John Hjorth
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Posts posted by John Hjorth
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40 minutes ago, dealraker said:
... Have a great weekend.
Agreed, +1! 'Have a great weekend' to you all here on CoBF, and thank you, -for being you.
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Thank you all for reading my post about RI.PA as a reply to @Spekulatius exactly as it was meant, and thereby generating some friendly talk and banter here on CoBF! 
@dealraker posting about having a good time with good friends on the porch just near by, and with a view to the lake, just south of Lexington, NC. I suppose the autumn colors are in the crowns of the trees by now.
Here, just like everywhere in the Northern hemisphire, we have just passed autumnal equinox by a week, and the clock here is now 22:45. It has been black night for a whole hour now, and I just hate it. 6 - 7 weeks ago we had light in the horizon to the north, generating light nights. Now totally gone. Tomorrow we are bound to leave the best September month ever to the best of my recollection with regard to rain, sun and temperatures. But all that is because of the Gulf Stream.
@RedLion, congrats on your new Maui acqusition!
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30 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:
Added a bit more RI.PA / PRNGY today and NTDOY yesterday.
Certainly interesting.
I wonder if market participants are sobering up.
... I mean I don't think we have seen any pics of CoBF members friday afternoon shopping cart contents lately, so everybody in the industry are putting robes in their sails, reducing credit times for customers, reducing sizes of inventories, looking with a comb on staffing, and trowing a critical view on the base of fixed costs.
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I just stopped at the 4:14 mark in the video posted by you with the interview of Prof. John J. Meirshaimer.
That was to me enough. He is a Ph. D. and all that kind of fine stuff, but he's nothing but an highly edudated idiot. Advocating a view the NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg is the 'real agressor' here, 'teasing Russia'.
It's just so f***ing lame! Utter *BS*!
1. How about what the people of Ukraine want?
2. Does the people of Ukraine actually deliver by themselves, under the armed conflict, simply by fighting back, to the best of the abilities of the people?
Please give me a break.
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Thanks, Sanjeev [ @Parsad ],
Marlin was a person of few words and posts here on CoBF, when he was active years ago. He mentioned once Mr. Kilpatrick had a website with a link to it, too. It's now gone. Maybe one day I'll try to send an e-mail to Mr. Kilpatrick asking my questions.
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36 minutes ago, WayWardCloud said:
Defenses contractors do seem like today's no-brainer and I've been toying with the idea of a defense/aero ETF. Revenues should go up meaningfully because of Ukraine as well as the escalation of tensions in the Pacific and it would also add an anti-fragile element to the portfolio. However I came to the conclusion I couldn't look at myself in the mirror if I got rich from people being killed. Same reason I have never owned tobacco companies. To each their own, though. I actually support the necessary evil of us building those weapons I just don't want to profit. ...
@WayWardCloud, @Cod Liver Oil & @Dinar,
To that part already mentioned about the ramp-up in munitions you have to add the judged effects of a lot of military ramping-up in European countries that are NATO members spending less than 2 percent of state budget on defence by now. Just look up a list of worlds largest defense contractors, and think about who has the stuff in their product catalog that is in demand.
None of these countries want MIGs [for obvious reasons
], they all want something called F-##. In general, I think it's a in general a fairly correct statement that the US defense contractors are the preferred suppliers in many cases.
I'm personally under similar investment restrictions as @WayWardCloud, set by the Lady of the House, btw. It's OK with me, I don't miss this to mess around with, also.
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DST [Danmarks Statistik - The Danish Statistical Department] : Theme - Invasion of Ukraine .
Ufortunately, the graphs break, if I try to give it a spin in Google Translate, translating the webpage to English.
This text in Danish :
QuoteHvor størstedelen af personer med ukrainsk oprindelse i Danmark var mænd i 30’erne før 2022, er det en anden køns- og alderssammensætning, der kom til Danmark i løbet af 2022. Størstedelen af de indvandrede ukrainere var kvinder på 20 år eller ældre. De udgjorde 14.900 personer. Dernæst kom 12.000 børn og unge i alderen 0 til 19 år, og endelig udgjorde mænd på 20 år eller ældre 4.600 personer. Kvinder og børn udgjorde dermed 85 pct. af alle indvandrede ukrainske statsborgere i 2022.
translates to the following in English :
QuoteWhile the majority of people of Ukrainian origin in Denmark were men in their 30s before 2022, it is a different gender and age composition that came to Denmark during 2022. The majority of immigrated Ukrainians were women aged 20 or older. They made up 14,900 people. Next came 12,000 children and young people aged 0 to 19, and finally men aged 20 or older made up 4,600 people. Women and children thus made up 85 per cent. of all immigrated Ukrainian citizens in 2022.
