Quotes & Sayings About Portfolios

I'm trying to manage myself, not just my portfolio. — Guy Spier

Perhaps the most important job of a financial advisor is to get their clients in the right place on the efficient frontier in their portfolios. But their No. 2 job, a very close second, is to create portfolios that their clients are comfortable with. Advisors can create the best portfolios in the world, but they won't really matter if the clients don't stay in them. — Harry Markowitz

In a world of businessmen and financial intermediaries who aggressively seek profit, innovators will always outpace regulators; the authorities cannot prevent changes in the structure of portfolios from occurring. What they can do is keep the asset-equity ratio of banks within bounds by setting equity-absorption ratios for various types of assets. If the authorities constrain banks and are aware of the activities of fringe banks and other financial institutions, they are in a better position to attenuate the disruptive expansionary tendencies of our economy. — Hyman Minsky

Under pressure from a growing movement of people who want their money out of fossil fuels, universities, pension investors and foundations are looking to exclude coal, oil and gas stocks from their portfolios. — Frances Beinecke

Even defensive portfolios should be changed from time to time, especially if the securities purchased have an apparently excessive advance and can be replaced by issues much more reasonable priced. — Benjamin Graham

Portfolios are everything, promises are nothing. Do the work. — Chase Jarvis

Wesley went everywhere with me from then on. I even wrapped him in baby blankets and held him in my arms while grocery shopping, to keep him warm during the first cold winter. Occasionally someone would ask to see "the baby," and when I opened the blanket, would leap back shrieking, "What is that?! A dinosaur?" Apparently, the world is full of educated adults with mortgages and stock portfolios who think people are walking around grocery stores with dinosaurs in their arms. — Stacey O'Brien

Internally, when we manage portfolios, we figure out what works in large cap, what works in mid cap, what works in small cap. Generally speaking, large cap stocks want earning stability, strong cash flow, margin expansion. — Louis Navellier

In choosing a portfolio, investors should seek broad diversification, Further, they should understand that equities
and corporate bonds also
involve risk; that markets inevitably fluctuate; and their portfolio should be such that they are willing to ride out the bad as well as the good times. — Harry Markowitz

As I said, i'm very quiet, i don't go around saying "I'm awesome!" but when I brought in my portfolio into DreamWorks and showed them what I could do, my art style is a lot wilder than I am. — Jennifer Yuh Nelson

Any so-called 'radical' strategy that seeks to empower the disempowered in the realm of social reproduction by opening up that realm to monetisation and market forces is headed in exactly the wrong direction. Providing financial literacy classes for the populace at large will simply expose that population predatory practices as they seek to manage their own investment portfolios like minnows swimming in a sea of sharks. Providing microcredit and microfinance facilities encourages people to participate in the market economy but does so in such a way as to maximise the energy they have to expend while minimising their returns. Providing legal title for land property ownership in the hope that this will bring economic and social stability to the lives of the marginalised will almost certainly lead in the long run to their dispossession and eviction from that space and place they already hold through customary use rights. — David Harvey

Long-term investment success is almost totally a function of how one emotionally handles declines in the equity market, as opposed to how one's portfolio handles them. — Nick Murray

Patent battles have become a strong catalyst for mergers, reducing competition in various domains. The largest corporations, with gigantic patent portfolios, routinely enter into cross-licensing agreements with their largest competitors. — James Gleick

Hitler's unusually improvisational and personal style of leadership, which created constant responsibility conflicts and an anarchic tangle of offices and portfolios, was anything but an expression of political incompetence. On the contrary, it served to make Hitler's own supremacy essentially unassailable. — Volker Ullrich

Unlike common stocks, whose dividends and earnings fluctuate with the ups and downs of the company's business, bonds pay a fixed dollar amount of interest. If the U.S. Treasury offers a $1,000 20-year, 5 percent bond, that bond will pay $50 per year until it matures, when the principal will be repaid. Corporate bonds are less safe, but widely diversified bond portfolios have provided reasonably stable interest returns over time. — Burton G. Malkiel

An index fund is a fund that simply invests in all of the stocks in a market. So, for example, an index fund might invest in every single stock or almost every single stock in the U.S. market, it might invest in every single stock abroad, or it might invest in all of the bonds that are out there. And you can make a perfectly fine investing portfolio that mixes equal parts of all three of those. — William J. Bernstein

