"Long-termism" não é manter por muito tempo, mas escolher corretamente

“Long-term holding” these four characters are probably the most widely circulated and deeply misunderstood phrase in the investment world.

Many people interpret it as a stance: buy and hold, regardless of rises or falls, believing that time will provide the answer. This understanding sounds plausible, but in fact hides a dangerous logical flaw — it equates “holding duration” with the “core of long-termism,” but time itself cannot create value; only giving good companies time can generate value. Holding a poor company’s stock for ten years might turn a 20% loss into an 80% loss.

First, long-termism is a multiple-choice question.

True long-termism does not start with how long you plan to hold, but with what you buy. Buffett’s views are often quoted and misinterpreted; people remember him saying “my favorite holding period is forever,” but they overlook the premise he stated before: “only buy companies with sufficiently deep moats that can continue to generate cash flow over the next ten years.”

In other words, the threshold for long-termism is a judgment of a company’s essence. Whether a company is worth holding long-term depends at least on three questions: Does its business model have sustainable pricing power? Will the industry continue to expand over the next ten years? Is the management team creating value for shareholders?

Many believe they are practicing long-termism, but are actually falling into the trap of sunk costs. True long-term investors treat their holdings more like ongoing assessments rather than passive waiting. They periodically ask themselves: Does the original logic of my purchase still hold today? If the company’s fundamentals change fundamentally, they will leave without attachment.

Second, industry ceiling is more important than individual stocks.

Choosing correctly is not just about picking the right company, but also the right sector. There are investors who look for the best company within a sunset industry and hold it long-term, but the industry’s cake is shrinking; no matter how excellent the company, it faces industry shifts. Choosing the right sector means having a basic judgment of industry trends: which demands are growing, which are being replaced, which barriers are real, and which moats are drying up.

The most common mistake is to treat “rapid growth in the past” as evidence that “growth will continue in the future.” The market does not reward you just because you hold for a long time; it rewards those who select “genuine growth.”

Finally, long-termism is a matter of cognitive density.

Short-term traders may make decisions frequently, but each decision has low cognitive content — essentially betting on short-term emotions and capital flows. Long-term investors compress a large amount of time and effort into a few key judgments — whether this company is worth trusting, where the industry’s future lies, whether the current price reflects reasonable expectations. Each judgment must be more cautious and rigorous because the cost of mistakes is high.

This is also why true long-term investors often seem to do not much work, but that’s an illusion. Genuine value investing requires putting effort into “selecting” rather than “trading.”

The market is not short of patience; what it lacks is justified patience. Holding for a long time is merely an external expression of long-termism; choosing correctly is its soul. Confusing the two often results in, after a long wait, not compound interest but an expensive lesson in self-deception.

Author: Li Yijian

Source: “Financial Panorama · Wealth” 2026, Issue 3

Editor: Xue Xiaoyu

Like, share, recommend, and arrange accordingly?