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oldye

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Everything posted by oldye

  1. So they have 4 billion invested in munis paying 5.79% out the 8.4 billion what seems like about a billion in corporate converts @10+% anyone want to take a stab where the rest of the money is at?
  2. Actually as long as savings rate is going up in the U.S, there should be plenty of money available for the U.S government to borrow and maybe even refinance at low rates.
  3. http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/francis/archive/2009/02/19/fairfax-financial-s-2008-coup.aspx "U.S. municipal bonds always sold at a lower yield than US treasuries because one is tax free and the other is taxable. In the fourth quarter, we were able to sell Treasuries, yielding pre-tax 3 to 3.5%, and have been buying munis yielding an average of 5.75% after tax. This is unheard of. We bought minis guaranteed by Berkshire Hathaway [Warren Buffett's company]."
  4. I'm guilty of being lazy(wrong) with the math because I assume I'm not buying at at exactly half of intrinsic and it won't grow at exactly 10%.
  5. If you pay half of intrinsic value and intrinsic value grows by 10% a year I think 20% a year is kinda easy.
  6. Why not just look at the dividend, they say the dividend is based on this years performance which was about 160% as good as 07 where BV grew by 1.4 billion. My guess is we do better than 50$/share in BV growth.
  7. If they pass the budget California will see, a 5% increase to the state income tax, 12 cent increase to the gas tax, 1% increase to the sales tax (yes they're increasing the sales tax during a recession, yes the one that effects the velocity of money and takes more money from people who already can't afford to live in poverty, Double the Car Tax etc) ...Who wants Californians buying cars in this market? The 8th largest economy in the world has cut state employment by 24 days a year for 200,000 employees and are considering another 10% cut if the budget isn't better by this summer. If they're trying to drive real estate prices down in California they might as well get rid of prop 13 while they're at it. Everyone around here seems to think illegal aliens (who came up with this term) are causing the huge budget gap, well I guess I got good news!... Btw Fairfax paid 2x book to pick up 50 million dollars in Progressive Stock but didn't increase their position in Berkshire sub 80,000. Interesting omission considering that they have a few A shares sitting around gathering dust.
  8. is it a coincidence that they were meeting up in Toronto?
  9. ORH is consolidated so you don't want to count the movement in price one way or another, which probably makes it worse YTD but really they're not going to be selling many of these positions for decades which explains Prem's recent comments on mark to market. ::)
  10. I'm far more comfortable having Hamblin Watsa make the calls on investing in GE and WFC, at the end of 06 they had less than 100 billion in debt, fast forward to today and they're 375 billion. Assuming the cost of debt is 5% after taxes, you are talking about nearly 20 billion dollars a year in interest payments. On the other hand good banks will probably have their highest returns on capital ever over the next few years. I sure as heck hope Wells Fargo is on the top of that list, but I know banking is not within my circle of competence. I don't understand why some banks are able to get away with charging clients for simple services like checking when its available for free, or why people keep significant money on deposit when they could be earning 2-4% risk free with almost no leg work. I've seen the type of attitude poor people have toward credit cards, how averse they are to any type of credit and think that there will be some habit changing going on. Its kind of like Charlie Munger and Pavlov's dog, if this is a lollapalooza type economic event we'll have permanent changes to way people behave toward money.
  11. Looks like they bought 10 million more shares in dell.
  12. these holdings are freaking huge like I expected after they closed out the hedge: 293 million in kraft shares 234 million in Intel 100 Million in Alcoa 158 million Magna 200 million GE 100 million in WFC 100 million in BNSF Increased stakes in JNJ 1.1 million shares Dell 10 million shares of dell 6.5% stake in USG Taking away the 400 million dollar increase in value of ORH, looks like they increased their equity investments by about 1200 million this quarter! Add that to the 1.2 billion the company put to work buying back shares and Northbridge and you have 2.4 billion dollars earnings put to work earning 15-20% a year for shareholders. Thanks Guys!
  13. Thanks for the heads up on Travelers, I always thought they were owned by Citi for some reason. Was doing a quick look thru it looks like they were saved by the short average duration of their portfolio...despite their claimed 18% record on equities, only 1% of assets was invested in equities at the start of 08. Good timing. Have they always been this conservatively positioned? Could be very interesting if they are capable of putting more money to work in this market!
