How do you become a top investor?

Hi Jose, this is a great question. The most satisfying way to invest is in areas that appeal to you - this may be something that you know well, something familiar to your surroundings or to your family, or something you've never gotten to be a part of but which seems really interesting to you. What is most appealing may or may not have the best return, however. If you want to roadmap how to have a dayjob as an investor/daytrader, or how to be a self-employed type of investor or a venture capital professional, these are all different paths. In either case, having strong training (and experience!) in business is an excellent path. If you want to steer clear of questionable supply chains, global slave and quasi-slave trades in your investing (these trades yield higher returns and are still status quo, but are concerning to those who wish to make a return on investment (ROI) from ethical and supportive means), studying a frontline type of major such as a social science and then getting experience in front line service areas such as through Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, etc., before studying business or economics, would be a great mix. For example, I grew up outside the business setting but seeing and doing a great deal of social service that showed me how curiosity about someone's background was vital value to an organization. The global awards I have received since then are all thanks to that awareness, which not everyone who has had multiple business degrees but less exposure to the result of corporate business decisions (i.e. paying a non-living wage to service employees) has had the opportunity to see close up. It has helped me to make a lot of money for a lot of companies, and it has helped me to choose investments as well.

The bottom line is that the best investor tends to be someone who has logged quite a bit of experience in the world, with a very solid amount of that in business, and with a solid amount of that in "extra-curricular" areas that round out the knowledge base. There are other skill sets that differentiate different types of investors, but those two qualities tend to be the common denominators.

In order of importance:

-Start young. This cannot be overstated. An investors best ally is compound interest (or compound earnings) over time. Google the rule of 72.

-Study investing. My best investment education was in a college Finance class, where the instructor taught us how to read the financial pages in the paper, and later, how to read a financial statement. It stimulated me to learn much more. This is investing in yourself.

-Understand risk versus return vs time. Young investors should take on more risk, as they usually have less money to lose, and time to recover from any losses.

-Invest consistently, and invest until it hurts. I am not saying to not enjoy your life. I am saying to budget your expenditures so that you still invest. If you can't swing life's expenses, fun and investing then take on a second job, or find a way to improve yourself to improve your earnings.

-Understand that your investments will go up and they will go down, but over time they will go up. Don't bail out when your investments are down.

-Don’t spend more money than needed on depreciable assets (cars, boats, RV’s, etc). The money you don't spend can be invested.

-Don't spend your investment money until your working days are over. Then understand how much of it you can spend so that it lasts until your last days.

-Enjoy the fruits of your sacrifice and discipline! This is the stage of life I am in, and I am having a blast!

I studied, I made mistakes, and I learned from it. I became a learning machine as Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett said.

Warren Buffett and Graham Dodd laid the ground work for intelligent investing. I practiced value investing and refined it to 24% returns for the last 10+ years.