Wilbur Ross Quotes
102 Wilbur Ross Quotes (Wilbur L Ross Jr, WL Ross)
1 2 3
We’d like to take perceived risk instead of actual risk.
Wilbur Ross
You get paid for taking risk that people think is risky. You don’t particularly get paid for taking actual risks.
Wilbur Ross
If you are thinking in terms of five years rather than the next ten minutes, you have a different thought process.
Wilbur Ross
Our only girlfriend is IRR [Internal Rate of Return.]
Wilbur Ross
You often learn more by studying why some companies fail than you do by studying what made others succeed.
Wilbur Ross
To be successful you have to be able to keep your emotions separate from the decision-making process.
Wilbur Ross
[In October 2007] I don’t think you can ever legislate people against making foolish loans.
Wilbur Ross
[In September 2008] I'd rather back a mediocre idea that was brilliantly executed than a brilliant idea that was poorly executed.
Wilbur Ross
[In November 2008 on what qualifies for a typical Wilbur Ross investment.] We like situations where we can change the way a company is managed and by doing that we also hope to change the industry.
Wilbur Ross
[In September 2008] I don’t think you can really have our historic standard of living if what the economy consists of is flipping hamburgers, swapping pieces of paper on the stock market, and suing each other.
Wilbur Ross
[In August 2010] What changes the price of anything that trades is the last few percentage points of the trade. It isn’t the 99 percent that doesn’t trade.
Wilbur Ross
[On not doing creative writing for a living.] It probably saved me from a life of poverty…
Wilbur Ross
[In September 2008] Our activity in private equity is very much in the first instance analytical, trying to understand what’s there and what’s not there, trying to understand what can be done with it to make it better.
Wilbur Ross
One of the problems with industries that have been in relatively long-term declines is that very often, the managements in those industries develop a kind of loser mentality.
Wilbur Ross
[In September 2008] I think good ideas really are simple ideas…
Wilbur Ross
On April Fool’s Day, 2000, I went into business for myself.
Wilbur Ross
[In August 2010] People don’t make hard decisions until they have little choices left.
Wilbur Ross
You don’t… need exotic solutions in order to cut pollution.
Wilbur Ross
[In December 2012] A lot of investors are substituting yield for credit-worthiness…
Wilbur Ross
[On Carl Icahn hiring the former Captain of the Vanderbilt College tennis team to be his tennis partner in a match with Robert Nederlander and Wilbur Ross] That’s just an illustration of how competitive Carl can be.
Wilbur Ross
[In July 1996] Five years is a long time for inside information to have an effect.
Wilbur Ross
[In November 2004] You can’t have much of an economy if people are just flipping hamburgers, trading stocks, and suing each other… Are our grandchildren going to dive for coins from cruise ships in the East River?
Wilbur Ross
[In November 2004 on a reference to ‘Vulture Investing’.] We’re a phoenix that rebuilds itself from the ashes.
Wilbur Ross
[In November 2004] In steel, every single company we bought would have been liquidated had we not bought it.
Wilbur Ross
[On the Dow Cow – which has both horns and an udder.] Look at it, it’s anatomically incorrect.
Wilbur Ross
[In March 2006] Almost every day, there is another [auto parts] supplier filing for bankruptcy. We are continuing to make acquisitions.
Wilbur Ross
[In March 2006] What you will see at the end of all of this, larger companies that are more narrowly focused. I think it is proper.
Wilbur Ross
[In October 2007] We’re looking at everything that’s in trouble.
Wilbur Ross
[In October 2007] I don’t think you can ever legislate people against making foolish loans… In terms of solving the problem of people who simply can’t pay, it’s not terribly clear to me what they can do to help them. Somebody has to take the loss.
Wilbur Ross
[In October 2007] There’s nothing wrong with lending to weak credit. There is something wrong with doing it at discount rates and without proper documentation and without conservative appraisals.
Wilbur Ross
[In February 2008 on ratings from rating agencies.] The real question isn’t its rating before you came in. The real question is, what would it be rated after you came in? The key would be to have the Triple A rating after… investment.
Wilbur Ross
The fellow who has been standing behind a machine for 10 years knows it better than the people who built it, really knows what to do.
Wilbur Ross
[On originally doing an English course that he hoped would prepare him to have a career as a creative writer.] Every single day, you had to submit 1,000 words of fiction or poetry that you had created… Every day… And I found that after about two weeks, I didn’t have any more material. So that convinced me this was the wrong calling.
Wilbur Ross
[On dropping out of creative writing.] It turns out it probably saved me from a life of poverty anyway.
Wilbur Ross
I think one thing that thinking about writing and trying to get your thoughts together, particularly in a limited space like 1,000 words, is to organize your thought process, organize your questions, and think through what your observations are. So I think those are all good disciplines for any kind of analytical activity.
Wilbur Ross
One of the problems with industries that have been in relatively long-term declines is that very often, the managements in those industries develop a kind of loser mentality. And when you ask them what’s wrong with the business, they’ll point to extraneous forces. It’s be the fault of the unions, or it’ll be the fault of China or the fault of the government or the fault of the class-action people. So rather than dealing with things that may be within their own control, they kind of sit around sulking about things that are fundamentally out of their control.
Wilbur Ross
I think good ideas really are simple ideas, at least in retrospective.
Wilbur Ross
[In September 2008] The main thing isn't so much the idea. It's important to have a sound idea, but the really important thing is the implementation. I have a little pin cushion that says on it a very important saying, and that is, ‘I'd rather back a mediocre idea that was brilliantly executed than a brilliant idea that was poorly executed.’
Wilbur Ross
[In September 2008] It's not just the idea. The idea is, in a sense, the easier part if you're careful. The harder part is implementation. And that's what really makes or breaks any of these things.
Wilbur Ross
[In September 2008] You don't need to have a global recession in order to find things that make sense to do.
Wilbur Ross
1 2 3
Return from Wilbur Ross Quotes to Quoteswise.com