People who work in secure jobs that pay low salaries and modest raises are slow growers, the human equivalents of the electric utilities such as American Electric Power. Librarians, schoolteachers, and policemen are slow growers. People who command good salaries and get predictable raises, such as the middle-level managers of corporations, are

Why did Melville succeed while Genesco failed? The answer has a lot to do with a concept called synergy. “Synergy” is a fancy name for the two-plus-two-equals-five theory of putting together related businesses and making the whole thing work.

If you’re considering a stock on the strength of some specific product that a company makes, the first thing to find out is: What effect will the success of the product have on the company’s bottom line?

Although it’s a nice gesture for the CEO or the corporate president with the million-dollar salary to buy a few thousand shares of the company stock, it’s more significant when employees at the lower echelons add to their positions. If you see someone with a $45,000 annual salary buying $10,000 worth of stock, you can be sure it’s a meaningful vote

There are several different types of turnarounds, and I’ve owned all of them at one time or another. There’s the bail-us-out-or-else kind of turnaround such as Chrysler or Lockheed, where the whole thing depended on a government loan guarantee. There’s the who-would-have-thunk-it kind of turnaround, such as Con Edison. Who would ever have believed

They also pioneered the pre-need policy, a layaway plan that’s been very popular. It enables you to pay off your funeral service and your casket right now while you can still afford it, so your family won’t have to pay for it later. Even if the cost has tripled by the time you require a funeral service, you’re locked in at the old prices. This is a

The same couple that spends the weekend searching for the best deal on airfares to London buys 500 shares of KLM without having spent five minutes learning about the company.

In our business the indiscriminate selling of current losers is called “burying the evidence.”

What I hope you’ll remember most from this section are the following points: • Don’t overestimate the skill and wisdom of professionals. • Take advantage of what you already know. • Look for opportunities that haven’t yet been discovered and certified by Wall Street—companies that are “off the radar scope.” • Invest in a house before you invest in