  14. Throughout 2008, insurers lost more capital than in any year in recent memory. Certain insurers are now scrambling to write business hoping that a light cat year + rebounding of asset prices might help them maintain market share. Allstate: "Book value per share, excluding the impact of unrealized net capital gains and losses on fixed income securities, declined to $30.08 as of December 31, 2008 from $34.25 as of September 30, 2008 and $38.11 as of December 31, 2007." Too bad Gaap doesn't recognize this form of accounting because YoY BV is down 42%! 2008 was a cat heavy year, and Allstate managed to generate CR of 99, hard to see them doing better in 2009 as Reinsurance prices have started to firm while the economy continues to drag down prices for regular lines of insurance. Debt to Equity is now around 50% Cincinnati Financial Corporation : Started 2008 with 5.9 billion dollars in shareholder equity, which adjusted for major losses from FITB, a core holding since the 50's that crashed with the rest of the banking stocks, to their credit they did sell the shares albeit after the crash. BV is down 29% YoY...UW was around 100 and should face considerable pressure from market prices. Management like to give guidense on where they think the Combined Ratio will be next year... can't make this stuff up. White Mountain: ADJBV/Share down 20% to 328 YoY, their assets are performing better than expected (ie I'm not sure why they didn't take more write downs, their mortgage backed securities must be better than average something), CR was at a respectable 95% for this cat heavy year. Of course BV consists in part of tax differed assets, MBS (Agency Backed and not) CBMS, and insurance recoverable which explains why Mr. Market is selling WTM at 65% of book. Markel: BV per share down 16% to 222, CR was 99 in 2008, Renaissance Re: Reinsurance prices are strengthening into 09, not that you can judge the strength of any risk taker over a period of months, but you have to look at their performance over a number of years. They've released 400 million dollars over the last 2 years from their reserves which is admirable but from a competitors stand point they've reduced capital by 400 million YoY, to their credit it was due to share buybacks. Ace: The Greenberg Clan didn't get completely wiped out, Hank's son Even did must better with BV down 10% YoY, CR was at a very healthy 89.7 (these guys do all kinds of insurance including reinsurance health and life). Chubb Re: 88.7% CR, BV unch YoY even after they bought back 1.3 billion dollars worth of stock. Kingsway Financial: Haven't announced their numbers but based on projections BV is down about 70% YoY, the company has 350 million dollars of debt which probably exceeds BV at this point. Nobody likes to see a viable company die, hopefully they'll start selling non core assets and perhaps buy back any public debt they have at a discount. Anyway I thought I'd get this started and hopefully we'll get a good list going as results come out
  15. I always felt value investors make their money when they buy, during the last couple of years you'd be better off if you sold early and bought more during the summer but whats to say that this year there isn't significant multiple expansion during the summer? The absolute truth is that your returns will mirror those of the business's that you own over time, market timing isn't value investing.
  16. so theres a chance the price move up and theres a chance the price will move down and its not likely that it will stay in one spot oh and buy and hold is dead...
  17. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123449787320481341.html this link seems to work without membership
  18. It doesn't seem as if the people in power are willing to accept the scope of this situation, we've had 20 trillion depletion in wealth, 50 trillion world wide, how is throwing 2-3 trillion dollars at the problem going to stop the bleeding? How about this, California could save 4 billion a year fighting fires by switching to garden hoses! These people move so slowly, why hasn't there been a payroll tax cut implemented across the board, wasn't Obama supposed to give tax cuts to 95% of workers? Speaking of which, where the hell is the universal health care? Do we really want people going to the emergency room every time they get a cold?
  19. http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid=27421675 Thanks!
  20. Rates are down 9% January YoY, it would be interesting to see what the numbers would look like if AIG was not in the market.
  21. I saw the 10% number used in a industry publication as well. Demand is also way up for Reinsurance which is a good sign that prices will finally start to trickle up in 09. Prices have been dropping for 6 years (insurance cycle normally lasts about 6 years), unless governments start flooding the industry with capital you'll see prices inch their way up. Aig is being investigated for using government funds to drive down the market price for insurance. Once these bastards are gone we'll see some swift improvement. Once our guys start writing insurance at full capacity, CR should drop by more than 6-7 points.
  22. Probably better than what we'll see industry wide as the numbers start to come out
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