While physicist Sir Isaac Newton is widely viewed as the leading authority on gravity and motion, economist 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Benjamin Graham, best known for his book “The Intelligent Investor,” is lauded as a top guru of finance and investment. Known as the father of 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:value investing, “The Intelligent Investor: The Definitive Book on Value Investing” is considered one of the most important books on the topic. By evaluating companies with surgical precision, Graham excelled at making money in the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:stock market without taking big risks.

One of Graham’s key contributions was to point out the irrationality and groupthink that was often rampant in the stock market. Thus, according to Graham, investors should always aim to profit from the whims of the stock market, rather than participate in it. His principles of investing safely and successfully continue to influence 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:investors today.

This article will examine Graham’s early career work, some key 🐠concepts related to value investing from “The Intelligent Investor,” and how Graham’s ideas helped inform the successful investing principles of later investors, namely Warren Buffett.

Beginnings of "The Intelligent Investor"

After graduating from Columbia University in 1914, Graham went to work on Wall Street. During his 15-year career, he was able to cultivate a sizable personal nest egg. Unfortunately, Graham, like many others, lost most of his money in the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:stock market crash of 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression.

Those experiences taught Graham lessons about minimizing downside risk by investing in companies whose shares traded far below the companies’ 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:liquidation value. In simple terms, his goal was to buy a dollar’s worth of assets for $0.50. To do this, he utilized 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:market psychology, using market fears to his advantage. These ideals inspired him to write “Security Analysis,” which was published in 1934 with a co-author, David Dodd. The book was written in the early 1930s, when both authors were professors at Columbia University’s business school. The book chronicles Graham’s methods for analyzing securities.

In “Security Analysis,” Graham’s first task is to help stock mar🍒ket participants distinguish between an investment and speculation. After a thorough analysis, it should be clear that an investment is going to protect the principal and provide an adequate return. Anything that does not meet these cr🔯iteria is speculation.

Graham also advocated for a diffe꧟rent perspective in regards to stock ownership; equity stock🏅s confer part ownership of a business. For Graham, in the short term, the stock market acts like a voting machine, and in the long term, the stock market acts like a weighing machine—so, in the long run, the true value will be reflected in the stock’s price.

Graham’s method focused on determining the value of the operating company behind a stock. “Security Analysis” enumerates several examples where the market undervalued certain out-of-favor stocks that ended up being important opportunities for the savviest investors. These and other concepts, including “margin of safety” and “period of financial distress,” helped to lay the groundwork for Graham’s later work in “The Intelligent Investor” and helped to pioneer some of his pivotal investing concepts.

What You Can Learn From "The Intelligent Investor"

Graham, along with David Dodd, began teaching value investing as an investment approach at Columbia Business School in 1928. In 1949, Graham published “The Intelligent Investor.” Here ar𒐪e some of the key concepts from the book.

Mr. Market

Graham’s favorite allegory was that of Mr. Market. This imaginary person, “Mr. Market,” turns up every day at the stockholder’s office offering to buy or sell his shares at a different price. Sometimes the proposed prices make sense,🌜 but other times, the proposed prices are off the mark, given current economic realities.

Individual investors have the power to accept or reject Mr. Market’s offers on any given day, giving them a leg up over those who feel compelled to be invested at all times, regardless of the current 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:valuation of securities. It is most advisable for an investor to concentrate on the real-life performance of their companies and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:dividends they receive, rather than paying attention to the changing sentiments of Mr. Market as determining the value of the stocks. 🌸An investor is neither right nor wrong if others share the same sentiments as them; only facts and analysis can make them right.

Value Investing

Value investing is deriving the intrinsic value of a common stock independent of its 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:market price. Analyzing a company’s assets, earnings, and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:dividend payouts can help identify the intrinsic value of a stock, which can the🍬n be compared with its market price. If the intrinsic value is more than the market value—in other words, the stock is undervalued in the market—the investor should buy and hold until a mean reversion occurs. The mean reversion theoryꦆ holds that over time, the market price and the intrinsic price will converge. At this point, the stock price will reflect its true value.

When an inve🐓stor buys a stock at a price less than its intrinsic 𝓀value, they are essentially purchasing it at a discount. Once the stock is actually trading at its intrinsic value, they should sell.

