ASTA

Great quotes but looked at their performance figure and just skipped the rest. Does anyone else feel the same way when one looks at AR by fund managers. Time is limited in life so I rather read or listen too good performance managers or really bad ones as comparisons. Plus lets say FPA Cresent also does the absolute portfolio stuff but at least has some graphs and not just 25 pages about good knows what. sorry if I come out as rude :)

Migration: The drain from Spain After years as a leading recipient of immigration, the exodus from the country threatens its recovery http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/f7bdd5ce-995e-11e3-91cd-00144feab7de.html#axzz2ttXZylpa great analysis on migration flight by South Americans and others from Spain.

Aberhound I agree with frugal Land is a good idea but maybe some time ago. As 1997 was a great year for that I know very well. However, I only spend about 11% per year of what I make so I think I am quite frugal :D

I have to buy German because I live close by so american brands are not common here. SD I am not going to buy Beckham's BMW :D http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-448158/Becks-stolen-BMW-used-Macedonian-Government-minister.html I think as I have house paid of and no debt I can buy a used m3 :D And the good thing is I only drive maybe 8k km per year so can keep that one long too.

I don't think that jaguar xf passes the wife test either German or Swedish cars ;D Regarding financing if one can do that through a company I think that's not a bad idea but I don't have that possibility. So will probably buy cash a 1 year old BMW we will see.

Since there has been a lot of talk about houses being expensive and if it is a investment or not lets talk about a value investor choice of a car :D I have been spending lets say 50 hours the last weeks learning about cars. for great information regarding BMW look at http://www.bimmerpost.com/ on Mercedes-Benz http://mbworld.org/ So I am driving a very nice car but its 10 years old and thinking about a new one. As the value investor in me its really tough. As cars are the worst investments. So was thinking about a used car. The problem now is my current car I have to pay 1000 euros tax and its has 12mpg 20 l/km so a gas guzzler. And some times I just worry about the gas so I don't even drive. So just wondering how other value minded people on this board go about buying a car? I think I will buy a nice 1-2 year old car maybe the new M3 or the new C-class any stories or recommendations :D

Well maybe he is right but as far as I see it the best investment for emerging market is PEP, KO, AGK, JNJ, IBM, Posco etc. so I think the investment board have been right :D Like Warren Buffet recently said I like stuff that moves :D example AGK. Anyone how lived in a third world knows that their power supply is abysmal.

jm25 well I have had moderate successes and I have not even once looked at a screener the last 3 years excluding magicformulainvesting.com and gurufocus 52 week low. So one can go about it many ways. And regarding seekingalpha and marketfolly I have looked at them maybe 4 times per year. What I am saying is the best way is all personal. Find whats best for you in your real portfolio or fake portfolio :D For example I just found 2min ago that Tweedy Browne bought more HSBC this quarter and its at about the low of the 4th quarter so that might be interesting :D

Great visual maps on how the world works/worked http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/08/12/40-maps-that-explain-the-world/?lines http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2014/01/13/40-more-maps-that-explain-the-world/

Any one else looking in to Wm. Morrison Supermarkets plc. as this has been the biggest purchase of Francisco Garcia Parames last year.

lol omg Kraven :o u are crazy ??? >:( :'(

I am happy for all people who had good results this year just amazing to see :D My returns where 32%. 30% in LRE and FFH combined and around 15% in cash all year so not to bad. Plus I don't use any kind of leverage.

Cool story about Farouk al-Kasim the man how showed up by foot at Norway’s Ministry of Industry and hired immediately. He wrote the law governing how Norway should control its oil fields. http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/99680a04-92a0-11de-b63b-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2mmdHIC27 A very nice read :D

AZ_Value sorry if I did not mention it but of course everyone here will now that he sold the puts. + twacowfca that's what I meant :D If you want to play with options the hedging or leaps are the way too play. Of course if your asset pool is growing over time work cash flow selling puts might not be to bad.

