How Investment Pros Should Think About The Future

Saw this over at the The Big Picture Blog  the other day and thought I would quote it.  This is a common sense approach since all investing is the process of making certain bets about the future.  Marks succinctly says what most of us try to convey to clients all the time.  

“I confess, I think about the future. So do my colleagues. If someone who’s spent decades investing doesn’t have an opinion about what lies ahead, there’s something wrong. I believe our clients want us to apply the benefit of our experience in gauging and reacting to the opportunities and risks that lie ahead.

But I have a mantra on this subject, too: “It’s one thing to have an opinion; it’s something very different to assume it’s right and act on that assumption.” We have views on the future. And they can cause us to “lean” toward offense or defense. Just never so much that for the results to be good, our views have to be right.”

-Howard Marks, Oaktree Capital Management

January 10, 2012

Link:  The Big Picture-Opinions About The Future

BTW posting may be a bit light over the next couple of days as I have to be out quite a bit seeing people.