Interview · 2019

Charlie Munger on Investing (CNBC, 2019)

2019 30m video

Source: CNBC / YouTube · embedded from the original; we don’t host it.

A compact dose of late-period Munger on the one subject he never tired of: how to think about owning businesses for the long haul. At 95 he is as direct as ever — skeptical of frantic trading, dismissive of people who confuse motion with progress, and quietly insistent that the hard part of investing is behavioral, not analytical.

Why watch. It’s a clean, concentrated statement of the Munger-Buffett creed without the marathon length of a Daily Journal meeting. He returns to the fundamentals: buy a few good things, understand what you own, sit still, and keep your emotions out of the way. The familiar targets get their due — over-diversification, the illusion that activity adds value, and the gap between genuine investment and correlation-chasing.

For the full Berkshire-meeting and Daily Journal sessions where he develops these ideas at length, see the other recordings in this archive. Watch the source via the official YouTube upload linked above.

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Auto-generated from YouTube captions and lightly cleaned — punctuation and proper names may be off. We don’t own this; all rights belong to CNBC / YouTube. Source ↗

Charlie thank you very much for taking the time to sit down with us today you spent a lot of time today talking about how people who think that they can beat the market averages are probably fooling themselves how much tougher it's gotten to be a value investor or even just an investor in general and I was just wondering do you think the golden era of investing is over well not forever why well because I think it isn't like the last recession or the last big opportunity that the world we're gonna get is passed there'll be opportunities in the future there are times that are easier and there are times which are harder so is right now tougher just valuations have come up would be the competition sorting through those opportunities is more intelligent more aggressive and more numerous of course it's harder do you think that the net result is people are gonna get worse results do you think that the number of people who are smarter who have better information than they used to that will go down or it will just be a question of valuations coming down at some point well I think valuations will come will go up and down because they always have and I think we'll have smart people in the in this game forever lots of them the opportunities that we all remember came from tomorrow ice period about 90% of natural stock buyers got very discouraged to stocks that's what created the opportunity for these fabulous records that my generation had and that was a rare opportunity that came to a very rural people of whom I was one was another people who start now have a much less they have lower opportunity do you think we saw a generational low after 2008 beginning of 2009 generational maybe yeah I don't think the behavior is gonna be cheaper was them yes it was low huge opportunities then what about just back around December Christmas Eve prices were down 20% and further for a lot of stocks well I don't follow the details and remember the exact days that I know that when the Daily Journal bought those bank stocks it was basically a little low-tech that was an accident no way deserves some credit no well but the exact perfect timing was an accident what about the lack of volatility that we've seen in the markets that's also kind of as central bank's got into the game and increased liquidity well of course it's with all this massive central bank interference I think that was necessary to do others I admire the politicians who did it and the technocrats including the Federal Reserve people and I think it was absolutely required and that the danger they were avoiding was worth some the troubles they caused so but it was very peculiar and it did have the accidental effect of bailing out the rich in order to help the poor and nobody was doing that because they loved the rich they just didn't have any other tool than the kid and they had to do something so the inequality that came from that it wasn't malevolence it was an accident and it probably won't happen again and it's not a permanent conspiracy against the poor it was it was an accident that we had the huge recession caused partly by passive stupidity in finance and banality and then when we ran out of tools and had to do something really peculiar that we'd never done before that was the wise thing to do given the amount of trouble we were in you got to remember the trouble allowed to run we might have had a revisitation of the kind of troubles that brought Hitler into power so we were facing real difficulties and both parties and our technicals got together for the last time I think and work this out you can all be proud I've been proud of nothing in politics sense there are all sorts of political proposals out there right now to try and solve that inequality that was created everything from a 70% tax on the highest brackets to a wealth tax to taxing stock buybacks or even preventing them do you think any other we have to destroy so many qualities probably gonna go away by itself why well I think there was a we hit a peak of inequality because authorities had no alternative but to print a lot of money of course that bailed out asset values and but that was a fluke and they can't they can't really do more of it they've played that game once as much as they really can and so I don't think people were worried about inequality here should worry too much about a lot more of it from a lot more interest rate lowering we are still stuck with this populist fervor though and yeah sure but that submit was breathing-- how do you think that plays out well I don't know so far it's probably doubt in waves sometimes the Democrats are and sometimes the Republicans in my lifetime the country has run better net because we had two parties each of which was partly in control if either party have been and totally in control of all branches of the government I think we would be