CorpRaider

I can't help but imagine david einhorn saying, "snitches get stitches" in a threatening whisper with wild and crazy eyes.

What was the last market to actually emerge? Korea?

Federal Supremacy? I think they can trump a zoning ordinance or private restrictions, but it is FEMA, so who knows. hah!

Haha, they might give you a travel trailer to live in for a few years.

Yeah, HELOCs generally float or are locked in only for a term and the cap on the deductible portion is much lower than a term mortage in the U.S. That would almost always be a poor decision here. Yeah, I mean wait till the 10 year is yielding 3% and you're probably coming out ahead on the 4% fixed tax deductible mortgage given the shorter duration of your investment. Exactly, mail them the keys and then head down to the carribean with your AIG-WT money.

Paying off the house has some risk as well, although very small. House burns down and your insurance company is insolvent? or You don't carry earthquake insurance? Maybe you thought it wasn't necessary in Seattle? I think for example most in Seattle do not carry it, although there is a risk of a large quake there. I don't know where he lives, but I'm familiar with Seattle. Even here in California many don't carry it. I presume the mortgage is non-recourse... that can be very handy!!!! Although not very likely. Kind of like a basket of munis being worthless is not very likely. Exactly. Or what if property values tank again WHEN rates rise, or if you live in the burbs and everyone continues to decide that they should live in the city, or if a crack house opens up down the street because your mayor decides to throw a party, or your house burns down and insurance company tells you to go eff yourself. Also, the home is probably less liquid than most other investments, even munis; you've just said you're going to need the liquidity within a few years when you hope to sell. I would try and keep it in something liquid that earns more than your after tax rate on your mortgage, assuming you have a 30 year fixed. I think some of our canadian friends don't realize that most people in the US have 30 year fixed mortgage rates. I don't think any of us should be rushing to pay back ~4%, 30 year fixed-term, tax deductible debt.

Have any of you guys ever used some of the new(ish) actively managed short term debt ETFs to park your cash? Seems like they are trying to take the place of the old MMMFs, given the post-crisis regulations. GSY and MINT would be two examples.

Doh! I'm seeing a green light.

COH

Yeah, I own KMI and am watching SYNL, which owned by Markel and Royce. They manufacture pipes used in the pipelines and tanks used in storage. Hasn't gotten cheap enough for me to pull the trigger yet.

They are definitely not just a more diversified version of fairholme though, are they? I can't see berkowitz buying so many tech stocks or norweigan kroners.

For all the other Carolinians (seems like there are alot of us to be on a Canadian hosted site, doesn't it?), this guy often times has some nice used cars for good prices. I've bought one car from him and a couple colleagues turned me on to him. http://eurocarsllc.com/ Although, I think I'm going to buy a ford the next time, if Mullaly and co keep them turning out boeings.

Global has got you covered, imop. I was also going to throw out SOR for something to look at, if the discount gets out of whack. It's a closed end fund (the one buffett and munger bought back when they got into a little trouble with the SEC). It is run by first pacific. They distribute ~4% of the current market price per annum, so they kind of take care of managing the distributions for you. They have a pretty good longer term track record. Also there are some munibond CEFs with pretty gigantic discounts and yields out there.

HTZ intrigues me but in a display of rationality, I recoil due to bad experiences with the old Cendant.

My understanding is that their turnover is very low (as one would expect with a cap weighting) but not zero. I show about a ~3% turnover ratio for the spy.

I will often cite the morningstar study regarding the outperformance of investors in target date funds over the actual fund's performance and the underperformance of most other fund investors versus the funds they own. This is apparently due to dollar cost averaging and the elimination of the temptation to buy high and sell low. If they have a decently low cost target date fund option and are not into finance, I would probably tell them they might consider that option.

. They could raise rates, they could cap the roth exclusion, they could change rmd rules. You can control distributions and converions from traditional, you can control if you leave california for florida for 10 years, or forever...race's analysis is accurate if you max. You could also just take the excess cash from the tax deduction from the traditional and put it in mkl or brk till you die off and get the stepped up basis...tell me what your rates are now and what they will be in the future and i can give you the right answer. Since thats not knowable, you could hedge the tax risk by taking the current deduction for your mediocre 401(k) investment options and put your 30% APR, brilliant personal investments in the roth.

Thats probably a good plan. Get some "tax diversification".

If you are in a low enough bracket to qualify for the traditional, i would go with that. You will have control over timing of recognition of the income. Gw bush iii comes in and slashes rates? Convert it to a roth or at least some of it. Move to texas and convert it...people pay big money for advice on how to defer recognition of income.

Don't sleep on bloomberg.com either.

He's full of something, that's for sure! haha!

Hah! Yeah, I've never made it through the conservative aggressive investor and I'm not a wuss as I made it through some of Dreman's books. Greenwald's comments in the most important thing were sort of "weak sauce".

I personally don't like investing in places where there aren't good property rights and a solid tradition of rule of law. Putin is likely to take your cookies if he wants them. If enough people feel the same way it might result in lower multiples.

I had a pretty mediocre year as well, got crushed by the s&p. I had way too much cash. EDIT: Thought I would add a little more detail since you are all showing your knickers: I did 40.5% in my Roth, a much smaller account than some others I run. Most of that was due to some great fortune with respect to timing on the SD leaps; I caught a triple on those things and got out. Larger accounts I have/run managed only 12-16%, underperformance is attributable to holding too much cash 50%+.

Tendering PSX stock; ~$19MM. http://www.bloomberg.com/article/2013-12-30/aI3ohUbFAQZw.html