William J. Bernstein Quotes

In fact, the nation's biggest investment pools are the retirement funds of the large corporations and governmental bodies, such as the California Public Employees Retirement System (CALPERS), which manages an astounding $170 billion. These plans receive a level of professional management that even the nations wealthiest investors can only dream of.

In finance as in life, there is often a huge chasm between what is expected and what actually transpires.

Human beings are not very good at taking losses or admitting failure.

We tend to think of technological progress as an ever accelerating affair, but it just isn't so.

We tend to think of the stock and bond markets as relatively recent historical phenomena, but, in fact, there have been credit markets since human civilization first took root in the Fertile Crescent.

At a very early stage in history we are encountering "survivorship bias" - the fact that only the best results tend to show up in the history books.

The Gordon Equation is as close as being a physical law, like gravitation or planetary motion, as we will ever encounter in finance.

Journalism attracts people with exceptional linguistic talent, but I have found that very few have the mathematical sophistication to appreciate the difference between skill and luck.

In other words, since you cannot successfully time the market or select individual stocks, asset allocation should be the major focus of your investment strategy, because it is the only factor affecting your investment risk that you can control.

The brokerage and mutual fund business form a financial colossus that bestrides modern financial, and increasingly, social and political life.

Ninety-nine percent of what you read about investing in magazines and newspapers, and 100% of what you hear on television is worse than useless.

Most great financial innovators come from humble circumstances - nothing arouses fascination with financial assets quite like their absence.

The worst possible time to invest is when the skies are the clearest.

In fact, using entirely reasonable assumptions, you can make the Dow's discounted market value almost anything you want it to be.