Hate to break it to ya, but you're not Warren...

You’ve probably heard of Warren Buffett alongside Bill Gates as the world’s richest men and as of March of this year, according to forbes, Buffett was worth $47 billion. So what is the source of his tremendous wealth? Berkshire Hathaway and his own investment genius. Basically, through BRK for which he is the chairman, CEO and primary stakeholder, Buffett has earned the title of the Sage or Oracle of Omaha by making shrewd and seemingly risky investments that have netted him and the company billions of dollars.

So the obvious thing to do would be to gather a few thousand dollars, take a good solid look at the BRK portfolio, start investing and become filthy rich. Simple enough right? Wrong. Money magazine took an interesting look at the validity of copying Warren and came up with two key reasons for why most people who try to do so, either fail or see only meager profits.

The first, discouragingly unattainable fact is that Mr. Buffett has earned privileges that you simply haven’t. He’s the big shot whose name everyone knows while you simply exist. Most any company would and have gone to great lengths to secure a spot upon Berkshire’s portfolio. Not only does it mean that all of us copycats are going to follow suit and buy shares, but to the fiscal world, the company has received the financial security of a firm with billions at their disposal and the endorsement of one of the world’s greatest investors. This allows BRK to cut deals that often greatly their own side, and through the very purchase, increase the value of their purchase. In simpler words, you could go buy a new car for a substantially lower price than anyone else, and the fact that you bought it makes it worth even more.

Of course you could easily argue this; after a while, the brand “BRK” just can’t be enough and how did Warren himself start out? This brings us to the second reason which is that Warren is most likely smarter than you. His efforts aren’t just focused around giving promising companies the capital they need to boom, but also involves delving far deeper into common stocks, preferred shares, currencies, distressed debt, merger arbitrage, fixed-income arbitrage etc. I personally don’t know half of the things I mentioned, and even if you do, I doubt many out there are capable of successfully investing in such securities.

The point is, (this is the ending for every get-rich-quick scheme) copying Warren simply won’t rake in the dough.  If you’re going to play the stock market, be smart, careful, independent and who knows, if everything works out right, you just might strike it rich.

PS Check out Money magazine's new blog which I've linked to to the right.