dealraker

This is a big one: GTCR Announces Sale of AssuredPartners to Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. for $13.45 Billion

It is going to be interesting to see what the Canadian rails deal with as to the DJT administration. While I own them all and don't consider the stock prices crazy high I'm still not aware of what's coming along to give them more volume and sales growth outside of inflation pricing. I bought NSC averaging in around a bit below $200 during the East Palestine tragedy but as of yet I've seen no other stock prices I'd be tempted with given what seems - at least to me - to be little coming along to up their game. NSC will get their OR down some from where it is now but that's already in the stock price it seems to me. That said, I'm an long term owner but I'm not an expert of the cycles and trends that make would help make a good timed buy.

coffeecaninvestor mentioned the railroads on another topic and alluded to a post I had just made recently as to RR sales of the last ten years. I'm actually a tad more upbeat on the railroads than that post may have presented. So basically the rails have been left out of the most recent years run-up of the markets, and they should have been left out. Norfolk had the disaster thing going and the stock of course temporarily tanked, but for the most part all of the RR's have just been spinning in neutral for a while. I'd think that will change, if and when there's more stuff on track to be shipped. All of the RR's are equipped to run hot should it - the stuff that needs to be RR shipped - come. So in that respect I do think the industry is in good condition and ready. Valuations are appropriate, not high or low in my limited opinion. So over time I think the RR's to be a decent place to invest.

This one has got my attention: https://seekingalpha.com/news/4357638-scam-parody-sign-of-a-top-enron-relaunches-as-a-crypto-play

Using the Berk deep dive is apparently still a successful specific subgroup asset gathering model, there have been many predecessors. Not sure any of done particularly well using this as to performance though...but heck what does that matter says Tilson. Fame has come and that's the goal. Deep dive knowledge of fund runners and investment performance may be related but in my life I've seen little proof of it. I've witnessed far more investment success using history, patience, persistence, and above all some degree of plain courage to look pretty stupid for a while. Meanwhile today it seems to me that counting the TT, crypto, market valuations, and most revealing of all the fact that Buffett wannabe Ackman is a full believer in Brookfield's "way" (note: I do own BN and BAM)... ...well, let's just say what I always say: "Life is great... ...if you can stand it!?"

The insurance brokers are running along in the higher end of their pricing cycle which corresponds to what is surely maybe the best environment in their history. Life is good! As to grasping the business? longterminvestor who posts right here has many excellent rants - that if you are a detailed type - can do a sound job of delivering information as to insight into the businesses. There are industry publications too, but I'd go with reading a BRO or AJG annual report or conference call for further insight. As I have posted before, owning the stocks is a good way to understand the businesses. Finding a decent starting spot is the hard part. After that? Well, the less I think and "understand" the business........the more money I make.

So today I thought I'd just mention that my railroad stocks are again roaring to the upside given the super-duper economy - as of course the economy was absolutely terrible a month ago. But anyway I own all the rails, all the US for somewhere between 30-some and almost 50 years (NSC). I thought I'd share something, given the OR obsessions and whatnot. Now I'm going on memory here so bear with me (cause I'm old and have no memory): UNP sales growth for the last ten years in total? Wanna bet? My bet is about zero. Am I right? NSC sales growth for the last ten years total? Hmm...I'll wager mid single digits. CSX sales growth for the last ten years total? Hmm...last I saw it was maybe very low double digits. Just making sure everyone's got somewhat of an off-Wall Street view from an owner. Unlike 99% of investors old dealraker doesn't mind at all discussing the reality of his stuff while most endlessly chant euphoria till the day their stuff is sold- then it is bombs away. I know, I know...they laid off unprofitable sales or whatever. Profits per share are up of course in the last 10 by a pretty good bit. Oh...and debt growth for the last ten? Seems there were some buybacks using debt along the way. I guess "sales-to-debt" isn't a normal financial metric sold to shareholders. Hoping for the best of course.

Today I sold PH in a taxable account. Had bought in June of 2022. I know...I know...it is the roaring 20's and all and ole deal dawn't sell. But there's things I'm eyeballin' with some eagerness (don't ask...you'd find them outrageously boring) given everybody is racing to the 50% off sale on Wall Street.

Oh my!

