He experienced 27 bull markets and 26 bear markets in the 20th century, worked as a professional investor for 68 years, and never lost money in a single year, earning the title of "century-long winner in stock trading." The funds managed by the company he founded, "Neuberger Berman," once reached 200 billion USD.

In his autobiography — "The Century's Stock Trading Winner: The Autobiography of Roy Neuberger, the Father of American Mutual Funds," Neuberger summarized ten key principles from his investment career that are worth careful reading:

1. Know yourself

After analyzing various intertwined factors, if you can make favorable decisions, then you are the type of person suitable for entering the market. Test your temperament and disposition:

Do you have a speculative mindset?

Do you feel uneasy about risks?

You must answer yourself honestly and completely. Your judgments should be calm and collected; being collected does not mean being sluggish. Sometimes action can be quite swift. Being collected means making prudent decisions based on actual circumstances. If you prepare well in advance, acting decisively will not be a problem.

If you feel you are wrong, quickly exit; the stock market does not require the lengthy procedures that real estate does to make corrections. You can escape from it at any time.

You need to have a lot of energy, the ability to react quickly to numbers, and most importantly, you need to have common sense.

You should have an interest in what you are doing. Initially, I was interested in this market, not for money, but because I did not want to lose; I wanted to win.

The success of investors is built on existing knowledge and experience. It is best to invest professionally in areas you are familiar with. If you know very little or have not analyzed the company and details at all, it is better to stay away from it.

I do not invest money overseas because I do not understand the overseas market. I have hardly made any trades in foreign securities markets. My main investments are domestic. My international investments are also made through domestic companies, most of which are global enterprises, like IBM, which derives half of its profits from overseas.

Before you truly become an investor, you should also check whether your physical and mental health is suitable. Good health is the basis for making wise judgments; do not underestimate it.

2. Learn from successful investors.

Even successful investors have gone through tough times at the end of this century. I have spoken with many of them, and only a small number believe that in 1996, amidst soaring stocks, they could still grasp the market situation.

However, at any time, their experiences and lessons inspire us.

Those successful investors all paved the way to success.

Lawrence H. Summers values emerging industrial growth, thus achieving success;

Ben Graham respects the law of fundamental value;

Warren Buffett seriously studied the experiences that his teacher Ben Graham taught him when he was studying at Columbia University;

George Soros applied his theoretical thoughts to the international financial field;

Jimmy Rogers discovered defense industry stocks and shared his thoughts and analysis with his boss Soros.

Each of them achieved great success in their own way.

3. 'Sheep Market' Thinking

You can learn from the experiences of successful investors, but do not blindly follow them. Because of your personality, your needs are different from others. You can draw lessons from both success and failure and choose what suits you and your surroundings.

The impact of individual investors on a stock can sometimes cause it to fluctuate by 10 percentage points, but that is only for a moment, generally within a day, and will not exceed a week. This market is neither a bull market nor a bear market. I call this kind of market a 'sheep market.'

Sometimes the flock may face slaughter, and sometimes they may be sheared of their wool. Occasionally they can escape and retain their wool. The 'sheep market' is somewhat similar to the fashion industry. Fashion masters design new clothing styles, second-rate designers imitate them, and millions of people chase after them, causing the skirts to fluctuate in length.

Do not underestimate the role of psychology in stocks; buying stocks is often more stressful than selling them, and vice versa. Aside from economic statistics and securities analysis factors, many factors influence the judgment of both buyers and sellers. A small headache can lead to a wrong trade.

In a sheep market, people try to think about what most others would do. They believe that most people will surely find a favorable solution despite difficulties. This mindset is dangerous and can lead to missing out on opportunities. Imagine that most people comprise an institutional group; sometimes they will become entangled and fall victim to their own actions.

4. Adhere to Long-term Thinking

Focusing on short-term investment easily overlooks the importance of long-term investment. Companies often invest a lot of money for long-term investment, and while there will be short-term effects, if short-term results dominate, it will harm the company’s development and prospects.

Profits should be based on long-term investments, effective management, and seizing opportunities. If these are arranged properly, short-term investments will not play a major role.

When a popular stock is analyzed from a small perspective, if it fails to meet its quarterly tasks, market panic will lead to a drop in stock prices.

5. Timely Entry and Exit

When is the right time to enter the market and buy stocks? When is it suitable to sell stocks or observe from the sidelines?

Timing may not determine everything, but it can determine many things. What could have been a good long-term investment can turn bad if bought at the wrong time. Sometimes, if you buy a highly speculative stock at the right time, you can also make money. Exceptional securities analysts can perform well without following market trends, but following the trend makes operations easier.

A successful speculator or investor often succeeds because they invest a large amount of funds to buy in a weak market, allowing them to exchange the same amount of money for more stocks. Conversely, investors will sell stocks at high prices in a strong market; although not many stocks are sold, they can make a lot of money. This principle is quite simple.

Grasping favorable timing relies partly on intuition and partly on the opposite. The selection of timing must rely on independent thinking. In economic running, an upward trend may emerge from a downward trend, while a recession begins from a peak.

What is the importance of intuition? Great economist Paul Samuelson believes that the stock market has "predicted three large-scale recessions eight times in the past," which is completely correct. Therefore, short-term intuition is almost as important as the ability to analyze securities.

Timing is subtle and very meticulous. If you short-sell at the wrong time (in a rising market), the cost will be high. Just ask those who short-sold stocks like Leyton, Telecommunication Transmission, Levitt's Furniture, Montgomery and others; they did nothing wrong but the timing was off, they sold too quickly. I know someone who lost everything by short-selling at the peak of the bull market in the summer of 1929, and didn’t recover until autumn.

