We simply attempt to be fearful when others are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful.

This line is authentic Buffett, and it can be traced to an exact page rather than an aggregator: he wrote it in his 1986 Chairman's Letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders (composed in early 1987), where, after describing fear and greed as two "super-contagious diseases" that periodically sweep the market, he concluded, "Our goal is more modest: we simply attempt to be fearful when others are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful." The wording in Berkshire's own letter archive matches the submitted quote precisely, apart from the trivial capitalization of "We" once the sentence is lifted out of its clause. The timing gives the passage its bite: months after Buffett noted that "little fear is visible in Wall Street" and that euphoria prevailed, the market suffered the October 1987 "Black Monday" crash, which is part of why the maxim became his most-repeated axiom. We found no credible competing author and no documented earlier use of this specific formulation; while the contrarian sentiment echoes older market wisdom and Buffett's own partnership-era remarks, this exact sentence originates in the 1986 letter. We therefore record it as verified.