Warren Buffett Speaks: Wit and Wisdom from the World’s Greatest Investor

Chapter . Introduction

Is there anyone anywhere who has more nicknames than Warren Buffett? Vanity Fair called him the Forrest Gump of finance.^[1] He’s been dubbed the Oracle of Omaha, Omaha’s plain dealer, the corn-fed capitalist, St. Warren (with a less than admiring inflection), and the financial world’s Will Rogers. He could also be called the king of bling for his ownership of jewelry stores, including the second-largest in the United States, Borsheim’s of Omaha.

Several books attempt to capture the personality, the philosophy, and the very essence of the world’s most successful investor; but words fail to adequately describe this unique individual . . . except perhaps his own words. Nobody does Warren Buffett as well as Warren Buffett. It was this realization that inspired this collection of his aphorisms and observations.

Who is this modern American hero/questionable saint? Here are the basics. The details will unfold as you read the rest of the book . . . told in his own words.

Warren Edward Buffett was born August 30, 1930, in Omaha, Nebraska. He attended grade school there but went to junior high and high school in the Washington, D.C., area, where his father, Howard Homan Buffett, served four terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. In college, Warren abandoned the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania because he didn’t think he was learning anything. He enrolled at the University of Nebraska (Lincoln campus), where he earned a bachelor of science degree in ...