Buy A Business, Not A Stock

If you read any investment advice from the world greatest investor (Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch, Philip Arthur Fisher, John Templeton, Benjamin Graham, David Dreman etc), you will find one common advice: “Buy A Business, Not A stock”

When you buy a stock, you have to understand what does it really mean to you. If you didn’t, you might be a stock market gambler.

Peter Lynch

Peter Lynch’s famous investment quotation (Excerpt from his famous books – One Up on Wall Street, Beating The Street, Learn To Earn):

“Stocks aren’t lottery tickets. There’s a company attached to every share.”

“Behind every stock is a company. Find out what it’s doing.” 

“If you’re prepared to invest in a company, then you ought to be able to explain why in simple language that a fifth grader could understand, and quickly enough so the fifth grader won’t get bored.”

Warren Buffett once said (1998): “I buy businesses, not stocks, businesses I would be willing to own forever.”

If you buy a stock with the mind of set of owning a business, you will change your mindset against what majority of stock investors in the market. Most of them think that stock market is a form of casino (though they may not realize it). They just buy and sell almost everyday without knowing the true meaning of buying a stock nor own a business. To them, it is just buy and sell a piece of paper.

If you wanted to own a business, what comes to your mind should be the following:

1. Business that you really understand well
2. Business that can be very profitable for a very long time

You do not want to buy a business that can only sustain 6 months and shut down for another year. Don’t buy a company that you are unable to understand its business model (what a company does, what a company produces, how a company makes money, what are the business risks etc).

Point to ponder: “All we want is to be in businesses that we understand, run by people whom we like, and priced attractively relative to their future prospects” -Warren Buffett 1994

London for Backpackers

I think everyone in the world know where London is. Flight cost can be pretty much expected. Here what I have found recently. One stop portal for those who want to go London. I can say that it is almost the "wikipedia" of London. All information about London is stored the portal. The information and everything you need is at your finger tip at the portal: http://www.qype.co.uk/

First impression of this portal, it is well categorized and it makes easy for visitor to google what they really want to find in London. This London wikipedia website also provide GPS-like or Google-earth-like map. Just click on the map, it will display anything in that particular area that you click. i.e: if you click on Southwark, the information will be displayed from restaurants, bar, entertainment, hostels etc available in Southwark.

As a tourist who has been to many places around the world, pre-plan itinerary would be helpful to reduce cost and save time. One need to consider the following to go to London:
1. A place to stay; hotels vs. hostels London
2. Good restaurants

Hotel vs Hostels London

Knowing London one of the biggest and expensive in the world, I would suggest anyone to choose hostel especially backpackers. There are about 200 plus hostels in London. The hostels London is as good any low cost hotel. From the portal, it also gives review and you can filter out and it can be sort from good to worst or vice versa. Additionaly, it also provides website so that you can pre-online booking without hesitation. The portal will provide you a good place to visit nearest to hostels that you stay. It makes your journey worthwhile and save cost.

Good Restaurants

As multi-cultural city, London serves many cuisines from all around the world. If you know the right restaurants and good review, you will not regret every single dime that you spend for food. For those who love indian food (for your information, many indians migrate to London and Indian is considered as one of the highest migrating foreigner in London); you can't really miss the indian cuisines; be it Southern or Northern Indian Cuisines. Try the indian sweet like gulab jamun or indian spicy like kebab or briyanis. You can find plenty of Indian Restaurants London.

Nice Capati in London

Tasty Dosa in the heart of London

You can find "Little India" just like any other China Town. You'll be amazed!

In summary, the portal gives information that visitors need. The best damn thing about the portal, it supports multi language; major language which is English, spanish, german, French. To make the review is accurate and reliable, every reviewers must be a registered user and login is required.

The only disadvantage of this portal is that, to do pre-online booking; you have to open another website through URL address provided in the website.