Jonathan Clements Quotes

Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny should take a few pointers from the mutual-fund industry. All three are trying to pull off elaborate hoaxes. But while Santa and the bunny suffer the derision of eight year olds everywhere, actively-managed stock funds still have an ardent following among otherwise clear-thinking adults. This continued loyalty amazes me. Reams of statistics prove that most of the fund industry's stock pickers fail to beat the market.

Most investors are pretty smart. Yet most investors also remain heavily invested in actively managed stock funds. This is puzzling. The temptation, of course, is to dismiss these folks as ignorant fools. But I suspect these folks know the odds are stacked against them, and yet they are more than happy to take their chances.

It's one of the ironies of investing. The rich can afford to take risks, but they don't need to. The poor need to take risks, but they often can't afford to.

Thomas Wollaston, in the Annals and Magazine of Natural History, complained that Darwin did no seem to know what a species actually was. The British Quarterly, deliberately sitting up trouble, speculated that a time might come when a monkey could propose marriage to a genteel British lady. Perhaps cruelest of all was a cartoon in Punch magazine, depicting a gorilla with a sign on its neck. Deliberately evoking the anti-slavery tract of Darwin's Wedgwood forbears, the sign read:Am I a Man and a Brother?

I am a huge, huge, huge fan of index funds. They are the investor's best friend and Wall Street's worst nightmare.

In the Modern Age, there are still those who refuse to contradict a single word of the Bible, even though the Bible contradicts itself.

What to do when the market goes down? Read the opinions of the investment gurus who are quoted in the WSJ. And, as you read, laugh. We all know that the pundits can't predict short-term market movements. Yet there they are, desperately trying to sound intelligent when they really haven't got a clue.

Natural science in England, as Darwin already knew to his cost, was still the purview of Christian scholars. But here was a question that Darwin found compelling: if God had created all the creatures of the world, what possible reason could there be for the variations found in the Galápagos?

These were officials accorded high respect. Yet they conspired, and still I destroyed them. If your abilities surpass theirs, then make your play. Otherwise, change your hearts and serve me, to save the Empire from further ridicule.