no_free_lunch

How do you weight the risk of a recession to the banks? I can't help thinking of all the European / US banks that had to raise funds and dilute the shareholders during the GFC. Is that not a real risk in Canada?

I agree with Spek's view on Maidan protests being the point where Ukraine threw off the Russian yoke. Russian influence is still there today, via religious leaders and political leaders, Ukraine continues to push that out. The war validates the thesis that there is no room for that viewpoint. How can you tolerate a side which will send in an army and use strategic bombing against you if you disagree. When the other side is democracy and a more prosperous west, it seems a clear choice.

I like Logistec LGT-B.TO (Canadian port operator / oligopoly), onex.to (Private Equity), elf.to (insurance), and AVB (apartment REIT). I don't have a top pick per se but I have positions in all of those and they all have their merits at current prices. Logistec in particular is just crushing it right now and will likely be ignored but is due a significant re-rate. I view it as a long term hold that should out perform the market and yet has lower beta to it.

I have no evidence to back this up but I have heard that those fleeing are correlated with tech and other high skilled workers. So the issue is more the loss to the Russian economy than to the recruiting pool and that will in time translate to your last point around military supply.

I am up by some small margin, maybe +2%. Big contributions from FFH, AMGN, NOC. Offset by some nastiness in other names. All in all, I am thrilled with the results and most on here should be as well. If you think about it, we managed to navigate the resetting of interest rates back to 4%+, the bursting of the tech bubble and some significant geopolitical events. Or another perspective, I am more comfortable right now with the future outlook that I was 12 months ago. To be in this situation with the portfolio intact is a treat. Good luck to you all next year. I continue to learn so much and for sure I would have posted much weaker, more index like results if not for the commentary I find here.

I am starting to look at real estate, probably an apartment style condo to keep it simple. Rents are up 15% or so and prices are down ~10%. It is suddenly appealing from an investment perspective.

On the women fighters, it is not surprising dear UK. Some people, in any society, are naturally very brave and coupled with Russian atrocities it will draw them into the conflict. To refute the white washing filth around Russia being there for some purpose other than to conquer and subjugate, see this article from UK intelligence. Or of course, just use common sense and basic facts around the events at hand. https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-war-captured-russian-documents-reveal-moscows-10-day-plan-to-take-over-the-country-and-kill-its-leaders-12759836 It all ties together, Ukrainians know the score, Russians support it but are not really willing to die despite all their bluster. In the end, I suspect Russia will be forced to withdraw and will be that much more of a shittier and weaker country as a result of all of this. The best part is that the west gets the top tier of the Russian population via immigration.

He is not being melodramatic. The country is at war and there is clearly an invasion under way. Have you looked at a map lately of all the Russian forces in there? Clearly it's an attempt to subjugate. Poorly though out and executed, as is the norm for Russia, but clearly that attempt was made and is ongoing. Guerilla movements can be put down by a determined opponent who is willing to use torture and murder. It's been done before, by Russia in fact to Ukraine just 60 or so years ago. They can do it again if they are willing to kill everyone they suspect. In fact that's exactly what they are doing in the areas they control, even as we speak.

I disagree Dinar, Russia is still a threat. Russia is openlty threatening the US with nuclear annihilation. On the USSR, some of the propagandists, Dugin for instance, aspire to be something similar to the USSR and with this invasion of Ukraine, Putin is sure acting like the USSR (or similar) is the destination. This is further reinforced by the ongoing threats against Kazakhstan. Russia is an ally of convenience to China and weakening them is clearly to the US benefit prior to conflict with China. I agree that europe is not the US, it would just be nice to see them get their big boy pants on and take care of their own business rather than recklessly attack and then depend on the US. Europe has now openly admitted (by virtue of supplying arms in minor doses compare to America) that they rely on the US for their defense and that such defense IS needed.

At some point, Russia may run out of suckers and it can lead to revolution. It's one thing to talk ra ra let's go get the nazi's but how many Russian's really believe that? It doesn't seem like people are rushing to volunteer given conscription and prison soldiers. The communist revolution in 1917 was caused by the first world war casualities, that was a big part, you could have something similar happen here. This is not an existential crisis and people know that as is evidenced by the lack of support. It ends when the russian population says enough. For sure though the western media is far too optimistic and paints Russia as weaker than it is. I do not understand why, who does it benefit if it's not true? Maybe it's so that the general public can feel they are closer to victory than reality.

I agree. I suspect there is half truths to these articles, it's really to shock the western public so they are more receptive and understanding to the defense production requirements. Yes, we will have to build more defense capacity for a more conventional war. Note that they have been saying this type of thing for somewhere around 6 months and yet Ukraine keeps getting supplied. From an economic perspective, this further ties in with in-shoring of production. I would prefer we could spend our energies on something other than defense but then we won't have a "we" if we can't fight.

On this board, on social media, the argument from day one has been that supporting Ukraine will just make things worse. Yet they now have retaken some of the seized territory. You can see that so far that logic has proven wrong. I don't see why patriots are going to tip the scales, it's not like it will completely seal the skies. Just give them the weapons they need so they can finish this thing.