worse off today do you think there's room for a third I think we buy going back and forth little tension I think we got about the right amount of social safety net it would have been evil not to have as much and we probably couldn't afford a lot more do you think there's room for a third political party the way Howard Schultz is kind of stepping in potentially well we got one Abraham Lincoln took a civil war to create but I think it's unlikely that we have the last time we got a third party movement it just elected one of the two parties who otherwise would not have been elected you mean Ross Perot where are you going yes I mean Ross Perot Ross Perot or like the Republicans a year are there any politicians you look at and admire sure but generally speaking it's not a genre is my favorite what are the politicians you do admire who do you think has good ideas right now well I'm not ecstatic about anybody if you ask me who performed pretty well recently I'd say Mike Bloomberg do you think he has a shot at winning I don't know what this that but I think he was a pretty reasonable evil kind of a guy who's trying to do right you mean in his job in his term as mayor yeah I'm sitting yeah right what do you think if you have not been thoroughly impressed by the political process since they came together to try and combat the Great Recession what do you think about our political fortunes going from here do you worry or is it something that you think will be well I would prefer that they do parties hated each other less and that everyone was more rational you don't like vast political excess and shouted epithets and so forth I really do but what can I do about them I'm just I can be cheerful you touched a little on the national debt which is just hit 22 trillion dollars you touched a little on yeah we're a new territory but that doesn't mean that it's crystal clear we can't get by what we've done we just know we're in uncharted territory you worry about the eventualities of a growing national debt well I don't worry much because I regard it as a sense of a great nation well and good time be ruined so where is Rome where is Britain at a day they all pass and so our turn is bound to come some day but I don't like thinking about it too much but is it coming some day sure of course it is but you have no guess as to win no earlier you've been a huge booster of China's economies and some of the Chinese companies and the entrepreneurs who run them we've gotten obviously into a little stickier situation with China with the trade talks that are going back and forth and maybe a different relationship than we've been dealing with for the last 20 or 30 years what's what do you think about China right now in its fuel well I think it's natural to have some tension or the truth of the matter is that Ricardo when he invented the law of comparative advantage did not predict but someday the law of comparative advantage would make with grass would greatly accelerate the growth of some poor nation which had a particularly able populace like China free trade would enable them to come up rapidly and take a lot of power away from the companies that bill on top and like being on top he just didn't think about it once we realized it could happen I don't think it's crazy to think there may be some limit to the amount of destruction we want to Kerr in our aerospace industry or something so I don't regard free trade is such a pure thing that we could never under any circumstances that our beam and I think that the advantages the United States and China after getting along are so great on both sides that dissipate they will reach some tolerable adjustment do you think the president's right to raise the questions about whether free trade is really free trade and open trade and fair to both sides I don't consider wrong to have some limits on free trade that matter of the United States I don't want many I don't want them to be huge but some limits on the operation of free trade are quite acceptable have you changed your perspective on Chinese investments to this point based on this trade talks or based on the new relationship we may have going forward I basically believe in the trade because I want two companies two countries have a lot of hydrogen bombs to be trading happily with one another instead of posturing the way we are with Russia so I prefer our relations with China to our relations with Russia and I think China thinks like what is and I anticipate that we will get along it will be crazy on both sides United States and China don't there's any one country both sides should want to keep friendly it's the other you know you bring up nuclear power or nuclear bombs and I just wonder what worries you the most and the arsenal of things that could go wrong is it nuclear bombs is it artificial intelligence is it no it's it's it's a nuclear war a nuclear war would be a really real disaster global warming is something that you cope with it we had to but a nuclear war is that's that is really serious you point to our relationship with Russia obviously we have the situation with North Korea I'm all for making the Russian relationship better - how well that's difficult but you got to work at it I don't think the right way to handle every tough guy that's fighting against you is hostility there are times I think when they ought to be killed with kindness even if they're wrong is that emphasis on killed or emphasis on kindness I think kindness they're worse things in the world when you're rich and powerful giving a little for the peace of the world your concerns about that where would you rate it because obviously this is something you've thought about for a long time and watched for a long time are you less worried or more worried than you were 10 years 20 years ago 40 years ago about that situation I don't think since the day they invented the hydrogen bomb I've had a moment when I didn't think that mankind's main problem was avoiding a modern war using hydrogen bombs it's a very circus problem sure can I ask you about some news of the day today while you were in your board meeting and then with the shareholders there was news out that