Margin of Safety

Graham also advocated for an investing approach that provides a margin of safety—or room for human error—for the investor. There are a couple of ways to accomplish this, but buying undervalued or o🌳ut-of-favor stocks is the most important. The irrationality of investors, the inability to predict t🍷he future, and the fluctuations of the stock market can provide a margin of safety for investors.

Investors can also achieve a margin of safety by diversifying their portfolios and purchasing stocks in companies with high 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:dividend yields and low 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:debt-to-equity (D/E) ratios. This margin of safety is intended ꦯto mitigate the investor’s losses in the event t🃏hat a company goes bankrupt.

The Benjamin Graham Formula

Typically, Graham only purchased stocks that were trading at two-thirds of their net-net value, as a way of 𝄹establishing his margin of safety. Net-net value is another value investing technique developed by Graham, where a company is valued based solely on its net current assets.

The original Benjamin Graham Formula for findin🅺g the intrinsic value of a stock was:

$\begin{aligned}&\text{V} = \text{EPS} \times ( 8.5 + 2g ) \\&\textbf{where:} \\&\text{EPS} = \text{Trailing 12-month earnings per share} \\&g = \text{Long-term growth rate} \\\end{aligned}$​V=EPS×(8.5+2g)where:EPS=Trailing&n🧜bsp;12-mﷺonth earnings per shareg=Long-term growth rate​

With V representing the intrinsic value of the stock, EPS as the trailing 12-month 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:earnings per share, 8.5 is the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of a zero-growth company, an🐻d g iꦿs the company’s long-term growth rate.

Later, Graham revised his formula to include both a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:risk-free rate of 4.4% (the average yield of high-grade 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:corporate bonds in 1962) and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:current yield on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:AAA corporate bonds represented by the letter Y:

$\begin{aligned}&\text{V} = \frac { \text{EPS} \times ( 8.5 + 2g ) \times 4.4 }{ Y } \\&\textbf{where:} \\&Y = \text{AAA corporate bond yield (in 1962)} \\\end{aligned}$​V=YEPS×(8.5+2g)×4.4​where:Y=AAA corporate bﷺond yield (in 1962)​

Dividend Stocks

澳洲🌌幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Many of Graham’s investment pri⛦nciples are timeless—they remain as relevan൲t today as they were when he penned them. Graham criticized corporations for their obscure and irregular methods of financial reporting that made it difficult for investors to get an accurate picture of the health of a company.

Graham would later write a book about 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:how to interpre𒁃t fin🔴ancial statements, from balance sheets and income and expense statements to financial ratios. Graham also advocated for companies paying dividends to their shareholders, rather than keeping all of their profits as retained earnings.

"The Intelligent Investor" and Warren Buffett

About “The Intelligent Investor,” legendary investor 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Warren Buffett—who Graham famously mentored—described it as “by far the best book on investing ever written.” In fact, after reading it at age 19, Buffett enrolled in 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Columbia Business School to study under Graham, with whom he developed a lifelong friendship. He later worked for Graham at his investment company, Graham-Newman Corp., until Graham retired.

Graham’s students all eventually develo🔯ped their own strategies and philo🌱sophies, but they all shared the main principle of creating a margin of safety.

In general, Buffett follows the principles of value investing, which looks for securities whose prices are unjustifiably low based on their intrinsic worth. Buffett also considers company performa💖nce, company debt, profit margins, whether companies are public, how relia🍌nt they are on commodities, and how cheap they are.

澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Bu꧂ffett’s strategy differs from Graham’s in that he stresses the importance of a business’s quality, and he preaches the virtue of holding stocks for the long haul. Buffett doesn’t seek 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:capital gain. Rather, his goal is ownership in quality companies that are extremely capable of generating earnings; Buffett is not concerned that the stock market ever recognizes a company’s value. Even so, Buffett said that no one ever lost money by following Graham’s methods.

The Bottom Line

Although details of Graham’s specific investments aren’t readily available, he reportedly averaged an approximate 20% 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:annual return over his many years of managing money. His method of buying low-risk stocks with 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:high return potential has made him a true pioneer in the financial analysis space, and 澳洲幸运5🌺开奖号码历史查询:many other 📖successful value investors have his methodology to thank.

While he is best known for the books he published in the field of value investing—most notably “The Intelligent Investor”—Graham was also instrumental in drafting elements of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Securities Act of 1933, legislation requiring companies to 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:provide financial statements certified by independent accountants.