about the stock market is that every time one person buys, another sells, and both think they are astute."
--William Feather

"There are two times in a man's life when he should not speculate: when he can't afford it, and when he can."
--Mark Twain