Amazon is actually pulling its headquarters bid for New York City and I don't know how closely you followed that but it's certainly an interesting study when you start looking at how much states and municipalities should be doing to woo corporate investments and when or if there's a time where it's giving too much or if they're standing up and they're just lost a potential for a huge investment well of course we've had states doing this kind of thing for a long time and by and large the states don't have ways to do it the states that have would come yes it's been smart of them to do - whoo outside companies to come in and of course it will go on time - wretched excess that's our system no I don't worry too much about it and my attitude toward Amazon is it the phenomenon of nature it's hardly been ever anything like it in the history of our country and very talented driven people and I would not have predicted that success that happened and now that's that one I wouldn't want to predict that it was gonna stop either I think it may run a long way just back to the idea of whether New York created a big problem for itself and I was just thinking about it in terms of the new tax laws that are there and the blue states the salt states have lost a lot in the new tax legislation it's basically punishment from the government for having such high local taxes because he can no longer deduct those on a federal level so New York is gonna get hit with that you combine that with the idea that it's not going to be not just only wooing Amazon but what message that may send to the broader business community could a state like New York or someone in the Northeast region really have shot themselves in the foot with a double whammy there are a number of places that have shot themselves in the foot Connecticut California New York City it's it's been serious and driving the rich people out is pretty dumb if you're a state or a city and the idea that you're going to help New York by rich people out of course it hurts New York and of course it hurt Connecticut the idea that beautiful real estate Encana down 50% in value they've driven out all the rich people and California is doing the same thing I know a lot of rich people who love California it's I think it's really stupid for a state to drive the rich people out there old they keep your hospitals busy they don't burden your schools the police department your prisons they give a lot who wouldn't want rich people I think Florida and Hawaii but both been very smarter than the way they have recruited rich people and I think Connecticut in California have been stupid do you think the country risks some of those same stupid policies it some of the people in California or so any growth they like gravity no rich people well that's not my view but you can understand why some people think that way let's go back to Amazon and the growth that you've seen there I know in the past that you've incredible what they've done yeah and you've called Bezos ferociously smart yes what do you think about the prospects for Amazon longer term there are some movements in Washington that push back against him whether it's because he's the owner of the Washington Post or whether it's just one company getting too big and regulators worrying about that I guess is he still has a long ways to go up you're a lawyer too was well one's a lawyer always a lawyer correct not really that's a long time ago what do you think about his move that he's made recently with the owner of the National Enquirer to say look he just came out and said they're blackmailing me they're extorting me well I admire people who simply confront problems head-on so I'm I have no quarrel with he's gonna probably go National Enquirer but I regard it is a little nothing place that the world would be could well do without and so on and don't they behave badly and he's objecting vigorously I'm all for it let's talk about bad behavior in business because I think of you sometimes as the high priest somebody who looks around and lods good behavior but also calls out bad behavior where you see it what do you think some of the worst behaviors are in business today well I think the behavior of the mortgage and banking industry in the in the delusional prosperity that preceded the great real estate bust was obscene practically everywhere and I think the people who got in a lot of the trouble will richly deserved it and I think they didn't get enough if God were just they would have been there would have been more penalties they were bailed out to some extent because the country had to do it and but it never should have been allowed to run all that disgusting lying and cheating and delusional assumptions it was just we all would consider it totally illicit an awful $2.00 ate the baby food to make more money to an extent where the babies died and they were doing pretty much the same thing with the basic but their basic product they were adult aerating it so badly that it threatened the whole welfare Republic this was deeply evil it's one of the things Elizabeth Warren is really right about and you don't agree with her on much that's true but I agree with her on that is that behavior still taking place or you think it's well it's attenuated thank God but is there still some craziness in finance of course there always will be but it's it's way better anything that rises to your radar screen now that may be under the radar for other people well nobody you know is how much of this money printing we can do and of course we have politicians who liked and they're both parties who like to believe that it doesn't matter how much you do look and ignore the whole subject and just print money is convenient well that's the way the Roman Empire behaved that was wrong yeah that's the way the Weimar Republic it's there's a point where it's dangerous and of course my other tools would something is big and dangerous is to stay a long way away from it other people want to come as close as possible without going in that's too tricky for me I don't like it in terms of possibly getting sucked up into it yes I might if there's a big whirlpool my rubberized