"Buy stocks when everyone else is afraid. Doing that is the single most important factor in my own success. It trumps nearly everything else I do in stock investing. I have made enormous amounts of money buying when everyone else is terrified. I still do it today, and I can count on the investing masses selling in a panic when things are a bit difficult, and then waiting too long and being too late to join the party when the market and stocks begin their upswing again. The best advice I have ever given anyone is to buy when things are at their worst, not when at the best. Even though I tell people every day to do this, it is stunning to me how many people ignore my advice, and follow each other like a mass of rats abandoning ship when things get a bit bad, and then run with the masses again to buy when the market is up. It is the most ridiculous thing I see in investing." -- Warren Buffett