It has been now well over 25 since 5 of us co-authored "The 12 Ways GE Misleads Investors." It was a collaboration of a few of us over on a former Berk forum who got together both online and in the same physical space and put together our "master plan" of wisdom. Some have asked me to slide that document over to them through the years and my reply is that I deleted my copies and won't spend one second looking for one for you to access. Watching out for your own notoriety, over-playing a past victory that nobody cares about is stupid place to get stuck in life- yet so many do it anyways. Took years for that GE setting to play out, we were wrong-as-rain and literally the laughing stock, those eps gains and even more pe gains. A female poster on the Berk board back then, she's now managed money for quite some time (with results I could have conditioned you for...but those who like her writing style...well let's just say she puts Bloomstran to shame with her ability to gain-a-group of followers...despite...you know that sideline they all avoid...results) literally worshiped Jack and John (of the Cisco type) and wouldn't allow us to progress much with our fake news narrative. Again as I've mentioned so many times, the thing that stands out here on COBF is that no poster controls the board, no one has dominance. Other forums have cult like dominance by one or two posters and I have watched that theme lead to some god-awful investing. Parsad is a genius as to constructing a forum model. Said it before, I'll say it again. When you are like me, old yet hanging around still, you feel quite alone iffin' you think about the past, you know that thing that no one learns from. You watch those same money managers promote the "results" of their holdings and not their own outcomes via their funds...and even one "man-up" comment gets you over on the hate/delete thread. Yet taking risks and making sometimes bold maybe right or wrong statements is the key to staying alive to thrive. So one after another investor gets stuck with believing something...and down the road with years and years of a poor outcome is most often the case. Wanting to get along sometimes has its costs. This forum? I limit myself to businesses and stocks. Gregmal is my favorite, Spekulatius not far behind, and Parsad right there. I may not agree, and I may strongly disagree, but there's no doubt what this trio is stating. The disagreements and the lack of cohesion is/are troublesome to some, but to me this scrambled eggs of views is the very thing that makes the forum a blistering success. Which gets me on down to the subject of today. Overall stocks are not cheap. A poster recently said something like, "I retired with investments worth 5 times what my home is worth." I'm well over 100 times, so there's the reality of "none of this really counts" for me but I pretend it does anyway. The TT is out and about and with things like industrial stocks, you know the ones T is going to make go from "good" to hype-successful, to me it seems the prices already suggest it has already happened. The asset managers could not have had more success...and their stocks scream bloody murder "investors totally admire - actually worship - us." The railroads can't grow their carloads and cuts for OR bragging along with inflation plus one "pricing" may one day prove to have run into a dead end. T will, in my view, prove again as before that defense stocks aren't his run-up vehicle. The insurance brokers? Oh my, Lord help us find a "soft landing" if there's any problems anywhere ever given their valuations. Retail - that Lulu story....is a super-star's presentation, I am overwhelmed thinking about it although I did just buy Lulu for Angela. Where's my Peter principal? He wrote endlessly: just buy....what you buy! Yea, my stuff, the things I can grasp...don't look buyable. And one of the guys we seem obsessed with, wild Bill? He's noticed that near-60 Bruce has no wrinkles at all, that there's never-ever a negative word; that not once have we believers overpaid for anything...NEVER. And we all know for certain, it has been rammed down our throats to ad nauseam, that interest rates are going DOWN. The brook is going to run North Carolina mountains flood style...or so wild Bill must believe. Else let's just say "he paid up dearly" ----- that is unless plan value actually comes forth for the first time ever. My view of the brook is that it will have some serious issues one day, but Jack...excuse me....I mean Bruce...will need to go before it all works out properly. 12 Ways? Nah, more like 100. In the meantime, the two investors that I most admire most? One word: Cash. (Note: As stated previously, Abbey was wrong from the very beginning yet had years and years of "success.") My morning rant.

Back in the 1990's and even early 2000-2001 Abbey Joseph Cohen was chanting up the big caps and that included even non tech names like AIG, GE, and a few others. She had many years of fame and the last 5 or 6 of those years the stocks she was famously successful at promoting... ...well those stocks were already, in 2001 onward as to valuation, over-valued 6 years previously. Yep prices gained after 1996 didn't hold by late 2001. And those were the stocks with real earnings and valuations what weren't part of the dot com. So years of fame and earnings "growth" were of the temp category. Interesting Abbey didn't lose her fabulous fame until 2008-ish. And even if you took the earnings from Abbey's bunch just before the financial crisis, some ten full years later, the prices of 1996 were over-valued.

Don't worry about Chris as he's been buying the dollar stores for some time now in large amounts....beginning at prices double today's quotes.

Just plumbed/wired up one (water heater) in my basement. Could have gone back to gas but I'd have to hire someone. So I just went to Lowe's and had it working within an hour. The old, the 2nd generation in this house, is on the way to the dump later today.

Over time, especially the last 3-4 years, I pretty much quit bringing up any discussion of the railroads as it always...and I mean always...went straight down the rabbit hole of operating ratio as being the one, and the only, thing that could or would ever matter. In my view those were simply terrible discussions, so dated, and so out-of-touch with the major screaming in your face issues that were far more important for future returns as far as us investors are concerned. This article gets more into the new era for the rails, long after the OR's have been run down, there more depth to the issues of the industry as far as we investors getting a return down the road somewhere. The last sentence should be read by those who never stop ranting that UNP is far better run than BNSF. https://www.freightwaves.com/news/railroads-have-turned-the-corner-on-service-and-resiliency-analysts-say

I have bought PAX now 5 times, each successive buy at a lower price. LOL, stopped buying on the uptick now and carrying a small loss. But my kind of situation. Unrelated in business but related in stock price movement, I did the same with CWK recently and have a 50% gain in that stock after carrying a loss for a while. To add...PAX is a complete unknown of course to those like me. I spent quite the time reading their stuff and from that experience I simply considered it a decent probability. Small investment, but my experience with these type outlays is to be honest sort of crazy good. Buy and take a chill pill. The balance sheet...? Have fun with that one.