This text in Danish :
QuoteTilknytning til arbejdsmarkedet
Kort efter den russiske invasion af Ukraine begyndte, vedtog et bredt flertal af Folketingets partier en særlov, som skulle give ukrainske personer, som indvandrede efter invasionen, opholdstilladelse og mulighed for at komme hurtigere i arbejde. Af de ukrainske statsborgere, som er omfattet af særloven, var 6.800 personer i lønmodtagerbeskæftigelse i december 2022. Heraf 4.700 kvinder og 2.200 mænd.
Omkring 1.200 var ansat i branchen hoteller og restauranter og ligeledes 1.200 i den branche, der blandt andet omfatter rengøring og vikarbureauer. Omkring 1.000 var ansat i landbruget og 700 i hver af brancherne handel og industri.
Inden invasionen, i slutningen af november 2021, var billedet noget anderledes. Her var der 9.586 lønmodtagere med ukrainsk oprindelse på det danske arbejdsmarked, hvor både indvandrere og efterkommere tæller med. Det var især i svine- og kvægbranchen, der fandtes mange lønmodtagere med ukrainsk oprindelse. I svinebranchen var der 2.168 beskæftigede, mens der var 1.590 i kvægbranchen.
translates to the following in English :
QuoteConnection to the labor market
Shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine began, a broad majority of the parties in the Folketing passed a special law which should give Ukrainian people who immigrated after the invasion a residence permit and the opportunity to get to work more quickly. Of the Ukrainian citizens covered by the special law, 6,800 people were in salaried employment in December 2022. Of these, 4,700 were women and 2,200 were men.
Around 1,200 were employed in the hotels and restaurants industry and also 1,200 in the industry, which includes cleaning and temp agencies. Around 1,000 were employed in agriculture and 700 in each of the trade and industry sectors.
Before the invasion, at the end of November 2021, the picture was somewhat different. Here there were 9,586 wage earners with Ukrainian origins on the Danish labor market, which includes both immigrants and descendants. It was especially in the pig and cattle industry that there were many wage earners of Ukrainian origin. In the pig industry, there were 2,168 employed, while there were 1,590 in the cattle industry.
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On 9/24/2023 at 3:23 PM, gfp said:
With various articles coming out on the 25th anniversary of the collapse of Long Term Capital Management, I was reminded of Warren's offer to purchase the fund for $250 million while on vacation in Yellowstone. One book I read claimed that Buffett only gave Meriwether one hour to accept the offer and a deal couldn't be negotiated in time. The Fed ultimately forced the banks to rescue the fund in exchange for 90% of the equity of LTCM. These were the same banks that were creditors to LTCM, so they were really just "bailing out themselves." The birth of the Fed put for contagion fears...
This page from Berkshire's 50th anniversary book has Warren's comments on the attempt and some of the original documents. The idea was that Berkshire would put up most of the capital but the fund would be wound down over time inside Goldman's trading desk. LTCM's equity was around $400m at the time of this offer, but rapidly heading to zero. Just about all of the spreads that had widened out to extremes returned to normal over time so Berkshire's capital and staying power would have produced a decent, although far from remarkable, profit.
Meriwether started another fund doing the same stuff with lower leverage after LTCM. It imploded in 2009. Then he started another fund doing the same thing after that. Most of these guys were from the Solomon Brothers arbitrage desk and of course there were some nobel prize winners in there.
I'm reading Roger Lowenstein : 'When genius failed - The rise and fall of Long-Term Capital Management" as leisure reading right now.
I have to say, that it's just awesome! Very entertaining!
- Basically, it about what do you get when you combine academia and Wall Street [, here, please note with a label / goods declaration : Guarantied without / free of "reason" / "sound judgement" [for the sake of the climate, it would be called to day, I think]].
It is about when extreme ambitions and greed, combined with being delusional about the circle of competence creates, karma, hubris and nemesis.
I recommend the book if you want a dose of this.
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19 hours ago, mcliu said:
Was peace possible if NATO agreed to stop its expansion?
I have to say I'm actually more than just surprised to see this video clip by Mr. Stoltenberg. Huge red flag. What I'm curious about is a date / time stamp for this statement, and the written statement by Mr. Putin, and its date. I have to admit, that this somehow has skipped my attention.
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Thank you, @Luca,
Yes, I practice gallows humor [German : Galgen witz, Danish : Galgenhumor] to mentally cope with and to mentally survive the madness thats going on here in Europe. It is for sure needed.