to a long way for a there were a bunch of canoeist once that tried to run the errand Rapids I think they were in Scandinavia and the fact of the Whirlpool's were so big made them very eager to Ted tackle was you would challenge death rate was a hundred percent I regard that is a normal result bill Melinda Gates put out their annual letter this week to and in it they had a list of a number of things that have caught them by surprise things they learned that they didn't see coming one of them I think was that toilets haven't really changed in the last hundred years another was they have as a matter of fact the Japanese made the openings bigger and what you want to go away goes away better they have changed their way better I don't think they paid enough attention to their toilets notice to see they increase the size of the hole without telling them it does wash away more waste with less water I will give you takes away more ways takes away more with less faster better then a list of things sometimes that data can be sexist obviously whoever's programming stuff puts it in another is that DNA test can actually catch serial killers that has been a pleasant change catching silly it's here yes I would agree I use this though as a way of just getting into things that may have caught you by surprise is there anything recently that really caught you off guard or that snuck up on you I was surprised when simple banks started printing money and buying massive amounts of private security ISM they hadn't done that previously in my lifetime honest at least not in a big way and they did it massively and it seems to work considerably and that surprised me and by the way it surprised the whole economic version if you read the textbooks on economics nobody was predicting this would be the logical response we're not out of it yet though no of course not you're never out of it until you're dead do you think we can call it a success without seeing quantitative easing wrapped up the big balance sheets kind of wound down or you think we've come far enough out of it to say this worked well all human successes are successes so far and this is a success so far and we don't know for sure what they although what consequences would be in the old days when people thought sure the currency should be back with gold and they wanted the inflation rate to be zero and the social safety net to be almost zero they created a lot of GDP growth and a lot of prosperity but with horrible recessions and to some extent the recessions automatically cured themselves when we got into the business of big interventions given by the example of the Great Depression what we got is pretty much a century of extreme prosperity with relatively minor recessions and but we're using methods that are so extreme that maybe we can't use a lot more of them and we don't know the answer to that if an economist told me he knew the answer to that I wouldn't believe him either way wouldn't matter which way his opinion was I just think we don't know is that because that question is too hard are you just don't trust economists in general well the reason the economists are wrong is because it's so hard you know the Greek philosopher who said man never steps into the same river twice you know the man is different and so is there ever any goes in the second back that's the trouble of economics it's not like physics the this is the same damn recipe different time gets a different result and I don't think the economics profession I think they're gradually coming to that recognition but it makes their subject harder nutty I'm more easy and they weren't handling it so perfectly even when they thought it was easier so of course it's hard for them and why would anybody think they know exactly take japan's present position can Japan double its national debt just yes because it feels like it from here I don't know I don't know charlie so many of people who come here come because they're looking for advice not on business or investments as much as they're looking for just advice on life there were a lot of questions today people trying to figure out what the secret to life is to a long and happy life and I just wonder if you were but that is easy because it's so simple we don't have a lot of em but you don't have a lot of resentment you don't overspend your income you stay cheerful in spite of your troubles you deal with reliable people and you do what you're supposed to do all these simple rules work so well to make your life better and they're so trite how old were you when you figured this out about seven I could tell that some of my older people were a little bonkers I've always been able to recognize and other people were a little bonkers and it helped me because there's so much irrationality in the world and I've been thinking about it for a long time it's causes and it's Prevention's and so forth it sure it's helped me and I guess staying cheerful with because of the wise thing to do is that so hard and can you be cheerful when you're absolutely mired and deep hatred and resentment of course you can't so why would you take it on is there any advice you would go back and give your 20 year old self I have not many of my children have worked out well and I've had very little to do with it I think they come under the world with a certain extent pre-made and you just sit there and watch aye-aye-aye I don't think they're it's simply amazing to me as a parent to note how much is sort of preordained the shy baby is a shy adult the booming obnoxious domineering baby is the booming domineering and mashes adult I have never found a way to fix that I can be cheerful about it but I can't fix it I can change my reaction but I can't change the outcome well Charlie I want to thank you so much for your time today it's really been a pleasure being here well I'm glad to be here you know I seem to have a guru level and India and China that like me now that's pretty much my whole favorable constituency well it's more than a lot of other people here and so I'm thankful for what I have and we are thankful for having you here thank you

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