If you think about it carefully you realize how costly the equity index puts were in the financial crisis. Berkshire got the float from them to invest, but its negotiations with the rating agencies meant that, at a time when markets were in turmoil, during the very crisis that Warren had been waiting for all those years to put the tens of billions of dollars to cash to work, he couldn’t do it. He was able to participate in the market crash only in a tepid way. That opportunity cost has to be offset against the expected profit from those equity index puts. They weren’t worth it. I think this quote is very good. As it once again reinforces my idea of put options being very dangerous and as I see it cash is always 90% better alternative. As one should just wait until an opportunity arises and then invest. Be it 10 years or not cash is just so much simpler then theses puts. Rather sleep tight and wait opportunity's always arises some times(hopefully not ten years ala Munger). Thanks for bringing it up LC

Why not hire some small hedge fund to run some money. For example Corner Market Capital Corporation. You only pay them if they preform and no pesky labor laws and stuff for staff managing family money. And the upside is that if they loose big they are whipped out as well. Not being mean here just saying like Munger says 95% of the population don't understand incentives enough. Off course family adviser might not like that idea :D

I think that this portfolio overall looks good very diverse set of stocks which should make this portfolio very stable time will tell but maybe we can start a COBF index investment company ala www.gothamassetmanagement.com. if I was starting a portfolio today this would be a very good start I think.

Another value investor working hard in South Africa :D If anyone have any more info please post. Allan Gray $8.5 billion Industry: Financial services Country Of Citizenship: South Africa Age: 75 Marital Status: Married This media-shy South African moneyman controls two investment companies that collectively manage over $50 billion in assets. After Gray received an MBA from Harvard, he worked for eight years at Fidelity Management and Research in Boston before returning to Cape Town in 1973, when he founded Allan Gray Limited, now the largest privately owned asset manager in South Africa. It is also the most successful with assets under management at approximately $30 billion. According to inside sources at the company, Allan Gray’s global mandate share portfolio has achieved an average annual return of 28 percent since 1974. Keys to success include rigorous research and the consistent application of Allan Gray’s ages-old and time-tested investment approach of buying heavily into companies whose share price is less than their intrinsic value. Gray is also the founder of Orbis, an asset manager in Bermuda, which he founded in 1989. Orbis has over $21 billion under management. Gray’s son, William, is President of Orbis and equally serves as portfolio manager of the Orbis Funds. Gray and his family are the controlling shareholders of Allan Gray Limited and Orbis. In 2007, Gray endowed his Allan Gray Orbis Foundation with $130 million, the single largest charity gift in Southern Africa at the time. The foundation funds scholarships for poor but promising South African high school students. http://www.ventures-africa.com/2013/10/richest-people-africa-2013/ http://www.allangray.co.za/

Have the audio-book already ;D Have read about half of the book but bought the audio-book too :D The only problem is I have been a slug in reading or listening to books lately I hope my reading/listening genie will come back soon.

Anyone looking in to Orkla ASA have been looking in to this name and some good fund manger owns it.

Jeast, I agree that Bogle have done allot more information on expense and Indexing. Bogel however never even talks about single stock selection. At least this book does go in to limited stock selection and behavioral investment and some history in the stock market regarding stock picking and concentration. Of course as anything else in life if one reads about specific topics one learns more. This is not targeted to Jeast a successful fund manger more towards Bob the collage graduate wanting to learn about (value) investing :D

I think that Copycat investment's are very good. I have done this for three years now and getting satisfactory results. However I think that concentration is the best way of doing it. And only invest when the "stars" line's up is also useful. Its super easy regarding large cap's just select a group of guru's on Gurufocus and watch that 52 week low list of your selected gurus. My best home run was more focused on the size of the portfolio manger had in a particular stock that was OSTK. So SIZE maters ;D If COBF, Morningstar, Gurufocus and magicformula lines up on one stock it has been a wise bet to bet on that stock (at one point of time maybe not today). Example MSFT and Apple.

I have two big mistakes excluding stocks of omission. Nokia As a swede I thought Nokia was a great buy at 9 euros. And just bought because of old memories. Now I try to stay away from my "home market Nordic countries" as much as possible. HPQ Second mistake was HPQ also just bought at $37 was thinking Glenn Greenberg had my back as he had a 4.5% stake. My lesson from that was I need more conformation then just one guy and wait until a opportunity presents it self. And only when the stars align up do I invest.

Thanks for the link. Liked the quote "I like things that travel" :)

Thanks jtvalue nice article did not know of post holdings.