When an investor focuses on short-term investments, he or she is observing the variability of the portfolio, not the returns - in short, being fooled by randomness. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

A blindfolded monkey throwing darts at a newspaper's financial pages could select a portfolio that would do just as well as one carefully selected by experts, — Burton Malkiel

When it comes to portfolios, my personal advice is for anyone who can, put money into forestry or farmland. Long term, you would probably never come near their returns in the stock market. In the world that I see, land is golden. — Jeremy Grantham

If you expect to continue to purchase stocks throughout your life, you should welcome price declines as a way to add stocks more cheaply to your portfolio. — Warren Buffett

You have never lost money in stocks over any 20-year period, but you have wiped out half your portfolio in bonds (after inflation). So which is the riskier asset? — Jeremy Siegel

You want less of the annoying nonsense that interferes with your portfolios and more of the significant data that allow you to become a less distracted, more purposeful investor. — Barry Ritholtz

Gold is no longer an investment. Gold is no longer a portfolio item. Gold is certainly not a trading vehicle. Gold is your lifeline and I mean that literally. — Jim Sinclair

Microsoft, Apple, Facebook all bought huge patent portfolios to further their strategic game. They're doing what I'm doing! — Nathan Myhrvold

Well, actually, I manage a couple of stock portfolios or funds or whatever you want to call 'em, and I think I've done relatively well with them. — Pat Robertson

There is one thing of which I can assure you. If good performance of the fund is even a minor objective, any portfolio encompassing one hundred stocks (whether the manager is handling one thousand dollars or one billion dollars) is not being operated logically. The addition of the one hundredth stock simply can't reduce the potential variance in portfolio performance sufficiently to compensate for the negative effect its inclusion has on the overall portfolio expectation. — Warren Buffett

The investor with a portfolio of sound stocks should expect their prices to fluctuate and should neither be concerned by sizable declines nor become excited by sizable advances. He should always remember that market quotations are there for his convenience, either to be taken advantage of or to be ignored. — Benjamin Graham

In today's gig economy, where jobs have been replaced by 'portfolios of projects,' most people find themselves doing more things less well for two-thirds of the money. — Tina Brown

Twenty-six states have passed renewable portfolio standards, which simply says somewhere between 15% and 30% of their electricity will come from renewables by such-and-such a year. In Washington, D.C., they haven't done a damn thing. — Brian Schweitzer

You know, some of the portfolios we might consider buying are portfolios which would do especially well if we have an economy-wide, or I mean, a global climate change that impacts us very negatively there are some companies that will do well, and so it might make sense to hold some of those in your portfolio. — Robert F. Engle

Photographers should make three or four prints from one negative and then crop them differently. When I was art director at Harper's Bazaar and at several agencies as a consultant, young photographers would bring me their portfolios and all the prints would be in the same standard proportions, either for the Leica or the Rolleiflex. Many times, by limiting themselves in this way, they missed the true potentialities of their photographs. — Alexey Brodovitch

The greater the potential for reward in the value portfolio, the less risk there is. — Warren Buffett

If you own a portfolio of stocks, you must learn to sell the worst performers first and keep the best a little longer. — William O'Neil

There's no use diversifying into unknown companies just for the sake of diversity. A foolish diversity is the hobgoblin of small investors. That said, it isn't safe to own just one stock, because in spite of your best efforts, the one you choose might be the victim of unforeseen circumstances. In small portfolios, I'd be comfortable owning between three and ten stocks. — Peter Lynch

But to me what seems to be missing in a lot of portfolios is Cartooning. — Craig McCracken

Amongst the financial Twitterati, the term 'muppets' has come to describe any client used and abused by some financial predator. I've adopted the term to describe portfolios that have been assembled for purposes other than serving the clients' best interests. — Barry Ritholtz

When you sell options, you get paid for assuming risk. That can be a profitable business, but it does not mix well with the risks inherent in a leveraged portfolio. — George Soros

Gold belongs only in the portfolios of fearmongers and speculators. If you own gold in your portfolio, expect to not get paid an income, pay higher taxes on your returns, take a more volatile ride than the stock market, and get a long-term return lower than bonds. — Peter Mallouk

