Barry Ritholtz Quotes

Investors tend to discover 'hot' mutual fund managers just after a successful run and just before the inescapable force of mean reversion is about to kick in.

With a regular venture fund, you raise, let's say, a billion dollars, and then over the next three or four years, you've got to invest that money; otherwise, the people who invested with you will say, 'What are you doing? You're just collecting fees on our money.'

Mutual fund managers are trapped in this rather deadly vicious circle: the more successful they are, the more money flows into their mutual fund. Then, it is more difficult for them to beat the market averages or even to match their own past performance.

Whether a tops-down or bottoms-up investor in bonds, stocks, or private equity, the standard analysis tends to judge an investor or his firm on the basis of how the bullish or bearish aspects of the cycle were managed.

We believe the size is almost irrelevant to investment success. Our size has certainly not diminished our enthusiasm for investing in our funds, our ability to find or create opportunities, or our performance outlook.

Successful hedge funds will be entrepreneurial; it is the essence of the craft.

Mutual fund managers want your money in their funds. They get paid based on assets under management.

The Vanguard Experiment was designed to prove that mutual funds could operate independently, and do so in a manner that would directly benefit their shareholders.

With actively managed funds, people have big behavior problems. With funds that have done well, they put their money in, and when it has done bad, they want to take it out.

Mutual funds with superior performance records often falter.

I think average investors should not trade a lot. The evidence is overpowering. The more you trade, the less you earn.

I don't think you should put all your money in one place. It must be invested in different investments.

If the fluctuations in your investment portfolio are reduced, the impact of emotions and behavior on your account is also reduced.

The average investor's return is significantly lower than market indices due primarily to market timing.

Every time we make an investment decision at FedEx, we ask ourselves: 'What is the return on this investment?'

There were two qualities about the mutual funds of the 1920s that made them extremely speculative. One was that they were heavily leveraged. Two, mutual funds were allowed to invest in other mutual funds.

An investor doesn't have a prayer of picking a manager that can deliver true alpha.

My investments have been hurt.

My advice to the average investor in 1988 is to be patient and think long-term. It will take 18 months for confidence to get better and, in the meantime, this is absolutely no place for short-term money.

In tennis, you strike a ball just after the rebound for the fastest return. It's the same with investment.

Sometimes your best investments are the ones you don't make.

If I were to leave and raise a venture fund, I would have to find 10 or 100 LPs. They would all give me a bunch of money, and I would take a percentage of that to pay myself. They would expect me to invest that over the next three years, and they want that money back in seven or eight years.

Plenty of funds have fine long-term returns despite being tax-inefficient and generally costly. But a dirty secret is this: Average, no-load fund investors do much worse than the funds - or the market.

I'm sometimes accused of being hostile to mutual funds. That's not fair, really. There is a place for them. Still, I am hostile to one thing, which is trying to use funds to time your way in and out of the market. That's a recipe for very bad results.

I'm a pretty disciplined investor and pretty disciplined buyer. I do my due diligence. I do my homework. I don't waste money.