"To suppose that the value of a common stock is determined purely by a corporation's earnings discounted by the relevant interest rates and adjusted for the marginal tax rate is to forget that people have burned witches, gone to war on a whim, risen to the defense of Joseph Stalin and believed Orson Welles when he told them over the radio that the Martians had landed."
"In general, markets know more than the people who write about them."
Source: A plague on the Wall Street casinos by Diane Francis, www.huffingtonpost.com. October 17, 2008.
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James Grant
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James Grant is a notable author and thinker known for his insights on freedom and truth, particularly in his influential works on societal structures.
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"Successful investing is about having people agree with you ... later."
"[C]apitalism without financial failure is not capitalism at all, but a kind of socialism for the rich."
"Progress is cumulative in science and engineering, but cyclical in finance."
"Central banks have gotten out of the central banking business and into the central planning business, meaning that they are devoted to raising up-if they can-economic growth and employment through the dubious means of suppressing interest rates and printing money. The nice thing about gold is that you can't print it."
"To me the gold price takes the form of a very uncomplicated formula, and all you have to do is divide one by 'n.' And 'n', I'm glad you ask, 'n' is the world's trust in the institution of paper money and in the capacity of people like Ben Bernanke to manage it. So the smaller 'n', the bigger the price. One divided by a receding number is the definition of a bull market."