siddharth18

Returns are laudable and begets respect especially for a prospective English major that almost became a journalist. But class and reputation need to be nurtured too. Maybe it's hard to do when you've made quite a bit of "free money."

I guess you should just size your position accordingly. Usually though, if the buyout price is absurdly low, some litigants do usually emerge although it may not be wise to assume that it will happen for every situation. To learn more about this, check out the EBIX securities litigation and litigation following the AutoInfo buyout.

Would you know if this feature is available to IB's retail clients or only to their hedge fund clients? Oh it's open to a retail client like myself (I haven't invested in any of the funds). And I have an individual cash account with minimal balance and I have access to it. I claim myself as an accredited investor, so maybe that's why it shows me the data? Here's how it looks: http://i.imgur.com/vDeAZz6.png

One more feature I loved in InteractiveBrokers was access to data from small hedge funds that use their platform: Their past performance, AUM, fees, holdings, client letters, etc. Believe it or not, there's a lot of good stuff to be had from that section, especially for those that are new to this game, and, at some point are hoping to work at or start their own fund down the road. PS: This feature is FREE!

You can OPT OUT of this by going to "Manage Account" --> "Security" Don't disable two factor authorization! Seriously, you're dealing with a lot of money ... You need a minimum amount of value in your account for one of the two electronic alternatives and I'm too poor for that :) +1 I wish all other brokerages had it too, instead of the impotent "security questions" or worse - no 2-step authentication at all. Disabling 2-step authentication is buying short-term comfort at the risk of acquiring a lot of long-term pain. @Eric - I'm amazed by the attention to detail you include in all your comments/answers. It's no surprise your returns are way up there. ;) Thanks for being generous with your knowledge.

You can OPT OUT of this by going to "Manage Account" --> "Security"

Thanks for sharing!

Did you mean to say that he bought puts rather than wrote puts ??? Yeah confused about this as well! I think he meant bought puts (or wrote calls) ? Also, if they were 1oz gold wafers, they couldn't be worth $2800/pop, right?

How do you find the borrow rate in IB platform? My account is cash-based, NOT margin based. Do you have to "subscribe" to the borrow rate data or something?

Thanks ItsAValueTrap, for the detailed answer! Here's an article that also explains how market makers front run the retail buyers/sellers: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB952617717976527487.html One thing I've learned: Cognizance of shark-like behavior is vital to becoming an intelligent player in the fish-bowl.

@Muscleman: I feel like Etrade, Tradeking, , TDAmeritrade, Fidelity, etc are all "basic" compared to the level of sophistication you receive at IB. This is assuming that what you want to buy is available at all brokers. For most US listed stocks, if you're trading in small quantities, the only variable to compare is the final commission. If you buy 100 shares @ $10/share, you'll just pay $1 in commission at IB, compared to $5-$10 at flat-pricing brokers. If you buy AWLCF (Awilco Drilling on OTC), IB and TradeKing won't allow it at all. Fidelity will tack on a $50 foreign fee and Etrade/TDAmeritrade will just charge you the regular $9.99/trade. But at the end of the day, each will have it's strengths/weaknesses. For me, Fidelity lets me purchase stocks in countries where IB won't (for example: Norway). But for purchasing stocks on Toronto Stock Exchange, IB is better than Etrade/Fidelity because of the competitive forex rates. While IB has lots of bells and whistles, its UI takes getting used to, and yes, there's a learning curve. Bottom line is that not everyone will have same needs, and not everything will be equally priced. In order to get the best of everything, you may have to understand pricing for each transaction at each broker and then pick the best option at your disposal. Can you please elaborate on this? I'd like to know what specifically is bad about Etrade. Before placing a trade, I just view live quotes at atleast 2-3 brokers and then proceed to place a limit order.

Anyone here own/used to own gas stations? I'm trying to learn more about this business. What type of ROI/ROE/ROA can one expect from such a business? I know that profit comes from the convenience store, not from gas, but that's about it. Here is a sample listing I saw: Price = $165,000 + $55,000 (inventory) =$ 220,000. Gross Profit = $288,000 (from the "Business Description). EBITDA = $125,000 (they define it as "cash flow). http://www.bizbuysell.com/Business-Opportunity/Gas-Convenience-Northwest-Orlando/764819/ Thoughts?

Jim Cramer fills a pretty good void. Especially for people who: 1. Have money 2. Want to make money 3. Want to make no effort to achieve step (2) 4. Want someone to tell them how to do it effortlessly AKA the proverbial free lunch.

Ah this is a different Cohen than most people are used to hearing these days...talk about variety... :D

Well gee! Out of all people in the world, who'd have thought that the group making hundreds of millions off of SAC would come and defend SAC? Isn't SAC one of the few firms remaining that trades the old fashioned way and pays a higher commission per share? If their statement says anything, it's that there's a lot of money at stake for them. That Goldman's statement should carry with it any ounce of credibility is beyond my comprehension. But then again, Goldman is no stranger to doing questionable things to acquire the Almighty Dollar.

You know what's illegal? Trying to pull a short squeeze on Ackman.................according to Ackman's lawyers of course ;D http://www.foxbusiness.com/industries/2013/07/31/fresh-squeeze-ackman-questions-soros-buy-herbalife/

Absurd to think that guys like these can find millions of dollars to run year after year even after lackluster results.

