📖Warren Buffett

Investor Temperament

🌿 Intermediate★★★★★

Emotional discipline matters more than IQ for investment success.

💬

The most important quality for an investor is temperament, not intellect.

— 1999 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholders Meeting，1999

🏠 Everyday Analogy

Investing is like fishing. The clever may know where the fish are, but the impatient keep changing spots and end up empty-handed. Those with patience, even with average skill, can quietly wait for the big catch. Intelligence determines what you can understand, but character determines what you can hold onto.

📖 Core Interpretation

Successful investing does not require genius-level intelligence, but it does demand a unique psychological disposition. Warren Buffett, with an IQ of approximately 148, once remarked: "Investing is not a game where the 160-IQ person beats the 130-IQ person."
💎 Key Insight：A 150-IQ investor who panics during crashes will underperform a 120-IQ investor with steady nerves. Temperament determines whether you buy during fear, hold through volatility, and ignore the noise. It can't be taught in business school — it comes from self-awareness, experience, and a deep understanding of why you own what you own.

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❓ Why It Matters

Ideal Investor Temperament: 1. Emotional Stability 2. Independent Thinking 3. Delayed Gratification 4. Acknowledging Mistakes 5. Contentment with Sufficiency

🎯 How to Practice

The Greatest Adversaries: Greed (chasing highs, using leverage), Fear (panic selling), Envy (taking risks because others are profiting), and Herd Mentality (buying simply because others are buying).

🎙️ Master's Voice

You don't need to be a rocket scientist. Investing is not a game where the guy with the 160 IQ beats the guy with 130 IQ.
Long-Term Capital Management was run by Nobel laureates and math geniuses. They failed spectacularly in 1998. Meanwhile, Buffett—using simple principles and emotional discipline—has compounded for 60+ years. The lesson: temperament beats intellect in investing.

⚔️ Practical Guide

✅ Decision Checklist

  • Am I making emotional decisions?
  • Can I stick to my strategy in a panic?
  • Have I slept well despite market volatility?
  • Do I follow my investment rules consistently?

📋 Action Steps

  1. Create investment rules and follow them mechanically
  2. Journal your emotions during market volatility
  3. Practice paper trading during crises
  4. Build a support system of rational investors

🚨 Warning Signs

  • Making decisions in anger or fear
  • Changing strategy during drawdowns
  • Checking portfolio obsessively
  • Losing sleep over investments

⚠️ Common Pitfalls

✕Successful investing requires high intelligence—average intelligence paired with the right temperament outweighs genius intelligence paired with the wrong temperament.
✕Emotion management is not about suppressing emotions—it is about establishing a correct cognitive framework to allow emotions to naturally stabilize.

📚 Case Studies

1
2008 Financial Crisis (2008)
When the VIX Surpassed 80 and Everyone Was in Panic
✨ Outcome：Warren Buffett calmly wrote an article stating, "I am buying U.S. stocks."
2
The 1999 Tech Stock Bubble (1999)
Buffett Mocked for Being "Past His Prime"
✨ Outcome：He insisted on not investing in technology stocks he didn't understand, ultimately avoiding the market crash.

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