hardincap

per cdc: "if a symptomatic patient with Ebola coughs or sneezes on someone, and saliva or mucus come into contact with that person’s eyes, nose or mouth, these fluids may transmit the disease"

I believe the virus cant live for too long once outside a host. But, in an Airplane, every body is close to each other and air conditioning. Who knows. BTW, the way we are discussing is how panic starts. no one really knows, which is why we need a margin of safety. be overcautious, and overprepared.

Any word on what happened? Accident or natural? I recall he was in his early 60s. Really unfortunate.

For those of you who hedge against general market declines, do you prefer going long puts, short selling the index, or other, and why?

http://hussmanfunds.com/pdf/hsgperf.pdf Remarkable difference between his equity returns and total (hedged) returns.

yes, worth the price.

On one hand, you have Pinker saying outliers is crap. on the other hand, Munger liked it enough to have copies available at the BH meeting. Who is right?

tim cook on q2 call. if they delay new products till after holidays, they have to be the dumbest management team ever. How do you know that Sept is when they are planning their big announcements and not Dec or March?

i disagree re: morale but i agree that from the general public's POV apple is like a mad genius who has gone into hiding and we have no idea what he's up to. sept better be good.

this is the kinda thing Apple needs to PR aggressively about. Bob Lutz: "When a company and its products are vastly better than their reputations, its time to focus on changing perceptions."

thats what im saying. cook's style is too laid back. he's a good operator, terrible promotor. i agree you dont want to sling mud, but there is so much he could say in positive terms to support the company's image. maybe talk more about apple's superior profitshare/marketshare ratio, pricing power that has stayed consistent despite android gains, be more forceful in how apple has a grand vision in tv (he mentioned it as if it were a side comment at the last allthingsd conf). i think the mistake introverts like him make is having this attitude that "if we do a good job, market will reward us" and not taking PR seriously. perception can create reality, esp in a consumer biz like apple.. im astonished how even apple fans i know think apple has "lost it" again, buybacks are good, but at 15% over 2.5 years its not so overwhelming that you can afford to shirk your PR duties. Apple many reasons to be secretive, they have a different business environment. I welcome the stock price being low as long as they are buying back. Cooks silence is likely to benefit long term shareholders more than noise. Try to get Buffet to talk about IV. Raking mud at a competitor is not always good marketing, especially when you have a premium position. You end up giving them free publicity. Plus, it's not Cooks style. Just like Buffet rarely speaks ill of anyone.

not mutually exclusive. theres PLENTY of things cook can say to defend apple w/o spilling secrets. like smack down eric schmidt's comment on how android will win because of its dominant marketshare. jobs would clearly be on the attack, calling android things like grand theft android. cook, nothing. buybacks: 15% outstanding over 2.5 years is not reason to let stock crash and not worry about it Apple many reasons to be secretive, they have a different business environment. I welcome the stock price being low as long as they are buying back. Cooks silence is likely to benefit long term shareholders more than noise. Try to get Buffet to talk about IV.

A great CEO not only runs the biz effectively but manages the co's story effectively. Cook hasn't been doing well at the latter. He needs to come out of his shell and be more aggressive. Even Buffett does his part by running annual shareholders meeting and granting plenty of interviews to the media.

He's back! I'm guessing he has a big macro trade that he can deploy LOTS of capital into. Maybe japan collapse, inflation, another financial crisis..

http://scionasset.com/

shld has been absolutely terrible. its far below his cost and he's been waiting 5+ years for it to work out. i doubt he'd get into it if he could do it over again... i think he overestimated lampert. i did too.. as buffett says turnarounds seldom turn around I thought the same thing -- well, both things -- too. Can anyone name a large position that didn't work out well that Berkowitz pounded the table on? I can only think of CNQ -- though he probably made a lot of money there too. He sold others before they worked out -- Pfizer and the health insurers. But, you made good money, I think, if you held. Anything else that someone can name where he made a large investment and it didn't work well? I guess we could argue AIG and SHLD haven't hit yet. I'm not sure of his average price on either. Perhaps it makes sense to wait a few months, or more, given his self-described propensity for "premature accumulation" -- great phrase. But, his ideas are pretty solid from what I've seen.

Would any of you ascribe any importance to the word "rapidly"? The only importance that might be ascribed to the word "rapidly" is it proves Sokol is an asshole. lol agreed.

Wow, very harsh words. Makes me really wonder WTF went on behind the scenes. Buffett has been behind-the-back vindictive before so I wouldn't be surprised if he did something that crossed the line for Sokol

Sorry I got confused with Wesco's portfolio. DJCO had ~4 or so positions. WFC was the largest I believe. http://mungerisms.blogspot.com/2011/02/2010-djco-meeting.html

DJCO had ~4 or so positions. WFC was the largest I believe.

What did he say on the warrants? Missed it. If not BAC, then I agree on GM, too, especially considering his recent comments on the warrants...

Gm would be my next guess. Definitely has strong tailwinds. Or maybe byd?

sounds like BAC

What are you guys talking about? Buffett thought that Welch's story was funny and wanted Welch to tell it to everyone watching CNBC. The humor didn't quite work out because Welch didn't recall the story. You guys are reading way too much into this. this is one of Buffett's many talents - he can take people down so subtlety that some don't even notice it was a take down I'm sorry, but if that was a take down, I found it weak. I thought Warren came off looking silly and out of touch, not Welch. To call in and want Welch to share some supposedly funny story from fifty years ago, which he apparently does not remember, is a bit strange. Even when Warren tried to describe the funny part, it really wasn't. If anything it was implying naivete on the part of women. you're missing the point. it wasnt meant to be funny, it was meant to paint welch as just another guy watching out for himself, not the viewers. the "funny story" pretension is just to make the takedown subtle and palatable.

What are you guys talking about? Buffett thought that Welch's story was funny and wanted Welch to tell it to everyone watching CNBC. The humor didn't quite work out because Welch didn't recall the story. You guys are reading way too much into this. this is one of Buffett's many talents - he can take people down so subtlety that some don't even notice it was a take down