racemize

I'm trying to get the SEC filings for a few warrants in order to get the dividend threshold amount--how do you look them up if you know the company ticker? In particular, I'm looking for: BPFH LNC SBNY TCB VLY Thanks!

I've just used a spreadsheet, but getting all that entered in from 2003 won't be pleasant.

Simply add a "+0" in the end. It will convert string of numbers to decimal format. Thanks, my inner OCD is very appreciative.

no kindle edition. SADFACE.

I am not sure how to do that, but why wouldn't you just use the tabs at the bottom?

It has immediately become one of my favourite quotes from Mr. Howard Marks. :) giofranchi “As time goes on I get more and more convinced that the right method in investment is to put fairly large sums into enterprises which one thinks one knows something about and in the management of which one thoroughly believes. It is a mistake to think that one limits one’s risk by spreading too much between enterprises about which one knows little and has no reason for special confidence.” - John Maynard Keynes Gio, how does your views compare to what Marks just said in this memo? It seems like he is much less pessimistic than you?

I just started importing in options--is there a way to format the cell so that it is in $ format? Every time I reformat, it just ignores and shows as a number. The OC in me is upset!

Please do!

I think it would be silly to not be happy the economy is improving.

Thanks for doing this, I've been very curious. As I'm being lazy today, what did the return on newly invested capital (or return on tangible equity) get to on MidAmerican with the adjustments you just mention?

Excellent as always. I'm on board with the second phase analogy.

General question/something I noticed on this year's stress tests: First, I'm largely referring to JPM/WFC, which are a few years ahead of BAC on dividends and buybacks. Both of these companies stress test capital levels did not change much from last year. At the same time, they are at the Basel III requirements of capital levels already. Doesn't this seem to imply that they can't increase buybacks/dividends as much--i.e., if they had paid out more last year, they would have done worse than last year (in terms of capital levels) in the current stress tests? At the same time, they did increase their Basel III requirements, so these tests seem to be harder to meet than the Basel III requirements everyone was fixated on. Am I off base here? Offsetting that, the banks had very different estimates of the stress test results, so perhaps it is just that the regulators decided to go ultra-conservative on these tests (as opposed to last year, perhaps) and we will see improvement in the coming years.

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/12812

I think that makes sense for a discount rate of 6-7%--using 10% appears to move it down to 1.5 of book, if I'm thinking about it the right way anyway.

BNSF pays out a bunch to Berkshire proper as well which reduces equity at the subs. I thought they were putting in ~10 billion a year in both of these, which is greater than the pre-tax income, which would mean money flows into these two rather than out--are there other payments to berkshire outside of earnings?

racemize, FWIW (presuming my historical figures are correct), WEB is on the record implying that a 1.75 multiple of book for Berkshire as "not inappropriate" in a world of long-term interest rates between 6-7% if per-share intrinsic value increased annually at a rate of 15%. Best, Ragu Thanks! Do you know where that came from? I was just watching the CNBC videos at part I, and Buffett said something along the lines of: "1.2 is undervalued, could the real number be 1.35 or 1.3x of book? I don't know what the value is but 1.2 is significantly undervalued." The fact that he was in the 1.3 range was surprising to me--I thought he'd be near 1.4 or 1.5 honestly.

Just read this and found it pretty interesting. Anyone read the book he mentions (Damn Right...)? http://seekingalpha.com/article/1263801-charlie-munger-built-his-fortune-by-seeking-income-first-capital-gains-later?source=yahoo

I hope they expand this until it is larger than the NA insurance!

I might just go BRK. BAC maybe.

I agree with the sentiment--however, I like seeing returns in an aggregate sense to show that what we are doing has worked for value investors of the individual type, particularly ones I am listening to, e.g., on this board. These 75% returns though, I need to get out of my head...

We can email questions to be asked by the three analysts, which I was planning on doing. I thought it might be interesting to get a set of questions together from the board and send the top voted 1-3 questions to those analysts--e.g., it may give the questions more weight if it was voted for by a bunch of value investors. Even if not, it might still be interesting to see what questions people have for Buffett and perhaps we could answer them ourselves. Here are my two questions about Berkshire: 1) There are numerous different ways to calculate the intrinsic value of Berkshire Hathaway. You [buffett] espouse applying a multiple to operating earnings of wholly owned subsidiaries and adding investments per share. Another approach is to begin with book value and apply various adjustments, such as adding back some of the float liability due to its lack of cost. These approaches give values much higher than recent prices. However, another approach for valuing Berkshire is to begin with its book value, which is a conservative proxy for intrinsic value, and apply an expected growth rate over time, against a discount rate, to determine the highest multiple of book that can be paid and still achieve an acceptable return. As you have repeatedly indicated, the 20% annualized returns on book value cannot be replicated going forward due to Berkshire's present size. Accordingly, I estimate future annual book value gains may be in the 10-15% range, hopefully conservatively. Against a discount rate of 10%, Berkshire can only be valued at book value for 10% annual returns and 1.5 of book for 15% annual returns, without an additional margin of safety. These values seem to be somewhat at odds with 1.2 of book being significantly below intrinsic value, as you have stated. Is this line of thinking flawed? 2) As Berkshire has begun buying and investing in capital intensive businesses such as MidAmerican and BNSF, you [buffett] have indicated that incremental capital is able to be invested at high (or at least acceptable) rates of return. Could you please let us know what range of returns you expect with this additional capital? In addition, these companies also generate a fair amount of profits themselves, so are they able to soak up much of the cash being generated by other businesses?

I asked this a few pages back, but maybe you missed it (or maybe you don't know), in any event, here it is: Are you really going to be out of investing and go into buy and hold after BAC (e.g., BRK/FFH)? Or perhaps you will set aside a new portion to keep going with?

I think Klarman is the only of the "great" value investors that I just don't really like. Something about the way he writes, or what he says, just doesn't work for me.

oh man, that title made me think you had them! now I'm sadface.

2007 -- FFH gains 2008 -- FFH gains (a lot of them because I was levered in the calls the day of the short selling ban) 2009 -- FFH gains, WFC gains (some), and ORH gains (account went up 50% the day of the buyout offer -- thanks to Cardboard) 2010 -- FUR gains, C gains, not sure I remember what else 2011 -- lost 35% in RothIRA 2012 -- Up 300% from BAC (it doesn't show in the numbers given because it excludes January 2012 which was epic month) ah, of course just holding FFH would net you a lot then. Are you really going to be out of investing and go into buy and hold after BAC? Or perhaps you will set aside a new portion to keep going with?