Ned Goodman’s Letter to Shareholders

“The Gambler”, the song that made Kenny Rogers famous, has been used by Warren Buffett when he suggested we need temperament, emotional stability, and a keen understanding of both human and institutional behavior which are vital to long-term investment success. His mentor, Benjamin Graham, said if you don’t have an intimate knowledge of the chronic behavioral anomalies of “Mr. Market”, the imaginary manic depressive who personifies the emotional impetus behind the actions of the “crowd”, you’re doomed to mediocrity or worse. Even if you can bring all your intuitive capacities into play today, our investing world means that you must read the faces around the table and at the same time, the cards in your hand, in order to draw an inference on the basis of insufficient possibly misstated and misleading data as to whether it’s time to hold ‘em or fold ‘em. We are in a global economic and domestic mutual fund investment business environment where “hold ‘em or fold ‘em” has become much more important.