Quotes from Whitney Tilson

While I take no pleasure in others' misfortunes, we've historically made most of our profits from other investors behaving in a panicked and irrational fashion and selling us certain stocks at prices far below their intrinsic value. More volatility equals cheaper stocks, which equals higher returns.

The relative illiquidity of small-company shares - which often contributes to their being undervalued - also increases their volatility.

In life, an abundance of confidence gives us higher motivation, persistence, and optimism and can allow us to accomplish things we otherwise might not have undertaken.

Nirvana, to a value investor, is paying a cheap price for a company that is growing in value every year at a nice rate - this largely explains why today we own stocks like Berkshire Hathaway, McDonald's, Wal-Mart, Microsoft, Costco and Anheuser-Busch.

Well-managed companies with independent boards have nothing to fear from activist shareholders.

Humans are hard-wired to be irrational when it comes to financial decisions. We must understand that so we don't become the sucker at the poker table.

Wall Street, in the main, hates uncertainty, which manifests itself in depressed share prices of companies whose prospects lack 'visibility.' But where the market can err is in confusing uncertainty with risk.

I believe our schools will actually get better if layoffs are done carefully, such that only the very worst teachers are let go.

In the game of politics, both parties are sometimes guilty of passing really stupid laws that, in reality, are purely symbolic and have no real impact on anyone.

I am part of the 1 percent of the 1 percent. By that, I mean that I am fortunate to be a wealthy American, and I say, 'It's okay to raise my taxes.'

If I bring to light a company that's poisoning customers, defrauding investors, or something like that... there just aren't enough regulators in the world to keep up with all of the fraud and malfeasance that goes on out there, particularly in the little nooks and crannies of the market.

There are far too many ineffective teachers and, in particular, far too many truly terrible teachers who are harming children and poisoning the system.

You just have to approach every day and say, 'If you were starting fresh today, what would my portfolio look like?' So that's how we think about it.

I have long believed the corporate world is plagued by poor capital allocation decisions.

Shorting saved my butt in 2008... Shorting kept me in the game. It generates cash when the market's crashing. And that's what you want when the market's crashing - cash.

There's a real company in Facebook and then a lot of pretenders riding their coat tails.

I think that most people who complain about our government have no idea what they're talking about because they've never been to a country with a bad government.

It's human nature: for most investors, the pain of stocks going down is more tangible than the joy of when they go up. The common impulse is to do something - anything - to minimise the pain.

We like to say we pray in the church of Graham, Dodd, Buffett, and Munger.

One can't be a successful investor without a healthy dose of confidence. To commit your own and others' hard-earned capital requires conviction, and conviction requires confidence. But as with fine brandy or coffee ice cream, too much of a good thing can be problematic.

Even the greatest companies encounter problems or otherwise fall out of favour.

It's difficult to fix a truly broken business, but when it happens, the returns can be extraordinary.

As in most subjects relating to money management, there's a wide diversity of opinion on portfolio concentration versus diversification.

There is a natural tendency for investors to devote a significant majority of their time to finding new ideas. After all, uncovering great companies selling at great prices is the lifeblood of successful investing. But in the never-ending quest for the next great idea, investors often give short shrift to their existing investments.