Probably my error of quick reading and responding. I always have a hard time understanding your posts (my issue) so I probably shouldn't be so spontaneous in reply. But some write as prepared text and some like me write as conversation. So things happen. Later.

My comment is 100% not directed at a guy named Jim Collins. If you've an author of a book, an article, or just posting and you obviously have got it figured out that these stocks are the ticket to paradise, well show me your super investment performance. Value Line claimed for decades their "timeliness" system led to crazy good - simply phenomenal returns and riches. One small problem, the mutual funds they created that used the timing model had awful performance.

I've now, years and years, later still not figured out this. It is simply factual, not about me. Here goes: I repeatedly read things such as this, you know...the great companies and that you must own them and above all chant it up while doing so (while owning them). In recent years the X (Twitter) posts, you know where those chanting up the hero stocks as if there's a "connection" to these managers via owning the big recent performers. Yet over and over and over and over again I spend some effort - and it often takes the quite the effort - to find out the actual returns such individuals and institutions get via their ownership (of the great companies). Except for a few my returns exceed these publishing experts and often by a big margin. All while I own little of the published great companies whatsoever. And then there's a an investor right here on COBF who I follow and...(well...it is the same story). A fisherman walks in to the tackle shop. He immediately sees and is star struck by a lure with 8 hooks and 8 colors. He asks the clerk, "Sir...does this thing actually catch fish?" The clerk replies, "Mr. I don't sell to fish." Bill Ackman just bought Brookfield. About a year and a few days ago we here discussed and many bought Brookfield. We were up 80% or more by the time Bill came. The company...and the inevitable story publisher (Bill will do what Bill does)..same old story.

Yea roundball I just heard that a few 38 year old NBA players had scored 30 just one time while LJ is already over 30 times headed to 100. LOL.

Viking I've been part of a few different forums and groups over the decades in my journey of being interested in and owning things like - and maybe expecially Fairfax given it has now (price wise) roared back to life. The nice thing about your leadership of this thread is that it isn't like "oh...this is my idea and never before did anyone ever..." and so forth. You did lots of work and you just put it out while stating your case. For a long time I was a loner-owner, nowhere could I find others to share discussion about Fairfax. It is hard to relay without seemingly projecting some arrogance as to how much I have enjoyed the experience of long term investing - again in things outliers like Fairfax that most typical investment types would never feel good sticking with or making the gap to grasp how it works. I'm a tad different than you as how I go about the insurance business. I basically choose managements that I think are the Labron James' of the business, better and more able to keep outperforming, and I roll right on through the bad periods. Interestingly, and I know you are fully aware, a few of Berkshire's insurance areas are having a tough go of it, Geico being left miles behind Progressive... So the story of Fairfax is one where I felt it inevitable of the comeback. As usual, as a long term owner, I'm quite happy with Fairfax's valuation whether high or low as to our intrinsic model. There's always choices that can be made based on the price-to-value. I don't expect full or over-valuation to come often, and if it does it will be very brief. Have a good day.

Today my multiple old age health issues sort of collaborated such that I sat on the sofa watching CNBC for a while. Yesterday I rode 20 miles on the mountain bike so I guess I over-did it. Anyway, other than Jeffrey Gundlach I'm thinking this is about the most euphoric I've seen the guests and commentators for the last 20-some years. Not sure how many times I heard "this is a time when valuation doesn't count" - but it was often.

It seems then that Jeffrey Gundlach is also out-of-the actual reality as too his thinking. Interesting.

My guess is Warren Buffett is reasonably certain something is going to give- that staying in short term credit will do as well as business/stocks. My worthless view is that more near term than long term: My guess is that rates do rise and that could be significant, even temporarily violently higher in a bond related panic. 2nd guess, particularly if Trump is leading, is that US debt is at least threatened to be (and likely to be) restructured. So if I were an investor I'd be leery of any longer term US debt with a decent interest rate. As far as balancing tax rev vs. spending? Democrats are pretty much accurately understood ---- and what's not widely understood is that Republicans are worse than Democrats, often far worse.

Of course. No surprises here. Some sound articles in my railroad publications as to overall business models and how the railroads can gain market share along with improving their status in the minds of customers. Given some amount of decent relationships the RR's should thrive soon.

The sell-off today in the railroads, led by the first to report CSX, is precisely what ole dealraker has been hammering home for several years now. The low-lower-lowest OR isn't a longevity profit model, it has run 90% if not more of its potential. Back a few years ago I debated with the Norfolk crowd, the $300 price of the stock was cheap they said. OR ratio? Oh it was the obsession. "Mine's better than yours" was the theme, like 5th graders in the bathroom trading baseball cards, envy of "who's better" filled the room. The rails gotta be thinking full blown business model to thrive now. Simply preventing employees from taking time off for a funeral ain't gunna make the CEO's next quarter like it once did. Life is great...if you can stand it.