I have started to follow Sahra Wagenknecht, based on the content of your last post. My spoken German is a bit rusty, but I have no problem taking care of dailyday activity by speaking German, while in Germany, while I have absolutely no problem with understading all shades and nuances of the German language spoken or written. [Insufficient active vocabulary, because of lack of practice].
I also feel like a touchy bitch when our North American friends here on CoBF talks about money and starts blending US South border security into this European warfare matter.
It concerns preventive measures in relation to 1st or 2nd order effects in relation to other and European NATO member states in case the situation escalates further. If our common North American CoBF members cannot or will not understand this, then I am not able to explain it.
Just to try to trigger some kind of embarrassment into our fellow North American CoBF members with such stance, I will try to dig up some factual data about how Denmark has behaved in relation to Ukrainian refugees coming to Denmark since the war in Ukraine started.
Nassim Taleb would express it as "You simply don't have the same skin in the game as your North American friends on CoBF." -Period.
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Edit :
Bloomberg [September 26th 2023] : Erdogan Says Turkish Approval of Sweden NATO Bid Hinges on F-16s.
Just Recep Tayyip Erdogan oportunistic modus operandi.
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3 hours ago, Luca said:
Its scandalous, was such a severe attack on the economy and its citizens, a shame it went so much under the rug. Also hilarious how collectively everybody here thinks their government doesnt know what its doing and that the people are incompetent. The hierarchies are corrupted! True for the US, Germany, Canada, doesnt matter which country.
This actually a bit funny, @Luca,
From the JP front page :
This Marchen Neel Gjertsen [the woman to the right] is actual the editor in chief at JP, and running a podcast with her colleague, the podcast called 'Under the rug'.
She is a neat piece of eye candy, 38 years old, and appointed to the position not so long ago. The theme is all kinds of critical stuff and dirt digged up in Danish politics and such stuff about Danish politicians at power. I think I started reading her stuff about eight years ago or so, and I thought she was a real real PITA. Today I must say I really like her. Here it's just unheard of to get appointed editor in chief at age 38. She is very good, and she likely still has a very long runway, where tiny Denmark becomes too tight for her at some time in the future, I think.
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34 more. It's just so ugly. *Ugh*
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To this day I'm still wondering if the 2020 [green] Elephant Edititon was the last one from Mr. Kilpatric?
From reading the CoBF board here during many years, I specifically remember a person posting here on CoBF by the name Marlin, at each new edition since I joined CoBF, and from posts other places here on CoBF [I think it was by Sanjeev [ @Parsad ] , actually I have gathered the perception that Marlin is one of those very rare and early Berkshire investors who have had a very joyfull - and lucrative - ride on the back of their Berkshire shares!? - Andrew Kilpatrick beeing another one of them!
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This topic has to me personally recently derailed totally into a trainwreck.
All this Nazi talk makes no sense to me. Would any of you posting in this topic blame a 1. or 2. order decendant of Adolf Hitler for Hitlers doings under WW2? -Or for that sake blaim it on any living person of German origin today? Come on - it makes no sense, and you all know it. In Europe, there are likely Nazis in every European country, even here in Denmark.
Also, in an other dimension the whole discussion going on in this topic is or has become one-dimensional [,as in "Europe is Europe"]. I'm here talking about the separation of, and distinction of :
1. Europe [Russia west the Ural mountains is actually generally accepted as a part of Europe],
2. EU member [, or not] &
3. NATO member [, or not].
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I did spend most of the day alone at home yesterday looking at the major six Canadian banks :
RY - Royal Bank of Canada,
TD - Toronto Dominion Bank,
BNS - Bank of Nova Scotia,
BMO - Bank of Montreal,
CM - Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, &
NA - National Bank of Canada.
Absolutely awesome experience, fantastic creatures, impressive last ten years development and ROE for them all, some better than others. A banking oligopoly. All built to last for the future.
I like the picture of price / risk I see here, also based on what I have read in this topic.
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Read this today :
Brookfield - White Paper - May 10th 2023 [19 Minute Read] :Three Themes Creating Opportunities in Global Real Estate [Download available on the webpage and attached here].
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I think on overall basis that this whitepaper at the date of release had merit, and that it still has. I can't see anything else that there is a lot to do that may turn out lucrative all over the palette in any dimension you may prefer and choose, if proper preparation and analysis is carried out before investment decisions are made.
Personally, I have no desire to become a landlord at this stage in life by doing direct RE investments - I consider myself too old for such stuff, besides that I don't want to. Actual and present existence too pleasant by now to have it spoiled by tennants calling about defunct plumming, defunct power etc.
So I have been looking at listed real estate companies in many places and countries within the last few months, to avoid the operational part of such ownership, by basically paying somebody for that part, to not get involved directly in operational tasks.