Beta and modern portfolio theory and the like - none of it makes any sense to me. — Charlie Munger

Any pension fund manager who doesn't have the vast majority-and I mean 70% or 80% of his or her portfolio-in passive investments is guilty of malfeasance, nonfeasance or some other kind of bad feasance! — Merton Miller

Do you really like a particular stock? Put 10% or so of your portfolio on it. Make the idea count ... Good [investment] ideas should not be diversified away into meaningless oblivion. — Bill Gross

We have already significant sums of money in our petroleum fund, a fund created by law that includes all the revenues received from the Timor Sea, and invests in conservative, safe, long-term investment portfolios - right now in US Treasury Bonds. — Jose Ramos-Horta

Combating myopic risk aversion is the most difficult emotional task facing any investor. I know of only two ways of doing this. The first is to check on your portfolios as infrequently as possible. ... The other way to avoid myopic risk aversion is to hold enough cash so that you have a certain equanimity about market falls. — William J. Bernstein

One way to ease liquidity for banks is that the government can buy all highly rated securities held by the banks. Every single bank in the U.A.E. has some sovereign debts in their portfolios. I am not asking them to buy any junk bonds, rather the high quality U.A.E. government debt. — Abdul Aziz Al Ghurair

We believe that people moving their portfolios to an overweight in bonds will be disappointed over the long-term and will significantly underperform an asset allocation that over-weights equities. — James O'Shaughnessy

Forward-thinking teachers and school administrators across the country are creating a whole range of alternatives to cookie-cutter teaching and evaluation methods, such as the use of student portfolios and exhibitions in addition to conventional exams to assess students' progress. — Hillary Rodham Clinton

Short-term performance envy causes many of the shortcomings that lock most investors into a perpetual cycle of underachievement. Watch your competitors not out of jealousy but out of respect and focus your efforts not on replicating others' portfolios but on looking for opportunities where they are not. The only way for investors to significantly outperform is to periodically stand far apart from the crowd, something few are willing, or able, to do. — Seth Klarman

CEOs are worried they're going to get fired any minute. They're worried about their portfolios. — Dan Jenkins

Americans no longer look to government for economic security; rather, they look to their portfolios. — Bill Owens

Active management strategies demand uninstitutional behavior from institutions, creating a paradox that few can unravel. Establishing and maintaining an unconventional investment profile requires acceptance of uncomfortably idiosyncratic portfolios, which frequently appear downright imprudent in the eyes of conventional wisdom. — David F. Swensen

Some people, no matter how robust their stock portfolios or how healthy their children, are always mentally preparing for doom. They are just born worriers, their brains forever anticipating the dropping of some dreaded other shoe. — Robin Marantz Henig

I have no little insight into the feelings of furniture, and treat books and prints with a reasonable consideration. How some people use their pictures, for instance, is a mystery to me; very revolting all the same
portraits obliged to face each other for ever
prints put together in portfolios. — Robert Browning

And the whole mess had been made possible by middle America's relentless appetite - for bigger houses, bigger portfolios, bigger government programs, bigger everything, and damn the long-term cost. — Ross Douthat

You two should do the next partner project together," she said as she flipped through our portfolios. "You both have excellent designs, and you have polar opposite strengths. You'd do well together." Jake and I nodded respectfully, but under the table, he rubbed my leg. "I guess we're pretty good together," he whispered against my ear later in the hall. "Is that what she said? I thought she said you could learn a lot from me."
Reinhardt, Liz (2011-09-06). Double Clutch (A Brenna Blixen Novel) (p. 206). Kindle Edition. — Liz Reinhardt

Men are hard-wired for risk taking - particularly young men. The number one killer of fifteen- to twenty-four-year-old males is accidents.6 Female investors hold less risky investment portfolios than their male counterparts and generally take fewer chances with their money.
Churches need men because men are natural risk takers - and they bring that orientation into the church. Congregations that do not take risks atrophy. Jesus made it clear that risk taking is necessary to please God. In the parable of the talents, the master praises two servants who risked their assets and produced more, but he curses the servant who played it safe. He who avoids all risk is, in the words of Jesus, "wicked and lazy". — David Murrow

Zimbabwe's stock market was the best performer this decade - but your entire portfolio now buys you 3 eggs — Kyle Bass

