WSJ – Charlie Munger: Lessons From an Investing Giant

A great article by Jason Zweig about the one and only Charlie Munger.  Link (paywall)

As usual, a few highlights:

“Trained as a meteorologist at the California Institute of Technology, Mr. Munger thinks in terms of probabilities rather than certainties, say those who know him well. An early divorce and the death of his young son from leukemia taught Mr. Munger that adversity provides an opportunity to show what you are made of. Decades of voracious reading in history, science, biography and psychology have made him an acute diagnostician of human folly.”

My favorite piece of advice in the article:

“Mr. Munger favors what he calls “sitting on your a—,” regardless of what the investing crowd is doing, until a good investment finally materializes.”

“Many money managers spend their days in meetings, riffling through emails, staring at stock-quote machines with financial television flickering in the background, while they obsess about beating the market. Mr. Munger and Mr. Buffett, on the other hand, ‘sit in a quiet room and read and think and talk to people on the phone,’ says Shane Parrish, a money manager who edits Farnam Street, a compelling blog about decision making.  ‘By organizing their lives to tune out distractions and make fewer decisions,’ he adds, Mr. Munger and Mr. Buffett “have tilted their odds toward making better decisions’.”

Source: WSJ