Guy Spier’s 20 Best Quotes | Evolution of a Value Investor

Guy Spier is a Legendary value investor who has been widely influenced by the teachings of Warren Buffett. 

The Evolution of the Value Investor: 

An Oxford graduate, Spier went to work on Wall Street before leaving after been dissatisfied with the ethics of the investment business which he stated was “like the movie the Wolf of Wall Street”. 

While in New York he stumble across a book about Warren Buffett and after which decided to setup his own fund not just on the investment principles of Buffett but also following the same moral code. 

Fund Performance:

Since creating the Aquamarine fund in September 1997. They have generated a compounded rate of 8.9% annually, versus just 6.2% for the market index (S&P 500).  The total return since inception is 376.4%, versus 202.4% for the Market index (S&P 500)

Fun Fact: Guy Spier is great friends with another Legendary investor Mohnish Pabrai and they are both known for bidding US$650,100 for a charity lunch with Warren Buffett in 2008. After which they become friends with Warren Buffett and also Charlie Munger.

Investment Strategy: Value Investor, Long term. 

1. Trade when the Market is Closed

“Try to Trade when the Market is Closed” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor). 

In the words of the Father of Value Investing Benjamin Graham, the Stock Market is a voting machine in the short term governed on fear & greed but in the long term it’s a weighing machine based on business fundamentals.

When the Market is open, emotion and FOMO is high, this can lead to impulse trades. Thus Guy Spier suggests trading when the market is close to help clarify that the business value doesn’t change as much as the Stock Market Fluctuates. 

2. Profit from Misperceptions

“Value Investing requires you to see where the crowd is wrong, so you can profit from their misperceptions” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor).

  When you value a business using fundamentals you can see when the price widely fluctuates wildly, this volatility is a potential opportunity.

Many successful investors are those who bet against the Consensus and be right, this is a Contrarian Investing strategy. Famous Contrarian Investors include: Sir John Templeton, Michael Burry (Big Short) etc.

3. Understand your wiring

“We can’t change the world, only ourselves by trying to get an understanding of our own messed up wiring” – Guy Spier.   

As the lords prayer states “Grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can and wisdom to know the difference”. 

The same goes for when investing understanding your own psychological biases and reactions to Stock Market declines can help us to put systems in place in order to improve. Self awareness is key.

4. Be Unconventional

“People will always stop you doing the right thing, if’s it’s unconventional”  – Guy Spier Legendary Investor.   

Being the only sane person in a crazy world is very difficult to do. We are programmed to want to follow the herd and the “perceived” Safety that brings. But doing the right thing whether Morally or just for a business decision pays dividends over the long term. 

5. Practice Emotional Detachment

“Attaining the Intellectual Clarity and Emotional Detachment that investing requires is tough” – Guy Spier Legendary Investor.   

Intellectual Clarity and sorting the signal from the noise is vital for investing success.

Legendary Investor Carl Ichan has a favourite poem which is, If by Rudyard Kipling this says “If you can keep your head while everyone else is losing theirs” . Thus Emotional Detachment is vital when making investment decisions, but that doesn’t mean you have to be emotionless in your day to day life.

For Example, Bold Investor Bill Ackman is know to become welled up with emotion easily and shed a tear watching certain heart pulling movies. 

6. Manage Yourself

“I try to Manage myself not just my investment portfolio” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor).  You make the decisions which govern your life & your investment portfolio, thus being self aware and managing yourself goes along way. 

7. Put yourself in a good Environment

“We like to think we change our environment, but the truth is it changes us” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor).  Like it or not, our environment influences us majorly whether this be place you work, friends you associate with, information you consume etc.

Thus controlling your environment is vital for your investment success, in the words of Real Estate Investor & Motivational Speaker Grant Cardone, “If you don’t control your environment, someone else will”.

8. Shift Your Mental Attitude

“When your mental attitude shifts, remarkable things begin to happen” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor).