I'm not sure how writers and artists of other graphic novels join forces, but this is how the process worked for me: First, I produced my final script. Then, Mark Siegel, my editor at First Second, assembled information about 10 or 12 different artists and had me look through their portfolios to see what kind of styles appealed to me. — Sharon Shinn

I did a handful of photo shoots and I never made any money for it just because I was trying to build a portfolio. I decided that that's not what I wanted to do. — Steve Grand

Since we try and take a fairly buy-and-hold approach to our newsletter portfolios and don't sell at every whipsaw, we want to have a mix of stocks that will perform at both ends of the oscillation. — Louis Navellier

People would be a lot more skeptical if they understood that there is an incredible amount of chance in the results that you observe for active managers. The distribution of outcomes is enormously wide-but that's exactly what you'd expect by chance with lots of active managers who hold imperfectly diversified portfolios. The really good portfolios contain a lot of really lucky picks, and the really bad portfolios contain a lot of really unlucky picks as well as some really bad ones. — Eugene Fama

The trick is to take risks and be paid for taking those risks, but to take a diversified basket of risks in a portfolio. — Jeffrey Gundlach

You need to really scrub your investment portfolios, because I guarantee you, many of you are going to find them chock-full of subprime carbon assets. — Al Gore

Avoid second-quality issues in making up a portfolio unless they are demonstrable bargains. — Benjamin Graham

The debate can be put in the form of the question: Resolved, that the best of money managers cannot be demonstrated to be able to deliver the goods of superior portfolio-selection performance. Any jury that reviews the evidence, and there is a great deal of relevant evidence, must at least come out with the Scottish verdict: Superior investment performance is unproved. — Paul Samuelson

The idea that a bell rings to signal when investors should get into or out of the stock market is simply not credible. After nearly fifty years in this business, I do not know of anybody who has done it successfully and consistently. I don't even know anybody who knows anybody who has done it successfully and consistently. Yet market timing appears to be increasingly embraced by mutual fund investors and the professional managers of fund portfolios alike. — John C. Bogle

Sophisticated people invest their money in stock portfolios. Rednecks invest their money in commemorative plates. — Jeff Foxworthy

Ask yourself: Am I an investor, or am I a speculator? An investor is a person who owns business and holds it forever and enjoys the returns that U.S. businesses, and to some extent global businesses, have earned since the beginning of time. Speculation is betting on price. Speculation has no place in the portfolio or the kit of the typical investor. — John C. Bogle

I sell these intermediate bond portfolios for people that can't go to stocks. — Louis Navellier

What I'm trying to say is that for the average investor, what I would encourage them to do is to understand that there's inflation and growth. It can go higher and lower and to have four different portfolios essentially that make up your entire portfolio that gets you balanced. — Ray Dalio

If you hope to have more money tomorrow than you have today, you've got to put a chunk of your assets into stocks. Sooner or later, a portfolio of stocks or stock mutual funds will turn out to be a lot more valuable than a portfolio of bonds or CDs or money-market funds. — Peter Lynch

Unbeknownst to most American investors, significant portions of their public pension, mutual fund, life insurance and private portfolios are comprised of stocks of privately held companies that partner with state sponsors of terror. — Frank Gaffney

If you look at what's happened to the stock market, if you look at what's happened to housing values, if you look at what's happened to bank loan portfolios because the value of their other assets that they've already issued loans against were going down, there was a pretty good argument for trying to pass something at about this level of investment with the divisions as they were - unemployment, food stamps, and tax cuts, aid to education and healthcare, and job creation. — William J. Clinton

When the goals of the Self are the only goals a culture makes available, spirited men and women will address them with the energy that they would have applied to the aspirations of the Soul. The result is lives that are massively frustrating and not a little ridiculous. People become heroically dedicated to middle-class ends - getting a promotion, getting a raise, taking immeasurably interesting vacations, getting their children into the right colleges, finding the best retirement spot, fattening their portfolios. Lives without courage, contemplation, compassion, and imagination are lives sapped of significant meaning. In such lives, the Self cannot transcend itself. — Mark Edmundson

The more confidence I have in each one of my stock picks, the fewer companies I need to own in my portfolio to feel comfortable. — Joel Greenblatt