The investor's chief problem - and even his worst enemy - is likely to be himself. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
An investor calculates what a stock is worth, based on the value of its businesses. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The value of any investment is, and always must be, a function of the price you pay for it. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
Avoid second-quality issues in making up a portfolio unless they are demonstrable bargains. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
Diversification is an established tenet of conservative investment. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
It's nonsensical to derive a price/earnings ratio by dividing the known current price by unknown future earnings. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The genuine investor in common stocks does not need a great equipment of brain and knowledge, but he does need some unusual… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
Wall Street has a few prudent principles; the trouble is that they are always forgotten when they are most needed. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The market is always making mountains out of molehills and exaggerating ordinary vicissitudes into major setbacks. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
We define a bargain issue as one which, on the basis of facts established by analysis, appears to be worth considerably more… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
Thousands of people have tried, and the evidence is clear: The more you trade, the less you keep. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
“The investment world nevertheless has enough liars, cheaters, and thieves to keep Satan's check-in clerks frantically busy for decades to come.” — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The investor's primary interest lies in acquiring and holding suitable securities at suitable prices. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The investor who permits himself to be stampeded or unduly worried by unjustified market declines in his holdings is perversely transforming his… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
In most cases the favorable price performance will be accompanied by a well-defined improvement in the average earnings, in the dividend, and… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
To have a true investment, there must be a true margin of safety. And a true margin of safety is one that… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
Speculators often prosper through ignorance; it is a cliché that in a roaring bull market knowledge is superfluous and experience is a… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
To establish the right price for a stock, the market must have adequate information, but it by no means follows that is… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
“The one principle that applies to nearly all these so-called “technical approaches” is that one should buy because a stock or the… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
Even defensive portfolios should be changed from time to time, especially if the securities purchased have an apparently excessive advance and can… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The best way to measure your investing success is not by whether you're beating the market but by whether you've put in… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
“The true investor scarcely ever is forced to sell his shares, and at all other times he is free to disregard the… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
All the real money in investment will have to be made as most of it has been in the past not out… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The investor is neither smart not richer when he buys in an advancing market and the market continues to rise. That is… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
“The most realistic distinction between the investor and the speculator is found in their attitude toward stock-market movements. The speculator’s primary interest… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
We are convinced that the intelligent investor can derive satisfactory results from pricing of either type (market timing or fundamental analysis via… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The history of the past fifty years, and longer, indicates that a diversified holding of representative common stocks will prove more profitable… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The reader can test his own psychology by asking himself whether he would consider, in retrospect, the selling at 156 in 1925… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
Even with a margin of safety in the investor's favor, an individual security may work out badly. For the margin guarantees only… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
It should be remembered that a decline of 50% fully offsets a preceding advance of 100%. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The only thing you should do with pro forma earnings is ignore them. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The intelligent investor is a realist who sells to optimists and buys from pessimists. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share Image
The purpose of this book is to supply, in the form suitable for laymen, guidance in the adoption and execution of an investment policy. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
There is something paradoxical in the fact that by establishing an export market we subject our entire domestic production to the vagaries of that… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
Those with the enterprise lack the money and those with the money lack the enterprise to buy stocks when they are cheap. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
It must be fundamentally wrong to reduce production of food and fiber while one-third of our population is still ill fed and ill clothed. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
The intelligent investor is a realist who sells to optimists and buys from pessimists. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
Intelligent investment is more a matter of mental approach than it is of technique. A sound mental approach toward stock fluctuations is the touchstone… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
Many progressive economists insist that gold is now in essentially the same position as silver and that the arguments the simon-pure gold advocates use… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
The art of investment has one characteristic that is not generally appreciated. A creditable, if unspectacular, result can be achieved by the lay investor… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
We have not known a single person who has consistently or lastingly make money by thus "following the market". We do not hesitate to… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
The essence of investment management is the management of risks, not the management of returns. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
In security analysis the prime stress is laid upon protection against untoward events. We obtain this protection by insisting upon margins of safety, or… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
Never buy a stock immediately after a substantial rise or sell one immediately after a substantial drop. — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
Observation over many years has taught us that the chief losses to investors come from the purchase of low-quality securities at times of good… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
No matter how careful you are, the one risk no investor can ever eliminate is the risk of being wrong. Only by insisting on… — Benjamin Graham Copy Share