Dr. Burry's bet was far from speculation. He not only read the mind-numbingly complex MBS prospectuses, but practically incited Wall Street to create CDS on subprime mortgages. He also clearly explains that his bet wasn't betting on an Armageddon scenario but specific tranches of subprime mortgages that would feel the most stress due to rate resets. For him, it was an incredibly asymmetric bet with a catalyst. As for Paulson, I gotta wonder who's running the show. Paolo Pellegrini was the one who did the original subprime research and then Paulson saw it and approved it. Maybe the best thing for him would be to retire after subprime bet? (Like Andrew Lahde) ;D

caledonia is one that I am in that is similar with african exposure and low pe. While the PE is not 1x like banro, they have also paid significant dividends. I don't know why all you guys are sniffing around these awful obscure juniors and exploration companies. The major producers are ON SALE. Barrick had an adjusted P/E of 5 on friday, it's lower today. I held Caledonia for the first 5 or 6 years of the gold bull and it is a total dog. I dumped it and shifted to High River Gold, it was a 14X or 15X off the 2008 lows (no, I didn't pick the lows then alas). HRG is about to get bought so probably not much left upside left there. But that said, the majors are dirt cheap! I did a workup last night and made a "report style" PDF for my website, probably a little simplistic for the likes of this board but it gets the basics across. But I wrote it before today's continuing crash. Who knows where this is going to stop, I see various opinions shooting emails all over the place with technical support points, whatever. I'm just waiting for the dust to settle but the major producers are cheaper now than in lows of October 2008. I'm attaching the PDF, but remember, these numbers use friday's closing data. Not today's. The main thing I'm thinking about now is with gold prices this low, what does that do to margin compression (but I guess if it impacts too much, production will slow down), The question remains - how long will Gold fall and to how much? Unless you are a macro expert - buying gold equities is implicitly betting that Gold won't sink as to make the mines unprofitable. Gold is only worth as much as the buyers think it's worth and currently the buyers are scarce. Gold also didn't rise after 2011 even as we witnessed increase in Q/E, Greek crisis, Japanese Q/E.

Or...become a stripper and coax the executives into giving you insider info, as enunciated here http://www.hulu.com/watch/54129 ! *Kidding of course* Nice thread guys. I'll add Glassdoor.com and Indeed.com for employee reviews/sentiment and job sites for openings (to in which area is the company expanding, and how aggressive they intend to hire).

What about Sandstorm Gold? You know - the royalty based, star jockey's (Nolan Watson) company? P/E seems pretty high but someone with knowledge of financials/outlook can comment (AboveAverageOdds - AAOI) ? While Gold's thesis hasn't changed, Gold hasn't seen a meaningful correction in pretty long. It could be a long and rocky road before things turn around.

Hey all, I was perusing Mike Burry's early letters where here discussed options compensation in riveting detail. My understanding of options pricing and the respective accounting is quite superficial at this point. His contention is that the traditional way options are priced, expensed and accounted for - is based on Black-Scholes and hence meaningless. Also that intrinsic value is created if the company issues shares at price above intrinsic value. I would like to know if anyone else calculates the option compensation in a way Dr. Burry does? Does any book/article cover this subject in detail? Has Buffett touched this topic? Here is the link to letter: http://www.scioncapital.com/PDFs/Scion%202001%202Q_web.pdf (starting page 3) To quote Burry: "The investors in the habit of overturning the most stones will find the most success."

Cui bono? If you are Warren Buffett holding Coca Cola in 1998 and the stock is selling at a stratospheric valuation, it doesn't benefit the long term shareholder (Buffett in this case) if KO initiates a buyback at that valuation. My understanding is: All the intrinsic value that is lost (lost because you spend $1 to buy back stock worth less than $1) from buyback executed at steep levels is completely and proportionately transferred from the company coffers (long term shareholders) to the sellers of KO stock. Since all companies are run under the mandate of maximizing long-term shareholder value, isn't overpriced buyback always ill-fated? Said another way: Buybacks executed at prices higher than intrinsic value benefit short term sellers at the detriment of long term share holders, right? With the benefit of hindsight of course - but if Coca-Cola could have issued new shares in 1998 to raise cash and then turned around and used that amount to buyback the stock in 2000-2001, it would have benefited long term shareholders at the expense of short term shareholders - which is exactly a company ought to be doing.

I guess the Berkshire Hathaway report, at only 112 pages, would be the much longer of the two if it provided an equivalent amount of information about each subsidiary. Understanding a business doesn't mean you understand every single element of it, but rather that you understand the probability of your upside and downside. The simplest businesses to understand are lemonade stands. If you're going for simplicity, buy a mafia network of them. Well yes. I suppose I'm just naive. I don't have much experience in evaluating insurance businesses and part of me just equates the size of the annual report to the complexity of the business. I also equate a full understanding of the business to having an edge in a particular investment. With AIG, I neither have a complete understanding of the business (a complete and thorough cognizance of all elements) nor foresee a competitive advantage over today's sellers of AIG. But it doesn't bother me one bit; I just move over to stocks in my wheelhouse!

Greed.