Long or Short Capital

Fear is temporary. Greed is permanent.

-unknown

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Do you know the saying, ‘man’s reach exceeds his grasp’? This is not true – rather, it is that man’s grasp exceeds his nerve.

-Nikolas Tesla in The Prestige

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

People who decry the fact that businesses are in business “just to make money” seldom understand the implications of what they are saying. You make money by doing what other people want, not what you want.

-Thomas Sowell

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Rap critics they say he’s “Money Cash Hoes”
I’m from the hood stupid, what type of facts are those
If you grew up with holes in ya zapatos
You’d be celebrating the minute you was havin’ dough(s)
I’m like fuck critics you can kiss my whole asshole
If you don’t like my lyrics you can press fast forward

-Jay Z in his track 99 Problems

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators.

-P.J. O’Rourke

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Anyone who even thinks about deserting this mission will be cut up into 198 pieces. Those pieces will be stamped on until what is left can be used only to paint walls. Whoever takes one grain of corn or one drop of water… more than his ration, will be locked up for 155 years. If I, Aguirre, want the birds to drop dead from the trees… then the birds will drop dead from the trees. I am the wrath of god. The earth I pass will see me and tremble. But whoever follows me and the river, will win untold riches. But whoever deserts…

–Don Lope de Aguirre, but also possibly the mission statement for Pirate Capital

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

What happened to [the Amaranth hedge fund] shows that when you’re really right, you always overstay the position and that’s when you get murdered. It’s better not to be right so much.

-Peter Bernstein, author of Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.

-H. L. Mencken

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Some people will happily jump on the next big thing, give it all they’ve got, and in this way make important contributions to fast-moving fields. Others just don’t have the temperament to do this. Some people need to think through everything very carefully, and this takes time, as they get easily confused. It’s not hard to feel superior to such people, until you remember that Einstein was one of them. In my experience, the truly shocking new ideas and innovations tend to come from such people.

From The Trouble with Physics by Lee Smolin.

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.

-Will Rogers

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Scene from the 1st episode of the 1st season of The Wire (HBO).

McNulty: Let me undertand you. Every Friday night you and your boys, you shoot craps right? And every Friday night your pal Snot-Boogie, he’d wait ’til there was cash on the ground and then he’d grab the money and run away. You’d let him do that?

Baltimore Youth: We’d catch him and beat his ass. But ain’t nobody ever go past that.

McNulty: I gotta ask you, if every time Snot-Boogie would grab the money and run away. Why’d you even let him in the game?

BY: What? (perplexed)

McNulty: If Snot-Boogie always stole the money, why’d you let him play?

BY: You got to. It’s America man.

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

We favour the visible, the embedded, the personal, the narrated, and the tangible; we scorn the abstract.

-Nassim Taleb in the book Fooled by Randomness

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Imitation is suicide.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing

Any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word. There are no exceptions to this rule.

-Mike Shea

Past Quotes Entirely Relevant to Investing