Zelensky himself may overplay his very particular role but the people of Ukraine often have no electricity and are subject to bombings, that is a fact. Hopefully it takes longer than 30-40 years for things to heal. Part of the issue is not learning from the Holodomor of the 30s. The only lesson here is never to trust Russia.

Agreed. This was the thread that came up when I searched, didn't realize there was another one in the proper section.

Onex Q3 numbers came out about a month ago. Small loss in Q3 with NAV now at $124 vs share price of $64. NAV should be higher now too as the NAV was as of Sept 30 and higher equity prices since then. Large scale share repurchases are ongoing. with around 4% of shares repurchased in the last 4 months. This equates to a 12% annualized share repurchase rate. At 50% of NAV these are very lucrative use of capital. The average repurchase price is $66, above current price. As for the underlying business fundamentals, not sure entirely. Perhaps higher interest rates will keep them down? I don't know but I continue to hold and will probably add if it stays depressed. https://www.onex.com/static-files/62dddfa6-5176-4090-90bf-fd46093c5235

The above is a Kazakhstan journalist, from what I understand. Shows the potential (hopefully does not happen) for a second front in Kazakhstan. It all ties into Ukraine and this is one reprecussion. The bully does not have the same power now that they are stood up to. Russian Ambassador to Kazakhstan: Nazis / nationalists live in Kazakhstan. if necessary will conduct a special military operation. Kazakhstan Journalist: God forbid you decide to come to us for an easy victory. You will not have an easy victory. The entire Kazakh steppe will be strewn with the corpses of your conscripts.

There is very little top line growth. They have been able to grow earnings per share by roughly double if you go back to 2007 era while paying a dividend but some of the growth is from improved margins. However, earnings should come and go. It's kind of a statistical bet. Onshoring should be a benefit to them as they seem to be have a lot of domestic US operations. Debt is quite low at around 2x earnings so they could probably do some share buybacks. The company is also supposed to spinoff it's health care unit, it's good to see management being proactive. The risk here is that there is a big lawsuit around faulty earplugs. You are speculating that they are able to settle the suit at a reasonable amount. This is not something I will claim to be an expert on, i appreciate the pushback.

Bought a little MMM (1% position). This is a stalwart, some moat, long history of slowly chugging forward. Not something you will get rich on but also priced to underperform. It's down over 50% from all time high and now trades around 12-13x earnings with a 4.7% dividend. Anyone else looking at this one?

On this one thing we all agree. Obviously this was done for the most simple minded political perspective, I think and hope it has backfired. Xerxes, I am curious about that PDF you linked but am afraid to click on the link! If possible could you attach the pdf or let us know the summary? Bluegolds, I did watch the first 10 minutes or so of your link but I find it hard to take this analyst seriously. I am not sure when it was filmed but he said point blank that all of south Ukraine (to Odessa) would be taken by Russia by fall. He says this would be in part due to Europe folding on winter / energy supplies. Quite the underperformance on that prediction. Why believe anything else he has to say when he is so confidently wrong?

I wonder how much of this is western propaganda, from what I can tell the Russians are still very slowly advancing in the Donbas. I also keep reading that RU artillery is 3-4x what Ukraine can put out. I really don't know what is happening but I think it is somewhere in the middle between western and russian propaganda. It's only when you get large scale changes, Kiev/Kharkiv/Kherson that both sides will admit to, that you can really discern the truth.

I fear that Russia is a long ways from the point of revolution or "rent seeking". Hope to be proven wrong but it seems this can continue. From what I have read, they are targeting conscription in the poorer parts of the country and from their ethnic minorities. In the major cities there is less of a push. Also the infamous use of prisoners as cannon fodder to buy time and keep the hot spots busy. The Russian sources I follow talk of a buildup of military production. Extra shifts, production on onverdrive, that sort of thing. Could be just propaganda but it seems plausible. I hope that western sanctions limit the effectiveness of their equipment but then it seems they can just buy from China or perhaps India to bypass, I am not sure how rock solid the sanctions are in that case. Certainly oil continues to flow. I still feel that Ukraine needs to push and take the pain to try to gain more territory and as fast as possible. Russia has this history of taking losses so better to try to grind them down before they can replace the qualified men and equipment. Maybe just maybe, there is still a military option and they can force some sort of near collapse of the Russian army. My main concern right now is actually some type of peace deal, not that I don't want peace - I do, but that it will never be honored and the fighting will just continue in a year or two. They need to get Russia out now and then fine, there can be a peace deal.

A little MDT. Just a 1% position, cheap at around 15 |PE, dividend, good history, a bet on return to growth and should do okay in the meanwhile.

I will just drop this one as if I am the only one believing it I'm likely wrong. For what it's worth, I was implying more the latter of what you said, the protests are completely independent but the western media and intelligence will take the opportunity and do what it can to further revolt.

Does anyone have any thoughts on the escalating protests in Iran? Perhaps I am over-focused on Ukraine but it seems the flare up in Iran seemed to roughly coincide with the start of weapon deliveries to Russia. Do people feel there is some kind of a link?

The article says that Ukraine managed to shoot it down, which is interesting. Maybe one of the faults with this strategy is allows testing of defense capabilities against these weapon systems. Not something you really want to reveal.