STREET DOGS

ICONTINUE to believe that short-term market forecasts are poison and should be kept locked up in a safe place, away from children and also from grown-ups who behave in the market like children.” — Warren Buffett Avoiding being pushed and pulled by news and opinion has never been harder. Each day, investors are bombarded with more advice, regardless of the outcomes from the last batch delivered the day before. Each week the lights are flashing brighter and the volume is growing louder. Each passing year brings more confusion, not less — more opportunities to be led astray.

But we can fight back. We can arm ourselves with wisdom and historical awareness. We can take control of our media diets and learn to contextualise the things we read and hear. We can categorise the opinions we’re inundated with and know when they matter. We can remind ourselves that much of the content being generated in the financial media is what some would call “news-flavoured entertainment” — but that there’s nothing wrong with people having biased opinions or participating in the creation of entertainment so long as we, as investors, know better than to reflexively act upon what we’re hearing.

There are legitimate commentators in the financial world and there are charlatans. There are people who genuinely want to get things right, and there are those for whom deception is more profitable. Throughout history, names and situations have changed, but the conflicts have not. Everything that has happened will happen again. It’s got harder than ever to sort through the calamitous clutter, and yet it’s never been more important to do so. From Clash of the Financial Pundits by Joshua M Brown

Michel Pireu — e-mail: pireum@streetdogs.co.za