Warren Buffett on tariffs

Tariffs are actually - we have a lot of experience with them - they're an act of war, to some degree.

Over time, they are a tax on goods.  I mean, the Tooth Fairy doesn't pay 'em. [laughter]  You always have to ask that question in economics, you always say, "And then what?"

~ Warren Buffett, CBS News interview, March 2, 2025

Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett on the keys to success

Munger: It's so simple: You spend less than you earn and invest shrewdly and avoid toxic people and toxic activities and try and keep learning all your life, etc., etc.  And do a lot of deferred gratification because you prefer life that way.  And if you do all those things, you are almost certain to succeed.  And if you don't, you're going to need a lot of luck, a lot of luck.  And you don't want to need a lot of luck; you want to go into a game where you're very likely to win without having any unusual luck.

Buffett: I'd add one more thought, though: You need to know how people can manipulate other people and you need to resist the temptation to do it yourself.

Munger: Oh yes!  The toxic people who are trying to fool you or lie to you, who aren't reliable in meeting their commitments, the great lesson of life is get them the hell out of your life.

Buffett: Yep.

Munger: And do it fast!

~ Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett, 2023 Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting, May 6, 2023

(video posted by Vitaliy Katsenelson, see here)

Warren Buffett on business motivation

As a practical matter, we need management with the businesses that we buy.  And 3 times out of 4, or thereabouts, the manager is the owner and is receiving tens of millions, maybe hundreds of millions of dollars.  So they don't have to work.  And we have to decide in that time when we meet them whether they love the business or love money.  We're not making a moral judgment... but it's very important for me to know which of the two is the primary motivator with them.  And we have had extremely good luck in identifying people who love their business.

So all we have to do is avoid anything on our part that diminishes that love of the business or makes other conditions so intolerable that they overcome that love that love of the business.  We have a number of people working for us that have no financial need to work at all and they probably outwork 95% or more of the people in the world, and they do it because they love smacking the ball.

~ Warren Buffett, "Why I Fire People Every Day - Warren Buffett," YouTube, 0:20 mark, November 16, 2021

Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger on cryptocurrencies (2018)

Warren Buffett: There's nothing being produced in the way of value from the asset.  You also have the problem that it draws in a lot of charlatans... who are trying to create various sorts of exchanges...  It's something where people who are of less-than-stellar character see an opportunity to clip people who are trying to get rich because their neighbor's getting rich buying this stuff that neither one understands.  It will come to a bad ending.  Charlie.

Charlie Munger: Well, I like cryptocurrencies a lot less than you do.  And so to me it's just dimentia.  And I think the people who are professional traders who go into cryptocurrencies, it's just disgusting.  It's like somebody else is trading turds and you decide "I can't be left out."

~ 2018 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting, May 5, 2018

Warren Buffett on bankruptcy

My partner, Charlie, says there's only three ways that a smart person can go broke: liquor, ladies and leverage.  

Now the truth is — the first two he just added because they started with L — it’s leverage.

~ Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett on compounding

Life is like a snowball.  The important thing is finding wet snow and a really long hill.

~ Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett on leverage

Having a large amount of leverage is like driving a car with a dagger on the steering wheel pointed at your heart.  If you do that, you will be a better driver.  There will be fewer accidents, but when they happen, they will be fatal.

~ Warren Buffett

Kevin Duffy on macro forecasting

We should be grateful the Buffett faithful reject macro forecasting.  This is just one of many tools in our toolbox.  Like all tools in the investing game, it works best when others fail to see its worth.

~ Kevin Duffy, "In Defense of Macro Forecasting," The Coffee Can Portfolio, September 18, 2022

Warren Buffett on analyzing businesses

A business should be viewed as an unfolding movie, not as a still photograph.

~ Warren Buffett

Vanity Fair on Warren Buffett's praise of George W. Bush for the 2008 Wall Street bailout

The lifelong Democrat, who recently announced that he was donating the majority of his wealth to the Gates Foundation, came under fire for a New York Times op-ed piece he wrote in November thanking the Bush administration for the Wall Street bailout.  "I felt that they deserved thanks," he tells [Bethany] McLean.  "People should see that the government can do things right."  He adds, "I may not have convinced anyone, but it should mean something when I say George Bush was right!"  Bush’s September 2008 declaration "If money isn’t loosened up, this sucker could go down!" Buffett calls "the 10 most immortal words in the history of economics."

~ Vanity Fair, Bethany McLean interview, January 5, 2011

Buffett with Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson

Warren Buffett on the U.S.: "we definitely had a system that unleashes potential"

We had four million people here in 1790.  We’re not more intelligent than people in China, which then had 290 million people, or Europe, which had 50 million.  We didn’t work harder, we didn’t have a better climate, and we didn’t have better resources.  But we definitely had a system that unleashes potential.  This system works.  Since then, we’ve been through at least 15 recessions, a civil war, a Great Depression.  All of these things happen.  But this country has optimized human potential, and it’s not over yet.  It’s like what’s written on the tomb of Sir Christopher Wren: "If you seek his monument, look around you."

~ Warren Buffett, as quoted in Bethany McLean interview, Vanity Fair, January 5, 2011

Warren Buffett on forecasting

Forecasts may tell you a great deal about the forecaster; they tell you nothing about the future.

~ Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett on the value of bear markets

The best chance to deploy capital is when things are going down.

~ Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett on the value of time

The rich invest in time, the poor invest in money.

~ Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett on how accurately CPI measures inflation

I think overall, for a typical young family, the CPI probably underestimates the burden they have faced, in terms of their own living standards.

~ Warren Buffett, "Warren Buffett DESTROYS Consumer Price Index (CPI)," YouTube, May 4, 2022

Warren Buffett: "The stock market is a no-called-strike game"

The stock market is a no-called-strike game.  You don't have to swing at everything -- you can wait for your pitch.  The problem when you're a money manager is that your fans keep yelling, "Swing, you bum!"

~ Warren Buffett, 1999 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting, as quoted in The Tao of Warren Buffett by Mary Buffett and David Clark

MLB 2021 Home Run Derby

Warren Buffett on bubbles

But a pin lies in wait for every bubble.  And when the two eventually meet, a new wave of investors learns some very old lessons: First, many in Wall Street -- a community in which quality control is not prized -- will sell investors anything they will buy.  Second, speculation is most dangerous when it looks easiest.

~ Warren Buffett, 2000 Berkshire Hathaway Chairman's Letter

Warren Buffett on stock forecasters

We've long felt that the only value of stock forecasters is to make fortune tellers look good.  Even now, Charlie and I continue to believe that short-term market forecasts are poison and should be kept locked up in a safe place, away from children and also from grown-ups who behave in the market like children.

~ Warren Buffett, 1992 Berkshire Hathaway Chairman's Letter

Warren Buffett on Bitcoin

The core use case for Bitcoin is to sell it to someone else.

~ Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett on how size will limit performance

We face another obstacle: In a finite world, high growth rates must self-destruct. If the base from which the growth is taking place is tiny, this law may not operate for a time. But when the base balloons, the party ends: A high growth rate eventually forges its own anchor. 

~ Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway 1989 Annual Report, March 2, 1990