George Soros Quotes

We define a bargain issue as one which, on the basis of facts established by analysis, appears to be worth considerably more that it is selling for.

Market value is irrelevant to intrinsic value. ... Unqualified judgment can at most claim to decide the market-value - a value that can be in inverse proportion to the intrinsic value.

Everyone has the idea of owning good companies. The problem is that they have high prices in relations to assets and earnings, and that takes all of the fun out of the game.

The key thing when you short is to make sure you're not wrong on the fundamental intrinsic value.

I particularly remember the time I gave (the research director) my paper on the banking industry. I felt very proud of my work. However, he read through it and said, 'This is useless. What makes the stock go up and down?' That comment acted as a spur. Thereafter, I focused my analysis on seeking to identify the factors that were strongly correlated to a stock's price movement as opposed to looking at all the fundamentals. Frankly, even today, many analysts still don't know what makes their particular stocks go up and down.

The concept of paying one-hundred-and-something times earnings for any company for me is just anathema. Having said that, at the end of the day, your job is to buy what goes up and to sell what goes down so really who gives a damn about PE's?

The margin of safety is always dependent on the price paid. It will be large at one price, small at some higher price, nonexistent at some still higher price.

All intelligent investing is value investing - acquiring more that you are paying for. You must value the business in order to value the stock.

In an efficient market, at any point in time, the actual price of a security will be a good estimate of its intrinsic value.

I don't entirely reject the idea of efficient markets. It needs updating.

What we do is we test what works on Wall Street. And sometimes it is earnings momentum, and sometimes it's earnings surprises. Sometimes it's price-to-sales cash flow, and then we put together our stock selection models.

What turned me on then, and turns me on even today - and when the time comes from me to retire from management I think I'd still be interested in it - is that everything that happens in the world affects the price of securities.

Warren Buffett is famous for talking about the 'intrinsic value' of stocks. But while many people parrot this phrase, few know what it really means.

Just because a stock is down doesn't mean it's a great buy.

We take the traditional value investor's process and just flip it around a little bit. The traditional value investor asks 'Is this cheap?' and then 'Why is it cheap?' We start by identifying a reason something might be mispriced, and then if we find a reason why something is likely mispriced, then we make a determination whether it's cheap.

I think investors ought to focus on making sure that the stock is within their circle of competence, that it's worth a lot more than it's valued at - and once you have those two things, a stop-loss makes no sense.

When it comes to valuation, there's only one thing stock investors really care about, which is earnings.

When high-growth companies slow down, growth and momentum junkies often sell indiscriminately, which can create great opportunities for value investors. Just be careful not to anchor on the stock's previous price or earnings multiple, which are no longer relevant.

While I take no pleasure in others' misfortunes, we've historically made most of our profits from other investors behaving in a panicked and irrational fashion and selling us certain stocks at prices far below their intrinsic value. More volatility equals cheaper stocks, which equals higher returns.

A price decline is of no real importance to the bona fide investor unless it is either very substantial say, more than a third from cost or unless it reflects a known deterioration of consequence in the company's position. In a well-defined bear market many sound common stocks sell temporarily at extraordinary low prices. It is possible that the investor may then have a paper loss of fully 50 per cent on some of his holdings, without any convincing indication that the underlying values have been permanently affected.

In other words, the percentage change in book value in any given year is likely to be reasonably close to that year's change in intrinsic value.

The investment game always involves considering both quality and price, and the trick is to get more quality than you pay for in price. It's just that simple.

The critical investment factor is determining the intrinsic value of a business and paying a fair or bargain price.

Investors must keep in mind that there's a difference between a good company and a good stock. After all, you can buy a good car but pay too much for it.

The only intelligence investing is value investing...to acquire more than one is paying for.