The duration of a bull market is generally longer than that of a bear market. During a bull market, stock prices rise slowly and irregularly, sometimes even more erratically than in a bear market. A bear market is usually brief and experiences severe fluctuations. However, the market ultimately follows certain patterns; it's rare for the stock market to rise continuously for more than six months, just as it's rare for it to fall continuously for more than six months.

Additionally, some investors immediately close their positions upon seeing loss reports, without assessing the current situation. In such cases, it is often true that the stocks being sold should actually be bought, not sold.

In this situation, what people should first learn is that the market does not care about individual actions. The price at which you purchase securities is inconsequential. It is quite difficult for people to understand bizarre price and value reassessment theories, and not only amateur investors fail to grasp this. Many investment advisors believe long-term investments should be made in utility stocks.

However, they hold onto a stock for too long. I believe the stock price has climbed to a relatively high level, and regardless of whether it is for government employees, teachers, or other retirement funds, it should be sold.

Although stock prices have not yet reached their peak, if you have made a profit, it’s better to exit.

Bernard Baruch was the best at timing the market, and his philosophy was to seek to do well but not be greedy. He never waited for the highest or lowest points. He bought in weak markets and sold in strong ones. He advocated for early selling. Our company was honored to have him as our client in his later years.

At certain times, ordinary stocks are the best investment, but in other periods, perhaps real estate is the best. Everything is changing, and people need to learn to change as well. I do not believe that there will ever be a permanently unchanged industry.

6. Analyze the company's situation seriously.

It is essential to carefully study the company's management situation, leadership, performance, and objectives, especially to analyze the real asset status of the company, including: equipment value and net assets per share. This concept was widely emphasized at the beginning of the century but has since been almost forgotten.

The company's dividends are also very important and should be taken into account. If its distribution plan is appropriate, its stock price can go up a level. If the company distributes 90% of its profits, note that this is a dangerous signal, and there may not be a distribution next time; if the company only distributes 10% of its profits, this is also an alarm, as the typical distribution plan for companies is to distribute 40% to 60% of their profits. Many public utility stocks have even higher dividend ratios.

Many investment institutions do not truly value dividends, but individual investors see dividends as an important method to expand income.

What are growth stocks? Their savvy followers discovered their potential value during the company's early development. However, generally, a company is recognized for its brand only after it matures. Growth is slow, and both individuals and institutions continue to buy its stocks because the predictions are more realistic.

Too much energy is spent on assumed growth, ignoring recessions, outbreaks of war, government reassessments of growth indices, and changes in the growth indices themselves.

A stock's PE rarely stays around 15 times because people's expectations for the company's prospects often exceed this PE price—this notion is not necessarily correct. We know there will be exceptions, but the unexpected opportunities only account for 1%. Thus, this fantasy influences you to buy stocks at high prices when the PE is high.

I find it acceptable for high-performing companies to have a PE that exceeds 10-15 times. Many of them have PEs between 6 and 10 times, which is beneficial for both sides.

If you can control the overall market price of a certain company, you can gain more profits from it.

Seven, do not fall in love.

In this adventurous world, because there are many possibilities, people can become obsessed with a certain idea, a certain person, or a certain ideal. In the end, what might captivate people could be stocks. But it is just a piece of paper that proves your ownership of a company; it is merely a symbol of money.

Eight, diversify investments, but do not engage in hedging.

Hedging means going long on some stocks while going short on others.

Professionals use hedging to avoid risk in the daily market; sometimes, new entrants to the market treat hedging as a gamble. I do not advocate for this, but there is no law that prohibits it.

Hedging is indeed a revolution in modern stocks; a century ago, when you bought the same stock from the New York and London markets, the price difference between the cities was minimal. Experts would buy a stock in one market and sell it in another; although they made little profit, there was still a gain.

The profit and risk factors are comparatively low compared to today's stock market. But believe me, today's stock market is quite risky.

If you insist on doing arbitrage trading and are confident that experience can help you, remember to diversify, have a broad perspective, and ensure that your rules are correct. To diversify your investments, you should strive to increase your income, such as assets.

Nine, observe the surrounding environment

The environment I am referring to means the market trends and the global environment. You need to adapt the patterns I give you to fit the operations of the market you are in.

In market evaluation, more focus should be on the percentage changes rather than the quantity. A drop of 100 points may seem significant, but it could only be 2% of the index.

Paying attention to the market can help identify when the market begins to decline and when it starts to recover. This also frequently provides investors with opportunities to invest in so-called conservative areas, such as short-term zero-coupon bonds, long-term treasury bonds, and treasury bills.

Short-term zero-coupon treasury bonds are a major investment direction for large investors. They are safer than any other investment and even safer than putting money under the pillow. You don’t need an economist to tell you how to study interest rates; nothing is more important than predicting market trends. The trend of interest rates is similar; the stagnation of long-term interest rates illustrates the seriousness of the economic situation better than any other fact. Generally, if short-term and long-term interest rates begin to rise, this tells stock investors: the uptrend is here.

Stocks are not seasonal, so investing according to the calendar is unnecessary. Remember, for investors, it is always a risk. For those who enjoy life and the joy of investing, although the seasons change, opportunities are always available.

Ten, do not stick to conventional wisdom.

It is necessary to change one's way of thinking according to the changes in the situation. The view is that one should actively change according to changes in economic and political factors. As for technology, sometimes it can be controlled, but at other times it is beyond our control.

I am good at bear market thinking, and I disagree with optimists. However, if the majority are pessimistic, I adopt a bull market thinking instead; conversely, I also engage in hedging trades.

Editor/Lambor