“You Are Not the Only Buy-and-Holder Who Lacks Confidence. They All Do. Not All Buy-and-Holders Threaten to Kill the Family Members of Those Who Disagree With Them and Insist on Their Right to Post Honestly About Why They Disagree. But the Vast Majority Tolerate Such Behavior Even Though It Goes Against the Core Beliefs of Our Society.”

Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for another blog entry at this site:

It has been 30 years for me. That is long term. My buy and hold strategy has worked just fine. I am now sitting on $2.6 million in diversified holds and adding more to my positions everyday.

Your words say one thing and your actions say another, Anonymous.

Your words say “I’m fine.” Your actions say “I’m worried.”

If you were confident, you wouldn’t behave the way you do. If you were confident, you would believe that what you say in this post would be enough to persuade others even if those who disagree with you were free to post honestly.

You are not the only Buy-and-Holder who lacks confidence. They all do. Not all Buy-and-Holders threaten to kill the family members of those who disagree with them and insist on their right to post honestly about why they disagree. But the vast majority tolerate such behavior even though it goes against the core beliefs of our society. And the small percentage of Buy-and-Holders who object to such behavior do so only timidly and tentatively and drop it when their Buy-and-Hold friends make clear their displeasure with them.

You don’t see that with Valuation-Informed Indexers. I have zero problem with the fact that you do not agree with my investing ideas. I call you “friend” with every post you put forward here, even after you have insulted me thousands of times. I acknowledge it when I learn from you. I say that I respect the Buy-and-Hold Pioneers because of the many powerful insights they have developed. I even say that I could be wrong about Valuation-Informed Indexing, that I have been wrong before and that, if it were happening again, I would probably be the last to know.

I could be wrong. But at least I possess enough confidence in the strategy that I follow to be see that those who believe in the school of academic thought that I have rejected help me out by posting honestly and thereby challenging my thinking and forcing me to sharpen my thinking.

I wish you the best of luck with your investing choices, Anonymous. I don’t believe that you have made good choices. But that doesn’t make me dislike you or wish you ill. Time will reveal which of us is right and which of us is wrong on the substantive issues. If I am the one in the wrong, I hope that something you say will cause it all to click for me one day. If that happens, I hope that I have the courage and grace to say the words “I” and “Was” and “Wrong.” If I failed to do that in those circumstances, I would only be hurting myself.

I wish you the best of luck in all your future life endeavors.

Rob