What is the number 1 rule of investing?
Warren Buffett once said, “The first rule of an investment is don't lose [money]. And the second rule of an investment is don't forget the first rule. And that's all the rules there are.”
Warren Buffet's first rule of investing is to never lose money; his second is to never forget the first rule. This golden rule is key for long-term capital protection and growth. One oft-used strategy to limit losses in turbulent markets is an allocation to gold.
A 70/30 portfolio is an investment portfolio where 70% of investment capital is allocated to stocks and 30% to fixed-income securities, primarily bonds.
The 1% rule of real estate investing measures the price of an investment property against the gross income it can generate. For a potential investment to pass the 1% rule, its monthly rent must equal at least 1% of the purchase price.
Core Principles of Rule #1 Investing
These are businesses that have a proven track record, a competitive advantage (or moat), and excellent leadership. It's not just about the stock; it's about the underlying business. Pay a Margin of Safety Price: Never pay full price.
In investing, the 80-20 rule generally holds that 20% of the holdings in a portfolio are responsible for 80% of the portfolio's growth. On the flip side, 20% of a portfolio's holdings could be responsible for 80% of its losses.
Over the decades, Buffett has refined a holistic approach to assessing a company—looking not just at earnings, but its overall health, its deficiencies as well as its strengths. He focuses more on a company's characteristics and less on its stock price, waiting to buy only when the cost seems reasonable.
Buffett's Two Lists is a productivity, prioritisation and focusing approach where you write down your top 25 goals; circle your 5 highest priorities; then focus on those 5 while 'avoiding at all costs' doing anything on the remaining 20.
“One bequest provides that cash will be delivered to a trustee for my wife's benefit,” he wrote. “My advice to the trustee could not be more simple: Put 10% of the cash in short-term government bonds and 90% in a very low-cost S&P 500 index fund.”
The 120-age investment rule states that a healthy investing approach means subtracting your age from 120 and using the result as the percentage of your investment dollars in stocks and other equity investments.
What is the 90% rule in stocks?
Key Takeaways
The 90/10 strategy calls for allocating 90% of your investment capital to low-cost S&P 500 index funds and the remaining 10% to short-term government bonds. Warren Buffett described the strategy in a 2013 letter to his company's shareholders.
The 7% stop loss rule is a rule of thumb to place a stop loss order at about 7% or 8% below the buy order for any new position. If the asset price falls by more than 7%, the stop-loss order automatically executes and liquidates the traders' position.
According to this principle, individuals should hold a percentage of stocks equal to 100 minus their age. So, for a typical 60-year-old, 40% of the portfolio should be equities. The rest would comprise high-grade bonds, government debt, and other relatively safe assets.
IBD's golden rule of investing is this: Cut your loss if the stock falls 7% below your purchase price. But can you do better than that?
The question is when has volatility been reduced enough such that the marginal benefit of an additional holding is immaterial. Most studies use the fully diversified portfolio as a benchmark and then derive that a portfolio of 20-30 stocks achieves a 'similar' risk profile as the target portfolio.
Assuming you do go down the road of picking individual stocks, you'll also want to make sure you hold enough of them so as not to concentrate too much of your wealth in any one company or industry. Usually this means holding somewhere between 20 and 30 stocks unless your portfolio is very small.
The mutual fund 15x15x15 rule simply put means invest INR 15000 every month for 15 years in a stock that can offer an interest rate of 15% on an annual basis, then your investment will amount to INR 1,00,26,601/- after 15 years.
The 25x rule entails saving 25 times an investor's planned annual expenses for retirement. Originating from the 4% rule, the 25x rule simplifies retirement planning by focusing on portfolio size.
The 4% rule entails withdrawing up to 4% of your retirement in the first year, and subsequently withdrawing based on inflation. Some risks of the 4% rule include whims of the market, life expectancy, and changing tax rates. The rule may not hold up today, and other withdrawal strategies may work better for your needs.
Email or write to Warren Buffet at Berkshire Hathaway, Inc. for large investment requests that meet his published criteria. Email, call, or write to Warren Buffet at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for charitable requests.
What is Warren Buffett's 90 10 rule?
Warren Buffet's 2013 letter explains the 90/10 rule—put 90% of assets in S&P 500 index funds and the other 10% in short-term government bonds.
Warren Buffett once said, “The first rule of an investment is don't lose [money]. And the second rule of an investment is don't forget the first rule. And that's all the rules there are.”
The Buffett Rule is part of a tax plan which would require millionaires and billionaires to pay the same tax rate as middle-class families and working people. It was proposed by President Barack Obama in 2011.
Warren Buffet has stated that he would never split the class-A shares of Berkshire Hathaway, even though they trade at almost $530,000 per share. His reasoning is that he wants to only attract long-term, high-quality buy-and-hold investors (like himself) and to discourage scalpers and day traders.
Conventional wisdom holds that when you hit your 70s, you should adjust your investment portfolio so it leans heavily toward low-risk bonds and cash accounts and away from higher-risk stocks and mutual funds. That strategy still has merit, according to many financial advisors.
