The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 13 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Zweig: The best investors often possess an autistic-spectrum emotional detachment
“A lot of the best investors Have that sort of touch of something on the autistic spectrum. It's a little bit of detachment from other people's emotions that enables them to stand back and look and observe what other people are feeling and say, that's funny. Wh…”
Zweig: Trading is hubris; trading less generates fewer opportunities for error
“Trading is an act of hubris, and the less you trade, the fewer opportunities for error you generate over time.”
Zweig: The best investors are inversely emotional, not unemotional
“I think the best investors are not unemotional. I think they're inversely emotional.”
Zweig: Insular VC social circles breed more toxic excess than public markets
“In some ways, a smaller social circle of people all doing the same thing can be maybe more of a toxic breeding ground for excess enthusiasm than even a public market can, because they're all talking to each other. They're all talking to each other all day long…”
Zweig: Financial columnists repeat the same advice 100 times a year
“I once defined my job as saying the exact same thing between 50 and a hundred times a year in such a way that neither my editors nor my readers will know I'm repeating myself.”
Zweig: Ignore commentators who state beliefs without showing their sourcing
“And if someone is telling me I believe X, or I'm, I have concluded Y, then I want to see how do you know X, and why do you believe Y? And if the person is not telling you that, then you probably should move on, because you have no way of independently or readi…”
Zweig: Satirizing a pitch is the ultimate measure of your skepticism
“One of the things I've been thinking about ever since I wrote the book is that the ability to define a term that you're presented with in business or in life in such a way as to make it cynical and funny is sort of the ultimate measure of your own skepticism. …”
Zweig: Bull market investors mistake rising portfolios for rising IQs
“A period of rising prices that leads many investors to believe that their IQ has risen at least as much As the market value of their portfolios. After the inevitable fall in prices, they will learn that both increases were temporary.”
Zweig: An investor's default position should always be to do nothing
“And the default position for any investor should always be to do nothing. Because it doesn't cost anything to do nothing.”
Zweig: Risk is the gap between what investors think they know
“In the end, risk is the gap between what investors think they know and what they end up learning about their investments, about the financial markets, and about themselves.”
Zweig: The single most important question about anything is its base rate
“The single most important question to ask about almost anything is what is the base rate?”