In his yearly letter to shareholders, released on February 22, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.B) CEO Warren Buffett gave his usual in-depth account of the company’s diverse operations and laid out his investment philosophies.
Buffett also talked about his missteps, some of which he could have prevented if he had been more rigorous in keeping to his own plan.
Regardless of their level of industry or market knowledge, everyone interested in investing can get insight from the letter. It is available for reading here.
Barbara Kollmeyer included some advice from Larry Swedroe, who has a lengthy experience managing money and has published numerous books about investing, in Wednesday’s “Need to Know” column. He gave four investment lessons that are easy to avoid but can mean disaster, even for market gurus, and cited Peter Lynch and Buffett.
To get the “Need to Know” email delivered to your inbox every morning, you can register here. It contains “the call of the day” from an investor, trader, economist, or other financial expert, as well as the most recent market rumors.
As an investor, are you concerned about the potential negative effects of politics or the economy?
Investing usually carries some level of financial risk. Regardless of whether you’re a Democrat or Republican, or how you feel about the administration, the early days of the Trump administration are demonstrating the importance of being mindful of unpredictability. Quentin Fottrell mentioned this week the need of adjusting to shifts in the economic landscape.
Warnings from the market
Every day, there are indicators that stock values are about to plummet, regardless of the state of the markets or the economy. The aforementioned chart highlights the prevailing sentiment that U.S. stocks are pricey and about to experience a widespread decline. In contrast to its 20-year average valuation of 16.2, the S&P 500 SPX currently trades at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 21.3. These are weighted ratios of the share prices of corporations to the rolling consensus estimates of 12-month earnings per share made by analysts surveyed by FactSet.
