Phil Carret

There are styles in securities as there are in clothes. A security may be undervalued, but if it is also out of style it is of little interest to the speculator. He is, therefore, compelled to study the psychology of the stock market as well as the elements of real value.

Phil Carret

The contrary opinion school has a great deal of validity. When everyone is bullish, why, you should be very concerned.

Phil Carret

The stupid thing we all do is to get more and more bullish as the market goes upand be frightened out of our wits when it goes down.

Phil Carret

Successful speculation requires capital, courage and judgment. The speculator himself must supply all three. Natural good judgment is not enough. The speculator’s judgment must be trained to understand the multitudinous facts of finance.

Phil Carret

If youre doing the right things, a bear market is not going to kill you.

Phil Carret

If you buy them cheap enough, they watch themselves.

Phil Carret

Never hold fewer than 10 different securities covering five different fields of business.

Phil Carret

At least once every six months, reappraise every security held.

Phil Carret

Keep at least half the total fund in income producing securities.

Phil Carret

Consider (dividend) yield the least important factor in analyzing any stock.

Phil Carret

Be quick to take losses and reluctant to take profits.

Phil Carret

Never put more than 25% of a given fund into securities about which detailed information is not readily and regularly available.

Phil Carret

Avoid inside information as you would the plague.

Phil Carret

Seek facts diligently, advice never.

Phil Carret

Ignore mechanical formulas for value in securities.

Phil Carret

When stocks are high, money rates rising and business prosperous, at least half a given fund should be placed in short-term bonds.

Phil Carret

Borrow money sparingly and only when stocks are low, money rates low and falling and business depressed.

Phil Carret

Set aside a moderate proportion of available funds for the purchase of long-term options on stocks in promising companies whenever available.

Phil Carret

If you have a good stock, sit on it. Unless you find something thats obviously much better, cheaper.

Phil Carret

I regard Keynes as disastrous for all concerned. Van Mises was in favor of free enterpriseand so am I. Theres nothing like competition.

Phil Carret

A period of prosperity contains the seed of its own destruction.

Phil Carret

I never sell anything, by and large, unless somebody takes it away from me.

Phil Carret

You should be philosophical. If the market is down 50 percent and your account goes down only 40 percent, why, thats a great triumph.

Phil Carret

Some of the greatest tragedies of the panic (1929) were the losses sustained by high corporation officials who were carrying large blocks of their own stocks on borrowed money. In many instances the accumulations of a lifetime were wiped out.

Phil Carret

Ignore mechanical formulas.

Phil Carret

I think mutual funds are ideal for the average citizen who doesnt want to bother to or doesnt have the necessary equipment to make judgments on his own. But they should understand that they will not make a lot of money out of it. Ten dollars will grow to $12 or $15, not to $150.

Phil Carret

I dont influence Warren. He influences me. I sent him a telegram the other day when his stock hit $20,000. I wrote: $20,000 WOW CONGRATULATIONS.

Phil Carret

The man who looks upon speculation as a possible means of avoiding work will get little benefit from this book. It is written rather for the man who is fascinated by the complexity of the forces which produce the ceaseless ebb and flow of security prices, who wishes to get a better understanding of them.

Phil Carret

Warren is obviously much smarter than I am. Ive known Warren for probably 40 years, and if I phoned, he would take the call. But I dont bother him.

Phil Carret

I can remember thinking that if the Pioneer Fund ever got to $25 million I really would have arrived. Now, with $25 million you couldnt possibly cover even the overhead.

Phil Carret

For the small investor, I might recommend maybe 10 percent in foreign stocks.

Phil Carret

Management is the important factor in a company. Anyone who gets to be chairman or president of a company is a fairly smooth operator, and talks a good fight, you know. You have to look at his recordhow much of his own money is in the stock (my yardstick is a years salary) and is he wildly optimistic or cautious? If he says things are pretty good and the results were very good, thats great. If he says things are fine and theres a lousy quarter, I dont want his stock.

Phil Carret

I was in Rome in 1987 when the market fell out of bed and lost 500 points in one day, and I still dont know why it happened. I hadnt foreseen anything. But I didnt owe anyone any moneyI never do.

Phil Carret

If you find something attractive, buy it.

Phil Carret

(The crash of) 1929 was much worse. If it had stopped by January 1930, it would not have been so bad. But it was kind of exciting, you know. Those on margin in a big way were of course devastated.

Phil Carret

Oil is produced in thousands of oil fields on every continent in the world. The temporary absence from the market of a single country – even a country as important to oil as Iraq or Kuwait – will have only a temporary effect. Other oil producers can boost their output quickly.

Phil Carret

For an individual, 25, I think.

Phil Carret (on how many stocks are needed in order to be diversified)

I carefully avoid exercise. I eat what I like. And I enjoy my work. But the greatest success of my life was my wife. I enjoyed 63 years of perfection. I used to tell her that she was 99.99 percent perfect. But I really thought she was 100 percent.

Phil Carret