How much do we really know about our investments?

Read? How much do we really know about our investments?


A natural progression of this logic was to look at my own investments and potential investments and realizing how little I know about them. A mid-level manager at any company I own almost certainly knows more about the company and industry landscape than I ever will. That’s because I can never replicate working in the business and industry every single day.

One of the biggest things that is almost impossible for an investor to know is a CEO’s inner motivation—yet it’s one of the most important. Reading The CEO Pay Machine earlier this year really drove home how bad virtually all compensation packages are. First, a CEO gets paid a high salary no matter how well the business and stock performs. On top of that, they are gifted stock options that have a ton of upside and no downside. Because of this, it’s damn near impossible for a CEO to be truly aligned with public shareholders. Knowing that, most investors spend time trying to triangulate what the CEO’s motivations are and how shareholder friendly they are, but at the end of the day it’s just a guess. Thomas Peterffy at Interactive Brokers has a long history of being shareholder friendly, focusing on the long-term, etc, but that doesn’t guarantee anything about the future. There are plenty of examples (Bernie Madoff, Tom Petters) of people who were highly respected for many years until they turned out to be frauds.


All of the above is why I’ve actively tried to stop using words like “always” and “never.” Talking in absolutes in a world that is grey is rarely correct. I’ve also tried to be more careful when I’m talking about a company’s future. Though I’m certainly guilty of it, it’s an exercise in intellectual dishonesty to say a company will accomplish something next year, as opposed to saying they should or hopefully will accomplish that same thing.


Read? Less Analyzing. More Investing - CW8888

Less Analyzing. More Investing - CW8888


May be after reading the above article; you may have some clues into why Uncle8888 thinks like that arh!