frommi

Does anyone know how Mecham was able to make 12% in 2008? From what i read he was invested in FFH and AZN, but was that all, was he fully invested? Learning from that the answer is maybe be 100% invested but invest into companies that are cheap and where the business is not under pressure in a recession or perhaps even profits from a recession.

So you think that because of china there is no cycle in the car industry anymore?

You said you have your network at your current employer, so don`t you think that its in the companies best interest to keep you contracted in some form? Are you easily replaceable or do you carry a lot of knowledge? I built a software library for other software developers with a colleague that we than sold some copies of. That was a good way to get direct contacts and show that we have the knowledge to do projects. The product itself was not very successful, but it opened some doors and resulted in some multi-year consultant contracts. I don`t know if you can do something similar in your position. Are you a developer or just an idea creator?

I can tell you what i have done. Try to get your employer as a first customer. Build a product as a reference project, preferably one that your current employer needs. Find a company/website that lends out consultants or matches consultants to projects. In germany there is gulp, i don`t know about sweden. There you should be able to see what other consultants in your field and with your experience are earning. Don`t undercut everybody on price here, that way you only get stupid projects on budget limited companies that try to squeeze the last minute from you. Try find find projects that make you happy, its a lot easier to differentiate yourself from the rest when you have fun working. And realize that its only possible to work as a consultant and earn double the amount of money because there is a huge demand for IT professionals and only a small amount of supply each year. But that is not a situation that is guaranteed to stay forever, so forget about only working 6 months and get your ass off to get to FI as fast as possible. Investment returns are irrelevant in the first 4-5 years of savings and since you have found this website you already have a huge headstart.

I don`t say its gone but i know that we are not at the bottom of the cycle. The oil price will sure give sales a kick for a short time, but how do you determine when to get out? There are already signs of a global slowdown, so even when the US has pent up demand whats happening in the rest of the world? Is GM/FIAT a double from here? (I doubt it, but i don`t know it either.) So just ignore me, i have no clue. :)

Thanks, was an interesting read. So is there a living owner operator in the O&G space with a similar success story? (And how much of that was luck when you look at oil & LNG price charts?)

I think one has to look why oil is cheap to decide whether this is good or bad. When its just caused by overproduction its a good thing, but when i recall it correctly we have a demand contraction, too. And this is a bad sympton, because that means that the economy is losing steam. You just have to look at chinese house prices to have an idea of whats possibly coming.

Car producers are looking cheap, indead. But is this not exactly how they look at the top of the cycle? Since i don`t know how to spot where we are in the car cycle i have decided not to invest in car producers. (I was close to make a an investment in FIAT, but that opportunity is gone and i won`t chase it) @ni-co Yes and because of that FFH is still the stock with the best outlook, looking at energy stocks and bonds one could assume that we are in a 2008 style downmove. But when you look at the S&P you think, huu? :) @wisdom Do you have a stock in mind?

Uccmal why should one invest into an O&G company? There is no competetive advantage, and it looks like there is no permanent low cost operator either. Is there a way to value an O&G company that is not dependend on the oil price? If not, is not every investment into an O&G company a speculation?

west has posted a lot of these cheap gems in the Investment Idea section. For example http://www.cornerofberkshireandfairfax.ca/forum/investment-ideas/7292-jp-murakami-corp/msg180197/#msg180197

OUTR and more NWH.AX, this is now down to 33% of tangible book. I can`t really believe how fast this has fallen.

I am late to the party, but i am thankfull for this great board, my wife, my work and whatever i forgot that makes up my day and brings a smile on my face. Happy Thanksgiving!

I feel really bearish about the market but at the same time very bullish on my stock picks. Perhaps its just a good idea to avoid cyclicals where the cycle is not at the bottom, banks near fair value, commodity stocks or stocks where you feel that their margins are stretched. I can sleep very well with FFH as a deflation protection. And that is probably the most important thing, that you can sleep well with your portfolio even when the stock market closes for a year or two.

Thanks for the link, this really sounds like more and more cheap energy for the next decades. Perhaps profit margins expand more. :D

Was there the same amount of bubble talk in 1999 and 2007 in here? After reading the book "The great crash - 1929" i really doubt that we are in a similar situation, even if the bear inside of me tells me other stories.

That level around S&P500 2215 fits very well with the Fibonacci extension of 161% of the first move from 2009->2011 so this could be a decent target to put on some hedges again.

Intralot and NWH.AX.

Finished buying my japanese basket today. Bought 9628, 1782, 4624, 9776, 7292, 5965, 7399 and 7297 over the last 2 months and have now around 25% of my networth in this basket. Again thanks west for your incredible research!

Too much wave counting, technical analysis and being a perma bear. Especially the last is a handicap that i can`t get rid of so easily.

Sold all puts today. I noticed that i got back to my old behaviour instead of following the plan to just be protected from june->october. It was really hard to do this and i struggled with this decision for one or two weeks now. Whats a bit silly is that i could have liquidated the positions on the start of november with a gain but because i waited so long it came out with a loss. My strategy was to sell half of the put positions when they doubled and that worked very well. The last 6 weeks were like a complete rollercoaster for me from feeling like genius in the middle of october (outperformance against the S&P was 15% at that point) to feeling like a fool now (-7% against the S&P ). I think i was just fucking greedy in october and that has cost me money and sleep. Writing this helped me feel a little better so thanks for reading. :)

Thanks for your studies. From what i remember the return of a simple 60/40 stock/bond portfolio would have the same performance of a 100% stock portfolio but with a lot lower volatility, this doesn`t really fit to your results. In the graphs it looks like the portfolio in cash would have earned nothing, it that the reason?

Which is really ironic for a value investing board. Some miners trading for less than cash, mines closing, extreme negative sentiment. Do you have some names that trade for less than cash?

But you only get your tax advantaged index fund returns when you never sell and don`t get dividends. I am under the impression that these studies are made for people who want to sell index funds. From the back of my head compounding of tax advantages really kick in after 5 year holding periods or so, so any value investing that sells near fair value has these problems.

Looks like he is raising cash, or are there some new bigger foreign holdings?

And not only the leveraged players, whole countries like russia, nigeria etc. have no choice but to drill more to compensate the lower price. And the cheap money helps to keep the leveraged players alive. I see this as a side effect of all this money printing.