ReverseSignals

(Buffett's Reverse Signals stocks picks buy/sell signals)

Warren Buffett, a.k.a. the “Oracle of Omaha”, is the second richest person in the world, preceded in his wealth only by Bill Gates. Besides being one of the most successful investors in the world, as well as the primary shareholder, Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett is also known to be a down-to-earth, wise and even frugal man. When asked about what the secret of the "Warren Buffett investing" is, he doesn't usually give you a straight answer. More often than not you would receive a smaller scale answer, related to something else in life. For example, he says the best advice he ever received, came from his dad, and it was teaching him the power of unconditional love. A more financially oriented advice is - if you have savings, invest money in index funds every month; don't listen to financial advice - that is - guys like him. For the majority of middle class folks who can't afford to invest a lot, he recommends setting a good example for your children, being the kind of person you want your child to be. In regards to the economy recovering, he says: In a period of 100 years, usually 80 are good and 20 are bad. We just can't predict exactly when those 20 are going to happen. But in an interview for the Huffington Post from July 2010 he says he sees a recovery and thinks the economy is coming back.

Buffett graduated with a B.S. in Economics from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1950, at the age of 19, and an M.S. in Economics from Columbia Business School in 1951. He also attended the New York Institute of Finance. Buffett worked from 1951 to 1954 as an Investment Salesman at Buffett-Falk & Co. in Omaha, from 1954 to 1956 as a Securities Analyst at Graham-Newman Corp. in New York, from 1956 to 1969 as a General Partner at Buffett Partnership, Ltd. in Omaha, and from 1970 to this day he is the Chairman and CEO at Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in Omaha.

A widely known economist and professional investor, Benjamin Graham was the first proponent of value investing which he began teaching at Columbia Business School in 1928. He made a fundamental distinction between investment and speculation arguing that in the short term the stock market behaves like a voting machine but in the long term it acts like a weighing machine (i.e. its true value will in the long run be reflected in its stock price). Graham distinguishes between the passive investor (defensive investor, cautious investing, looking for value stocks, buying for the long term) and the active investor (has more time, interest and probably specialized knowledge to seek out exceptional buys in the market). Graham recommends that investors spend time and effort to analyze the financial state of companies - when a company is available on the market at a price lower than its intrinsic value, then a margin of safety exists which makes it more suitable for investment.

Warren Buffett speaks fondly of Graham who was his professor at Columbia and later an employer and a friend. Buffett describes Graham as the second most influential person in his life, after his own father. It was Ben’s ideas that sent Buffett down the right path and he would be a different person today if he hadn’t picked up Graham’s book The Intelligent Investor back in 1949 when Buffett was 19. Buffett continues to describe him not only as having brilliant ideas about investing but also as being a generous man whose name he gave to his son. Graham was born smart and he didn’t have a choice but to be an intelligent human being. However, he could’ve behaved in an arrogant manner or had total superiority but instead he chose to be a wonderful human being even though he knew he was smarter than 99.99% of the people around him. It didn’t bother him sharing knowledge with his students that in affect was going to make them his competitors.