All Activity

Took the words out of my mouth. When was the last time the US won a war? Iran? Sure the US destroyed Iran's navy, air force, etc. But So far Iran still has its nuclear abilities, still has caves full of missiles, and now, now it seems to have gained control of the SOH, not to mention potentially being awarded billions of dollars from the US. Even Trump hasn't got the balls to actually attempt to invade the country. And Canada is 6 times larger than Iran, and 15 times the size of Afghanistan. And size does matter when it comes to controlling or invading territory Winning a war takes more than the best weapons. Look at the French resistance in WWII and the problems a small group of people caused the mighty German war machine. Look at the failure of Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba and the futility of the hardships the US has imposed on the Cuban people for nearly 70 years. Look at the embarrassment when the US was forced to flee Saigon. Look at the fiasco that took place when the US fled Afghanistan. And one more thing. There are a lot of Americans that would rather join Canada than fight us.

Am I the only one who's completely indifferent to anything that occurs in such a short time frame?

I'm down 7% YTD, which is pretty terrible particularly considering the index performance. Eats up the last few years of outperformance. On the bright side, I feel good about my current portfolio composition.

You need to be more understanding. Now that MAGA's favorite island is off limits, there's no democrat in the white house to "peacefully protest", and their great white hope has kind of shat the bed in Iran, there is a concerning lack of positive talking points. So when in doubt? Fall back on the tried-and-true: A good old-fashioned and self-administered suppository of 1950s conservative talking points!

I tend to make quite concentrated bets and it causes a lot of volatility in the YoY metrics. Down this year due to being heavily concentrated in ADBE. but i have long strong conviction and in some future period it will have an outsided return. Or who knows a few years from now ill be down 75% and ADBE will be at a PE of < 3 because AI is killing it while revenue continues to grow at 10% and i will continue to cry myself to sleep.

I am using Interactive Brokers and Trade Republic for this one. Worked fine with IBKR; with Trade Republic, I had to file another acceptance instruction after the offer price increase. A colleague of mine did it through Deutsche Bank maxblue, and it was also sufficient to file the acceptance instruction only once. As settlement is generally T+2 in Germany, it should theoretically work until Wednesday, July 1. Usually, brokers have shorter acceptance periods, but you can sometimes extend those by contacting their customer service. I can generally recommend IBKR, as they seem to be the fastest when it comes to notifying you about the offer.

It turns out enduring London will be worth it. I heard back from the Royal Institution today and even though they are closed on July 27, they are letting me and Lyn in to tour the Ri!

I'm having a poor year, up about 6%. The biggest detractor has been software stocks I bought back in December.

Thanks to you all, wise words, but also good to. know there are a bunch of smart people out there in similar situations, and owning similar assets. When you're doing this on your own, even though you know rationally your portfolio is full of good companies, it's still easy to doubt yourself. And this sort of environment irritates me with all the Memory fanboys gloating.

I'm a glutton for punishment so I've been nibbling on some Volkswagen

I mean, yeah, obviously. The problem isn't winning the war. It's the next 50 years with a 5500 mile border, potentially 40 million newly-minted terrorists, largely indistinguishable from Americans, many of who would view the Geneva Conventions as naive suggestions. It is super strange how Americans keep on believing that "winning the war" is the end of things, not the beginning. When was the last time that was true? WW 2 or Korea?

New starter position in HONA (Honeywell Aerospace spin off)

Any ideas for companies in this category? CME has declined enough that, with the special dividend, you’ll probably end up around 6% (maybe a little below 6%). VZ is over 6% now.

down YTD with Fairfax, Stryker, and TCEHY causing most pain

BRK, MKL, and FFH probably make up half of my portfolio, so I am under performing as well. I trimmed some google and boosted mkl and ffh on the big earnings drops which came around the same time Google hit its high. I am definitely lacking positions that add torque to a portfolio.

Absent LQDA I'm up 2%. CPNG is a big detractor for me as it was about 15% of my portfolio. I'm not excited about my portfolio but I go to sleep knowing it's probably sound.

CVRX common. Don't say any reason for the big drop today so increased my position by about 40%. Now the 2nd largest in my portfolio.

I'm up for the year to date but it's been hard-ass work. Would have much preferred a peaceful buy and hold.

Ytd returns of 13% 1 yr return of 62% Thanks to Canadian banks and good timing with Google purchase. Terrible timing with Go Easy.

Me too. Flat YTD. CSU, FFH, Terravest dragging me down. Also bought AJG and BRO too early. These things happen......I'm not worried.

Which brokerage do you use? and will the timeline work(i.e isn't it close?)

I only care about underperformance if I'm out of cash or more so think my thesis has changed on the companies I own and continue to buy. I in no way want massive exposure to SPY with 40%+ sitting in the MAG7 who has mostly underperformed.

It's just like someone with severe TDS to go back to all the debunked law fare initiated against the Trump family. Look at the assholes that launched it - Fani Willis, Letitia James, James Comey, Joe Biden - all criminals trying to jail their major political opponent on bogus/fake charges - just like a banana republic. And of course, when Americans realized the lengths these assholes would stoop to - Americans rejected THEM and elected Trump. What idiots they were to try and put Trump in jail and remove him from the Presidential ballots. Americans are not stupid and understand corrupt politicians that have NOTHING to offer except "We don't like Donald Trump" Imagine that as your campaign platform.

This (flexible and intelligent capital allocation) is a really important differentiator for top notch insurance companies/conglomerates @Viking. There are plenty of publicly traded insurers who attempt to maintain underwriting discipline through an insurance cycle, but they unnecessarily restrict their capital allocation options. Too many of the insurance CEO’s limit their capital allocation decisions (when underwriting opportunities become less attractive) to share repurchases, dividends and possibly acquisition of other insurance companies. They either don’t appear to be able to think outside those boxes, or perhaps they just don’t have an optimal holding company structure for insurance company subsidiaries that would also allow them to acquire subsidiaries outside of insurance. If they are focused on Return on Equity, when profitable underwriting growth for the numerator is difficult to achieve, they typically will turn towards returning capital to shareholders as a means of reducing the denominator. This can result in a relatively efficient insurer, addressing the issue of “excess capital” if it would otherwise be invested in low return fixed income instruments and damage the Return on Equity measurement. But the problem can be that in their urgency to “return” excess capital to shareholders, they forget to consider whether the price at which they are repurchasing shares is favorable or not. Both Fairfax and Berkshire have been (and are) proving themselves to be adept at rationally scanning a much wider global opportunity set of places to invest any excess capital that can accumulate during softer markets.

Anyone with a high allocation to Berkshire and Fairfax has likely under-performed and if the name of this site in any way selects for those types, it is likely that many have lagged the markets. But so what? What is six months over a lifetime horizon?