Home Investing Why Warren Buffett Recommends Index Funds (Passive Index Investing Analysis)
- Investing
By
Oddmund Groette
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Warren Buffett recommends most investors invest in passive index funds. In general, investors should not be active investors. Why?
Buffett recommends passive and low-cost index funds because he believes this is the most rational way to invest for most people. There are so many forms of mistakes ordinary investors can make, but passive index investing limits those risks massively.
Buffett has a very valid point. The average and median retail investor grossly underperform the indices, which is well documented in research.
Table of contents:
Why Warren Buffett recommends passive investing
My regular recommendation has been a low-cost S&P 500 index fund.……
Berkshire shareholder letter of 2016
Tim Ferriss asked Warren Buffett how to invest $1 million. Park it in an index fund, ‘forget it and get back to work’ was his advice.
On page 685 of Snowball, Alice Schroeder has an excerpt where Warren Buffett explains why he recommends index funds to the ordinary investor:
Stocks are the things to own over time. Productivity will increase and stocks will increase with it. There are only a few things you can do wrong. One is to buy or sell at the wrong time. Paying high fees is the other way to get killed. The best way to avoid both of these is to buy a low-cost index fund, and buy it over time. Be greedy when others are fearful, and fearful when others are greedy, but don’t think you can outsmart the market….If a cross-section of American industry is going to do well over time, then why try to pick the little beauties and think you can do better? Very few people should be active investors….
Why risk finding multi-baggers when you can sit back, relax and let your capital compound by being patient? Warren Buffett is a great investor, but he has had the patience to let his capital compound.
Buffett mentioned the mistake of buying and selling at the wrong time. Investing is difficult because you have to overcome these obstacles:
Investing involves the risk of behavioral mistakes
Most small investors buy and sell at the wrong times. Ample evidence has been pointed out this year in and year out. If you make just one small timing mistake, it can ruin your compounding capacity for many years. The risk of making a mistake far outweighs the gain of being right.
- The most common trading biases (how to overcome them)
- Why it’s important to avoid investment mistakes (unforced errors)
Stock picking is difficult
A few outliers mainly drive the returns in the stock market. How probable is it that you can pick those outliers? Most likely pretty slim.
Hendrik Bessembinder’s famous study from 2017 established that most of the listed stocks between 1926 and 2015 failed to beat short-term Treasuries during their listing.
- Why stock picking is so difficult
Warren Buffett recommends Dollar-Cost Averaging
In the quote above, Buffett recommends “buy over time”. What does he mean by that?
He is, of course, referring to dollar-cost averaging. It’s amazing how far you can get if you are disciplined and save every month for many years. Delayed gratification and compounding really work!
- Dollar cost averaging vs lump sum investing
- Compounding – the magic of a long-term mindset and delayed gratification
Warren Buffett recommends starting saving early
I packed my little snowball very early, and if I had packed it ten years later, it would have been very different than where it stands on the hill right now. So I recommend to students that if you start out a little ahead of the game – it doesn’t have to be a lot, but it’s so much better than starting out behind the game. And credit cards really get you behind the game.
The quote above, on page 702 in The Snowball, illustrates the importance of saving early. Buffett made 98% of his wealth after he turned 50 and 95% after he turned 65. Think about that!
Make investing simple:
Women are better investors than men. This is not because they are smarter but because they don’t try to be smart. They are more likely to save regularly, timely, and forget about it.
Most investors should do the same, man or woman. Warren Buffett recommends passive index funds simply because you avoid making mistakes.
FAQ:
– Why does Warren Buffett recommend passive index funds for most investors?
Warren Buffett advocates for passive index funds as he believes it’s the most rational way for most people to invest. The strategy minimizes the risks associated with common mistakes made by ordinary investors, leading to more stable and potentially profitable long-term results.
– What is the main point behind Warren Buffett’s recommendation of low-cost S&P 500 index funds?
Buffett suggests investing in low-cost S&P 500 index funds because he believes in the long-term growth of stocks. He emphasizes the importance of avoiding market timing and high fees, making index funds a rational choice for patient investors.
– According to Warren Buffett, why is stock picking difficult for investors?
Stock picking is challenging due to the difficulty in identifying outliers that significantly drive stock market returns. Buffett highlights that most stocks fail to outperform short-term Treasuries over the long term, making it unlikely for individual investors to consistently pick winning stocks.
