Foreword: The Exception vii Howard Marks Foreword to the Second Edition xvii Bill Miller Foreword to the First Edition xix Peter S. Lynch Introduction xxv Kenneth L. Fisher Preface xxxi Chapter One A Five-Sigma Event: The World's Greatest Investor 1 Personal History and Investment Beginnings 3 The Buffett Partnership Ltd. 10 Berkshire Hathaway 13 Insurance Operations 15 The Man and His Company 17 Five-Sigma Event 18 Chapter Two The Education of Warren Buffett 21 Benjamin Graham 21 Philip Fisher 30 Charlie Munger 35 A Blending of Intellectual Influences 38 Chapter Three Buying a Business: The Twelve Immutable Tenets 45 Business Tenets 46 Management Tenets 50 Financial Tenets 59 Market Tenets 64 Anatomy of a Long-Term Stock Price 69 Chapter Four Common Stock Purchases: Nine Case Studies 71 The Washington Post Company 72 GEICO Corporation 81 Capital Cities/ABC 91 The Coca-Cola Company 100 General Dynamics 110 Wells Fargo & Company 114 American Express Company 120 International Business Machines 123 H.J. Heinz Company 130 A Common Theme 135 Chapter Five Portfolio Management: The Mathematics of Investing 137 The Mathematics of Focus Investing 143 Focus Investors in Graham-and-Doddsville 155 Chapter Six The Psychology of Investing 179 The Intersection of Psychology and Economics 180 Behavioral Finance 182 And on the Other Side, Warren Buffett 194 Why Psychology Matters 199 Chapter Seven The Value of Patience 201 For the Long Term 202 Rationality: The Critical Difference 205 Slow-Moving Ideas 206 System 1 and System 2 207 The Mindware Gap 210 Time and Patience 211 Chapter Eight The World's Greatest Investor 213 The Private Buffett 216 The Buffett Advantage 218 Learning to Think Like Buffett 224 Finding Your Own Way 232 Appendix 235 Notes 253 Acknowledgments 263 About the Author 267 Index 269 |