The greatest investor, Warren Buffett

From a very young age, Warren Buffett had a very big and clear dream of becoming the world's greatest investor. Born during the time when his father was close to bankruptcy, Warren Buffett learn about the value of money and the importance of being financially secured at an early age.

Even before his teens, Warren Buffett knew that he wanted to be rich. As early as elementary school and later on in high school, he would tell his classmates that he wanted to become a millionaire before the age of 35. Inspired by his dream, he started researching on the secrets of wealth creation.

Through his readings, he found and memorized a book called "A Thousand Ways to Make $1,000". At the age of six, he started buying coke bottles at 25-cents per six-pack and selling them at 5-cents a bottle, giving him a 16% gross profit. At the age of 13, he got a job delivering newspapers and through innovative marketing and distribution strategies, he served five hunderd customers a day.

At the age of 11, he took all his savings and started investing in the stock market. Hist first investment was three shares in a company called "City Service". While most kids at his age were reading comic books, Warren spent his time reading company annual reports. By the age of 14, he invested in pinball machines which he installed in restaurants all over his town. He was earning US$175 a week, as much as the average 25-year old was earning in 1944.

Warren later mastered the art of investing by modelling two of the world's greatest investors during his time, Benjamin Graham (the father of Value Investing) and Philip Fisher (the father of Growth Investing). By combining the ideas of both geniuses and further refining them, Warren Buffet has become the most powerful investor in the world and also the second richest man in the world with net worth US$52 billions (just US$4 billion behind Bill Gates). What I am amazed by this man is that he made his fortune purely through investing in stocks!

He is also well known for his rules of investing. His Rule #1 in investing is "Never Lose Money". His Rule #2 is "Don't Forget Rule #1".