Looking To Improve Your Results? Here Are 50 Laws For Better Investing

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As an investor, you should always keep improving. Here are my 50 laws to become a better investor, writes CQ, editor of Compounding Quality.

  1. Common sense is not so common
  2. Greed often overcomes common sense
  3. Greed kills
  4. Fear and greed are stronger than long-term resolve
  5. There is no cure for being overleveraged
  6. When you combine ignorance and leverage, you usually get some pretty scary results
  7. Operate only in your area of competence
  8. There is always more than one cockroach in the kitchen
  9. Over long periods of time, equities will rise in value
  10. Long investing generates wealth
  11. Short selling can protect wealth
  12. Be patient and learn how to sit on your hands
  13. Try to get a little smarter every day and read as much as possible
  14. Investors often think too little and calculate too much
  15. "Security Analysis" by Benjamin Graham is the most important book ever. Read and reread it
  16. History is a great teacher
  17. History rhymes
  18. What we have learned from history is that we haven't learned from history
  19. Investment wisdom is always 20/20 when seen in the rear-view mirror
  20. Avoid first-level thinking. Embrace second-level thinking
  21. Think for yourself
  22. In investing, that which is profitable is most often not exceedingly profitable at the end
  23. Avoid herd behavior
  24. The more often stupidity is repeated, the more it gets the appearance of wisdom
  25. Always have more questions than answers
  26. You must have accounting and finance knowledge, work hard, and be very competitive to be a successful investor
  27. The stock market is full of individuals who know the price of everything and the value of nothing
  28. Directional call buying, when consumed as a steady appetite, is a mug's game and often a path to the poorhouse
  29. Never buy the stock of a company whose CEO loves expensive toys
  30. Avoid "The Noise"
  31. Reversion to the mean is a strong market influence
  32. On markets and individual equities: "When you reach success station, get off."
  33. Try to buy stocks at cheap valuation levels
  34. Being right or wrong is less important than how much you make when you're right and how much you lose when you're wrong
  35. Too much of a good thing can be wonderful
  36. New paradigms are a rare occurrence
  37. Price goes before the fall
  38. Consider opposing investment views and cultivate curiosity
  39. Maintain a healthy level of skepticism
  40. In investing, nothing is certain
  41. Always control your emotions
  42. "Rate of change" is the most important statistic in investing
  43. In evaluating the attractiveness of a stock, always consider upside reward versus downside risk
  44. Always stick to your investing strategy
  45. Know what you own
  46. Immediately sell a stock on the announcement of an accounting irregularity
  47. Always follow the cash (flow)
  48. Replace the word EBITDA with earnings
  49. Favor doing stock research over spending time on sites like r/wallstreetbets
  50. Find a good mentor and pay attention to what they're doing

A few final words? Investing is simple, but not easy. The beautiful thing about the world we live in today? You can learn from the best investors in the world and copy their investment philosophy/ideas.


About the Author

Compounding Quality has a true passion for investing and helping other investors. He aims to invest in the best companies in the world, as it's far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price. Compounding Quality used to work as a professional investor but left his job to help investors with his newsletter. The main reason for this? He was sick of the short-term mindset of Wall Street and wanted to genuinely do the right thing.


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