I think the key to make the right decisions here where we are now in markets is to understand at a deeper level the existing financing of each specific investment object of interest.
Brookfield - White Paper - 20230510 - Three Themes in Real Estate May 2023_0 - 20230924.pdf
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On 8/15/2023 at 7:17 PM, scorpioncapital said:
I'm confused. Are the former Communist Eastern European countries more capitalist than the Western European ones?
For example, from what I understand the EU controls international elements of the bloc as well as cross-country policies.
But does the EU have the right to control taxes on companies within a country? Or is that an OECD thing?
In other words is it possible that some EU countries are very economically liberal compared to others?
Well, the Eastern ones have other problems like a regressive tax system. (E.g. very low flat tax which benefits the rich or those with capital and very high wage taxes, say 30-40% plus the 10% flat tax which impedes capital formation if you don't already have it)
PS. These bank windfall taxes make 100% sense to me and I'm all for it even as a capitalist. Think about it. The banks pay 0% interest. They don't want to pay 3 or 5%. The government is saying, unless you pay 3-5%, we will take that money as a tax and distribute it to people in lieu of getting that 3-5% on interest. How is it different than the outflow of capital from banks causing bank failures in USA because people took their money out to brokers or etfs that did pay 5%? Essentially it is the bank's own fault for not following with higher rates on cash. Now one can argue its not the best method. For example, not everyone has savings so it could just be a socialist redistribution grab but the banks could certainly up interest to avoid some of these taxes?
Trying to answer all parts of your questions would quite a mouthful
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Here I will just try to focus and zoom in a bit on European taxes.
Wikipedia : Tax rates in Europe. So it should be very clear to you that the taxation of income is individual per nation, with national definitions how to calculate taxable income, including possible and legal deductions included in taxable income.
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Russian Black Sea Fleet HQ in Sevastopol getting hammered yesterday. Wild, just wild.
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On 9/21/2023 at 8:24 PM, John Hjorth said:
At The Brookfield Listed Affiates Investor Day running right now, there was in the presentation of BBU a presentation of Sagen [www.sagen.ca ] by it CEO. [BBU is a part owner of Sagen]. That presentation was especially and also with focus on the expectations for the near future for Sagen about morgage default insurance in the Canadian residential real estate market, so to me certainly relevant to this topic, and I found it interesting.
I suppose a video of the session will be made available on the Brookfild website tomorrow.
YouTube - BBU 2023 Investor Day session replay. The Sagen presentation by Sagen CEO Stuart Levings starts at around the 20:10 mark.
Personally, I perceive the expressions of expectations about what the future will bring by Mr. Levings to be in overall line with what - as in to a high degree similar to - what @Viking has expressed in this topic, while I'm very well aware that the expressions of boths gents are about the future with all what that brings with it, with regard to reservations etc.
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I can't help to think, that what I and all other non-administrator members' perceptions of CoBF might be by now doesen't really matter as much as what the guy running the place [joint?] may think of it, most of the time it has not been needed to be a door bouncer, like in some bar, pub or Irish Inn! -But it has happened!
I still remember some periods in time, where CoBF was a really unpleasant place to visit, because of the prevalence of bad posting manners among members, combined with primitivity and rudeness to the extremes.
Most left by themselves, some got 'help' to do so.
To me, the worst period was up to the last presidential election in USA, with trolls in here stirring the pot day in, day out, some even without even just one serious post in the Investment Ideas section of CoBF.
Sanjeev [ @Parsad ] must really like us, as a whole! - to keep this thing going!
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By the way, Joel [ @racemize ] has just updated his complilation of all existing Howard Marks memos. The compilation starting with the first memo of October 1990 is available for download via Austin Value Capitals Twitter account here .
It's a neat and tiny thing, by now consisting of 1,632 pages.
Thank you for it, Joel [ @racemize ].
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Bank of Canada: Have we entered a new era of structurally higher interest rates?
in General Discussion
Posted
At least partly related to the discussion going on in this topic:
Bloomberg - CityLab Housing [September 28th 2023] : These Island Homes Were an Affordable Dream – Until Residents Started to Age.
I've never heard about the place Toronto Islands before. To me, strange to read about such a place in existence for so many years so near the center of such a city as big as Toronto.
The line of thinking among the elderly in this subsociety is to me flawed in a serious degree. You have no right to regret your own decisions on this matter earlier in life to move in. That was namely inverted delayed gratification, because the saved housing expenses by living there hasen't been set aside and saved in an investment scheme, but has been consumed on a running basis while housing costs has been low while living in this community.
When you remove your fingers from the piece in Chess the table captures the piece.