How could Warren Buffett become one of the world’s richest men only by investing? Let’s see the "secret" and net worth of the "Oracle of Omaha".
More often than not, investing can be a risky endeavor if not done correctly. Trying to predict how the market will move is sometimes associated with luck, much like winning a gamble in a casino.
Some people, however, seem to have a magic investment wand, turning every stock they buy into gold. The most obvious example is Warren Buffett. His fortune was all completely made on the stock market, amassing an unbelievable net worth.
Buffett is known as the “Oracle of Omaha”, because all of his predictions seem to magically come to life. Somehow, he sees in stocks and businesses something that other people don’t.
However, as Buffett himself will say, the secret to his success is much simpler than one would think.
Warren Buffett knew he’d dedicate his life to money from a very early age. He visited the New York Stock Exchange at 11 years old, and he had already accumulated $6.000 before going to college.
Warren Buffett was a millionaire at 30 years old and a billionaire at 60. He was never in a hurry to become super-rich, he always waited for the right opportunity and exploited it with patience.
Once he became CEO of Berkshire Hataway, he made it his holding company of the many shares he owns. Today, it’s one of the most successful holding companies in the world.
Warren Buffett’s “secret”
But how could a simple boy from Nebraska become so successful? The stock market is incredibly volatile, and sometimes not even expert economists can accurately predict how it will move.
Rather simply, Warren Buffett’s success is not due to the stock market. Buffett always said that he “buys businesses, not stocks”.
Warren Buffett never tried to predict how the stock will move on the market just by looking at its previous movements. In other words, he thinks technical analysis is pretty much useless.
The only way to predict if a stock will increase in price is by analyzing the business it’s attached to, not the stock itself. Warren Buffett (and now Berkshire Hataway) always looked into the company’s accounting documents before investing in it. He’d look at the company’s product, revenue, profit, corporate management and so on.
This is how Warren Buffett could predict when a small, basically unknown company could eventually become a leader in the sector. Sometimes, he would even buy stocks as they were falling in price, just because he believed the company would thrive in the long term.
This is the secret to Warren Buffett’s success. And what a success! Thanks to this strategy, Warren Buffett’s net worth today amounts to $103 billion.
Buffett became the world’s fifth richest man without inventing a fabulous technological product or a rich inheritance. He just exercised a bit of patience and deep analysis of a business’ fundamentals.
