One of my first investments was $100,000 in a Web-based calendar startup - and I lost every dollar.
A mistake I've made is investing in my idea rather than the entrepreneur's. Sometimes I'm excited about an idea that is similar to the entrepreneur's idea - but not the same. A smart entrepreneur will convince me it is the same, until I write a check!
One of the rules I've learned is that struggling to try and think your way into making an investment is usually the best way to not have a great outcome.
Funny, but after trading for more than 15 years, I still am capable of forgetting a cardinal rule: The paper you own, in the end, will be intertwined with the fate of the 30-year bond.
I invested all my money in debt.
I presumably lost $150,000 in the depression of 1937—on my one stock investment—because I did everything Lehman Brothers told me. I said, well, this is a fool’s procedure . . . buying stock in other people’s businesses.
There is no doubt One.Tel was a terrible investment and something that I regret greatly.
I don't want to live with the guilt of messing up someone's retirement fund.
If you're trading individual securities, you're almost certainly making a mistake. Because most professional managers can't outperform their benchmarks, and there's little reason to think that individuals can.
Losing other people's money was terrible.
If there's one thing I wish I'd done differently it would be to have invested money in property.
Fund investors are confident that they can easily select superior fund managers. They are wrong.
Don't get trapped by looking at what the price was that you paid for some stock originally.
There have been some clients who have said, 'In order to compete, I'm going to put a pool in and then sell the house.' That's a terrible idea.
People who invest in aviation are the biggest suckers in the world.