We all have those days when we are feeling negative or down, the trick is to “shift” your mental attitude. The Legendary Public Speaker Tony Robbins talks about using a 60 second rule, have a 60 second limit on negative thoughts which don’t serve you. 

9. Control Your Environment

“Our Environment is much stronger than our intellect few understand this critical point” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor).   When it comes to investing, mainstream news is generally designed to provoke an emotion and the information is secondary. 

10. Stick to people better than us

“We should stick close to people who are better than us, so we can become more like them” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor) People are a major part of our environment, thus be aware & limit your time around those who may be energy “drains” negative or may not have the same moral compass as yourself. Ideally we want to associate with those who have traits we admire.

Even if you can’t do this physically, interviews, Books etc can all help you be “closer” to the people you admire. We even have our investing strategy Course & VIP Group which is full of motivated & smart people, ready to help you level up. 

11. Investing is about more than money

“Investing is about more than money, as your wealth grows you will want to give alot back to Society”  – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor)  . This is very true and an interesting Irony, once you make millions or even billions the natural tendency is to want to give back & help others. You realise that is what truly matters. 

12. Long Term Compounding

“Long Term Compounding is an investors Best friend, so why get in it’s way” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor).  The Power of Compound Interest was called the 8th Wonder of the world Albert Einstein said: “He who understands it earns it and he who doesn’t pays it”.

13. Set Devoted Goals

“A goal that seems impossible in one instance can become entirely possible in the next, devote every ounce of your mind, body and soul to reach it” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor). Setting ambitious goals & then “devoting” your mind, body and soul to achieve them can be huge. 

14. WillPower is a Limited Resource

“Psychologists show willpower is a limited resource, so be sure not to deplete it” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor). It is very difficult to continually resist a certain temptation thus be aware of this and try to limit the number of times you need to resist a craving per day.

15. Build a Reputation

“It takes 20 minutes to build a reputation & 2 mins to ruin it, if you think about that you do things differently” – Guy Spier (Legendary investor).

Your reputation precedes you thus building a solid foundation & sticking to your morals & internal compass pays dividends long term. 

16. Breaks increase strength 

“The World Breaks everyone and after some are strong in broken places” – Guy Spier. (Legendary Investor). When we go through challenges in life it can “break us down” in many different ways.

Although this may feel tough at the time, the benefit is we tend to come back stronger in those places. It is like training a muscle in the gym you must tear the muscle fibres in order for them to grow back stronger. 

17. Use Inner Scorecard

“I was driven by what Warren Buffett calls the Outer Scorecard, the need for approval and recognition (by others) , this is a dangerous weakness” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor).

Your Inner scorecard is a set of principles & values which you have thought about & decided to live by in order to live a fulfilled life. This is your internal compass, so when the winds of society blow and may push many people into the rocks you will be on track in the right direction.  

18. The Crowd is Irrational 

In Investing an “Inner Scorecard” or compass is vital. Sometimes you may make a decision which will be criticised or unpopular to many.

Thus, having an internal guide to keep you on track is vital. Even Warren Buffett was heavily criticised for not investing into Tech stocks just before the dot com bubble burst in the year 2000!

19. Learn from Mistakes

“An essential component of our education is to learn from mistakes if you don’t make mistakes, we may not learn at all” – Guy Spier (Legendary Investor)

Mistakes are apart of our education & evolution as a human being, embrace them don’t avoid them.

20. Choose the Right Environment

I have outlined alot in this post about the important of “Choosing & Controlling your Environment” , the information you take in and people you associate with etc. Now this can be very hard to do in person.

Thus, if you want to level up your environment and also learn how to be a great fundamental investor check out our,  investing strategy Course & VIP Group which is full of motivated & smart people, ready to help you to your investing game to that next level.

We open the course to a limited number of people each month to keep the quality high, so be sure to click the links above to find out more now.   

Guy Spier Quotes Gallery