Investors worldwide adore Warren Buffett – often without fully knowing what he really does

In my view, derivatives are financial weapons of mass destruction, carrying dangers that, while now latent, are potentially lethal – Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway Annual Report, 2002

Thus, our derivative positions will sometimes cause large swings in reported earnings – Warren Buffett,...

In business and in life, it smoothens interactions. Politicians, of course, believe in the opposite – ‘after me’

For many years, I thought this whole business of ‘after you’ was a social nicety. It distinguished the men from the boys. It separated those ‘who knew’ from those ‘who did not’. It was perhaps a Western import, sought to be absorbed in our local setting. Or ‘an imitation’ of our...