Warren Buffett on the integrity of Goldman Sachs' leadership

I think Lloyd Blankfein has done a great job of leading Goldman Sachs. I've known the people that run Goldman Sachs ever since Gus Levy, everyone one of them. Goldman has had a history of picking first class people to run the business, the sort of people who you'd feel fine having married to your daughter and who are plenty smart about running a business.

~Warren Buffett, Goldman Sachs investor, "The Buffett Express", CNBC's Squawk Box, May 3rd, 2010

Thomas Piketty on insane Greek sovereign debt interest rates

Austerity can be justified, but 8 percent interest rates on a debt that amounts to more than 100 percent of gross domestic product is just crazy. They will have to restore their public finances and then pay back this huge debt at the same time — and Greek debt amounts to so little when you compare it to what was needed to bail out the banks [last year]. Not only is this not going to help growth, it’s going to end very badly, politically speaking. Taxpayers cannot accept this in the long run.

~Thomas Piketty, professor and founder, Paris School of Economics, as quoted in "Deflation Could Stall Efforts to Revive Greece in Debt Crisis", NYT.com, May 2nd, 2010

French economics professor on virtue damning debt-burdened Greece

How can Greece grow out of its debt if there is deflation? Deflation increases the debt burden, so we are following this virtuous circle that is bringing us toward hell. Economics has nothing to do with virtue, which can kill an economy.

~Jean-Paul Fitoussi, professor of economics, Institut d’Études Politiques, Paris, France as quoted in "Deflation Could Stall Efforts To Revive Greece in Debt Crisis", NYT.com, May 2nd, 2010

Ken Fisher on gold (timing)

The history of gold is that, for most of its history, it's been declining in price, followed by short periods with very rapid spikes in price. In history, if you take out 15% of the months, which have come in 6 or 7 spurts depending on what currency you're in, the cumulative rest of history gold has been a net money loser. Whenever you have something that gets 100% of its return in 15% of the months, you better be really good at timing.

My point is I am neither pro-gold or con-gold, when I am asked, "What do you think about gold?" I ask, "Well, what do you think about your ability to time?"

~Ken Fisher, Intelligent Investing with Steve Forbes, April 23rd, 2010

Ken Fisher on investor psychology

I am what most people would view as crazy bullish.

The fact of the matter is most people think my optimism is pretty Pollyanna-ish. I think most people are caught up in this period I call the "Pessimism of Disbelief."

~Ken Fisher, Intelligent Investing with Steve Forbes, April 23rd, 2010

Ken Fisher on American un-exceptionalism

America is not an island alone, it hasn't been for a long time and it never will be again.

~Ken Fisher, Intelligent Investing with Steve Forbes, April 23rd, 2010

Ken Fisher on the global recovery led by emerging markets

The fact of the matter is, we've got a very nice global recovery being led by emerging markets countries, which collectively are bigger than America, pulling the developed world forward and consistently economic events are coming in better than expected, surprising people. Yet, people just keep batting it off, saying 'I don't believe it, anything good's going to morph into something bad, whatever happens is probably going to be bad.'

~Ken Fisher, Intelligent Investing with Steve Forbes, April 23rd, 2010

(For comparison, consider this recent snippet by Kevin Duffy from the Azimuth blog: "According to the latest Investors Intelligence poll of investment newsletters, for the week ended August 20, 51.6% were bullish and 19.8% were bearish. This reading of +31.8% net bulls registered the highest level of optimism since December 21, 2007. At the time the S&P 500 stood at 1484, on the precipice of a 65% plunge in 15 months.")