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Trying to prioritize among things we're unlikely to do is pretty fruitless.

Charlie Munger

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Charlie Munger
Age: 100
Born: 1924
Born: January 1
Business Person
Financier
Investor
Lawyer
Omaha
Nebraska
Charlie Thomas Munger
Charles T. Munger
Charles Thomas Munger
Unlikely
Among
Pretty
Trying
Things
Fruitless
Prioritize

More quotes by Charlie Munger

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Practically everybody (1) overweighs the stuff that can be numbered, because it yields to the statistical techniques they’re taught in academia, and (2) doesn’t mix in the hard-to-measure stuff that may be more important. That is a mistake I’ve tried all my life to avoid, and I have no regrets for having done that.
Charlie Munger
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Spend each day trying to be a little wiser than you were when you woke up.
Charlie Munger
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You must know the big ideas in the big disciplines, and use them routinely - all of them, not just a few. Most people are trained in one model - economics, for example - and try to solve all problems in one way. You know the old saying: to the man with a hammer, the world looks like a nail. This is a dumb way of handling problems.
Charlie Munger
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You've got to have models in your head and you've got to array you experience - both vicarious and direct - onto this latticework of mental models.
Charlie Munger
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Assume life will be really tough, and then ask if you can handle it. If the answer is yes, you've won.
Charlie Munger
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Beta and modern portfolio theory and the like - none of it makes any sense to me.
Charlie Munger
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If only I had the influence with my wife and children that I have in some other quarters!
Charlie Munger
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People calculate too much and think too little.
Charlie Munger
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Almost all good businesses engage in 'pain today, gain tomorrow' activities.
Charlie Munger
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There are two kinds of businesses: The first earns 12%, and you can take it out at the end of the year. The second earns 12%, but all the excess cash must be reinvested - there's never any cash. It reminds me of the guy who looks at all of his equipment and says, 'There's all of my profit.' We hate that kind of business.
Charlie Munger
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Ben Franklin and Samuel Johnson, he credits their wisdom for his success. They were both utterly brilliant men. And powerful communicators. Both have helped me all the way through life. Their lessons are easy to assimilate.
Charlie Munger
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Since those don’t hit financial reports, the opportunities you had but didn’t accept, most people don’t bother thinking about them very much. At least that is a mistake we don’t make. We rub our own noses in our mistakes in blowing opportunities, as we just did.
Charlie Munger
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Mimicking the herd invites regression to the mean.
Charlie Munger
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Investing is where you find a few great companies and then sit on your ass.
Charlie Munger
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I have a name for people who went to the extreme efficient market theory-which is bonkers. It was an intellectually consistent theory that enabled them to do pretty mathematics. So I understand its seductiveness to people with large mathematical gifts. It just had a difficulty in that the fundamental assumption did not tie properly to reality.
Charlie Munger
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A banker who is allowed to borrow money at X and loan it out at X plus Y will just go crazy and do too much of it if the civilization doesn't have rules that prevent it.
Charlie Munger
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Stock-picking is like gambling: those who win well, seldom bet, but when they do, they bet heavily.
Charlie Munger
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There’s no way that you can live an adequate life without many mistakes. In fact, one trick in life is to get so you can handle mistakes. Failure to handle psychological denial is a common way for people to go broke.
Charlie Munger
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Move only when you have an advantage. It's very basic. You have to understand the odds and have the discipline to bet only when the odds are in your favor.
Charlie Munger
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I'm not entitled to have an opinion unless I can state the arguments against my position better than the people who are in opposition. I think that I am qualified to speak only when I've reached that state.
Charlie Munger