255 Quotes by Benjamin Graham

It must be fundamentally wrong to reduce production of food and fiber while one-third of our population is still ill fed and ill clothed.

The people of the United States will not tolerate another deep depression that arises not from any lack of natural resources, productive capacity or man and brain power, but solely from imperfections in the functioning of the system of finance capitalism.

Individual security bargains may be located by the process of security analysis practically at any time. They can be bought with good overall results at all periods except when the general market itself is clearly in a selling range for investors. They show up to best advantage during the years in which the market remains in a relatively narrow and neutral area.

Whenever the investor sold out in an upswing as soon as the top level of the previous well-recognized bull market was reached, he had a chance in the next bear market to buy back at one third (or better) below his selling price.

Cartels have spread and will spread as long as the world lacks an effective mechanism by which balanced expansion may be achieved without a resulting disruption of prices.

THERE is widespread agreement among economists that abuse of credit constitutes one of the chief unwholesome elements in business booms and is mainly responsible for the ensuing crash and depression.

The money cost of the reservoir plan literally fades into insignificance when it is compared with the financial burden which the great depression imposed on the nation.

The purchase of a bargain issue presupposes that the market’s current appraisal is wrong, or at least that the buyer’s idea of value is more likely to be right than the market’s. In this process the investor sets his judgement against that of the market. To some this may seem arrogant or foolhardy.

It is a fact worth pondering that four centuries ago the evil of “an abundance or surplus” arose from its being kept off the market, while today the evil of surplus lies in its being thrown upon the market.