The real fortunes in this country have been made by people who have been right about the business they invested in, and not right about the timing of the stock market.
If you do smart things and use leverage and do one wrong thing along the way, it could wipe you out, because anything times zero is zero. But it's reinforcing when the people around you are doing it successfully, you're doing it successfully, and it's a lot like Cinderella at the ball.
The greatest investment a young person can make is in their own education, in their own mind. Because money comes and goes. Relationships come and go. But what you learn once stays with you forever.
We will continue to ignore political and economic forecasts, which are an expensive distraction for many investors and
businessmen. Thirty years ago, no one could have foreseen the huge expansion of the Vietnam War, wage and price controls, two oil shocks, the resignation of a president, the dissolution of the Soviet Union, a one-day drop in the Dow of 508 points, or treasury bill yields fluctuating between 2.8% and 17.4%.
Part of making good decisions in business is recognizing the poor decisions you've made and why they were poor. I've made lots of mistakes. I'm going to make more. It's the name of the game. You don't want to expect perfection in yourself. You want to strive to do your best. It's too demanding to expect perfection in yourself.
It's going to be tough because the economy is going to be getting worse for a while. And it might fall off a cliff if this doesn't pass. But nobody will ever know that if it does.
If I taught a class, on my final exam I would take an Internet company and ask, 'How much is this company worth?' Anyone who would answer, I would flunk.