And when investors are greedy, they can bid a stock's price up to unreasonable heights. The challenge for the individual investor is to avoid getting caught up in the emotions of the crowd. All our recommended investments are made with the hope of holding on for years. Admittedly, these hopes are not always fulfilled. A stock can turn down much sooner than we expect, and we will recommend that you sell.
Losses can be hard to take, psychologically.
But they are the price you pay for finding the big winners. In short, you can't get rich with short-term winners. Only long-term winners, combined with the magic of compounding, will do the trick. In fact, when you invest for the long-term and you are able to hold the stock of a successful company over a period of years, you benefit from the unforeseeable and the incalculable. That is, you reap the rewards of progress at the company that was totally unforeseen years before but was brought to fruition by capable management given time to do its work.