73 Reds

A lot of good one can do from the grave. Keep trying.

For me Fairfax remains as compelling a long-term hold as ever. Inflation will re-emerge and push interest rates up, an upcoming soft insurance market will harden again and stock valuations will decline and then go back up. These are entirely unavoidable factors that don't affect the long term trajectory of a well-run company.

Not sure why Berkshire would not/should not seek the best outside talent? There should certainly be more than one individual managing an investment portfolio the size of Berkshire's. In fact, there should be a consortium of managers who each specialize in different areas.

One can easily hold both. To your point, I own Fairfax India because of a lack of knowledge or true ability to evaluate and invest directly in Indian companies but trust management at both parent and sub. That being said, I didn't own either until there was a specific reason; the parent simply got too cheap due to issues that appeared to have been corrected by management and the sub is a very cheap worthwhile holding due to the upcoming Anchorage IPO.

@Crip1 In the spirit of wholesome discussion, I think you are blaming the company for your mistake. We all make investments with specific expectations. When those expectations don't play out for whatever reason, we are free to act. What I learned over the years is when looking at a downtrodden "undervalued" investment, there needs to be a reason why something will change for the better in order for the investment to be at all attractive. Otherwise, I always tend to revert back to Newton's Law.

+1 Until the IPO is announced the lower the price the better. I thought this was a "value investing" board.

Not directed at you, but there seems to be a lot of belly-aching about this stock. Why? All "value investments" trade at a specific price for a reason. Value investments typically need some form of catalyst, i.e., a change in leadership, an inflection point, or an event that changes the trajectory. Fairfax India has such an event coming up - the Anchorage IPO. Doesn't really matter when it happens as long as it does. In the mean time, now would be a perfect time to accumulate shares rather than lament the company's history. What am I missing?

That's the very issue at stake here. When more and more people are not willing to defend the Country, and worse yet hate it and what it stands for, you have no Country and no future. Just a stunningly stark issue that half of the US can't grasp and Britain is not far behind.

As always, Fairfax Financial. Most of my investments are in the private realm but the public equities I am consistently buying recently year include JOE, TGT, and BABA.

Completely agree. One individual, focused on many other things, cannot direct a $trillion enterprise by himself. Ignoring under-performing businesses does not lend itself to success. Buffett's accomplishments are astonishing but a horse and buggy are no longer adequate. I've said it before - new investors need a legitimate reason to consider investing in Berkshire. As a 40+ year shareholder, I wouldn't buy additional shares if the company does not evolve. In fact, if a capital gains holiday were implemented or even better, a 1031-like tax-deferred exchange existed for equities, I'd unload quite a bit of my existing Berkshire stock for better alternatives.

Yet Buffett hired him anyway - out of an entire World full of money managers. Hmm. My guess is there is a lot we don't know and probably never will.

Sorry, should have prefaced prior post with the words "Kidding aside". The joke was obvious but your kids did a good job with the illustration.

What Berkshire really needs is to expand its circle of competence. As individual investors it is easy to focus on a narrow circle of competence because there are usually unlimited investment alternatives. But when managing other people's money and the investment universe shrinks within your circle of competence, the only effective approach is to broaden the investment horizon in a meaningful way or give people back their money. I think Greg will have to deal with this issue sooner or later.

I mean who knows; maybe Berkshire is one of Todd's initial equity investments in his new gig at JPMorgan. He clearly knows the company.

Well, all board members are "strongly encouraged" to own shares so wouldn't you think the same would apply (or even more so) to Todd and Ted? Or do you know something I don't, LOL?

IMO, without knowing his true motivation for leaving, its all mere speculation. We can't even measure his value added to Berkshire, other than some kind words from Buffett every now and then. I think folks are reading too much into this without further information. I would, however be interested to know whether he keeps his Berkshire shares.

Really don't know. Also don't know to what extent, if any he was limited in his investment decision-making. Most of us even here evolve with our investment criteria. It could not have been easy working for Buffett who did evolve but very slowly.

Why all the hate on Todd here? Personally, I'm ambivalent to the move and we don't even know what his actual investment record has been at Berkshire. Plus we don't know who, if anyone will replace him. The fact that Jamie Dimon loves him says something, no?

I dunno, if someone were managing a relatively insignificant percentage of your investments with no chance to invest more of your capital, even if he shoots the lights out would your reaction be anything more than "OK, that's nice"?

Hard to know his true motivation(s) for the move. I'm not going to speculate but at Berkshire he was very much an after-thought.

@Cigarbtt I think the way you frame the question of housing affordability suggests a more complicated response. One issue is whether, or to what extent owning a house today is more expensive than renting and whether the ratio has changed, i.e. risen. Another question is whether housing affordability is different than the affordability of most anything else. Hasn't everything become more expensive and if so, is this a housing issue or a broader topic? Another question is the affordability of housing for who? If we are limiting the discussion to first-time home buyers in large cities, we are already behind the eight ball because the assumption is these are young or relatively young people who perhaps have not had the time or ability to save as much as older folks who live in more expensive venues like large cities. For most of my life homes in large cities were always less affordable than similar homes located in smaller cities, towns and more rural locations so has anything really changed?

John, there have always been different perceptions of the World; i.e., division. The difference this time around is that the division is not caused so much by policy differences but by the attitude toward a single individual who rents space at the White House. They just can't get past it.

Can't argue there! My only other current idea that is gradually growing in this account is TGT (thanks, Sanjeev).

Re. leverage, I kind of see it differently. There does not appear to be a great deal of upside from here so what is the point of leverage? OTOH, don't really mind holding this for a few months for what looks like another 4% and a dividend payment or two, particularly with a lack of great ideas right now aside from moving the money within the family to Fairfax India.

Do you think they'd hold out for a higher price? Can't imagine any opposing 3rd party bidders.