bonechip1

beerbaron - this is the only workaround that I am aware of - fellow boardmember uncommonprofits pointed this exception out to me a number of years ago and I have used it to buy shares on non-prescribed exchanges a number of times since in registered accounts. "Shares of a corporation that were listed on a prescribed stock exchange but that have been suspended from trading or de-listed continue to be qualified investments if the corporation that issued the shares was, and remains, a public corporation, and the shares do not otherwise cease to be qualified investments." http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/E/pub/tp/it320r3/it320r3-e.pdf I have argued with several discount brokerage reps on this, and when you call the CRA to get an interpretation, it seems that they don't have an official list of eligible stocks that are traded OTC or delisted entirely, but still qualify. Not sure this would help with buying Lancashire, as I am not familiar with the situation.

Although these articles are a little dated, you may find them helpful to clarify this situation: http://www.jamiegolombek.com/articledetail.php?article_id=787 http://www.jamiegolombek.com/articledetail.php?article_id=576 http://www.jamiegolombek.com/articledetail.php?article_id=584

I talked my father into investing some of his portfolio with Tim back in about '05 or '06 because I thought McElvaine's Trust would preserve capital better in difficult markets. I was wrong, but still think he will significantly outperform the indexes over the next 10 years. I have advised him to stay invested with Tim for the same reason that The Sequoia Fund went on to crush the indexes after underperforming for it's first 3.5 years as a new fund in the early '70's. I don't think that Tim rejoining Cundill has much to do with underperforming lately. It may have been a bit of a distraction, but if anything over the long term, it may be a benefit as he is exposed to many more international and larger company ideas that he can add to his own portfolios. Don't forget that he ran the fund part time while he was crushing the indexes in the last half of the '90's and early '00s while working as full time portfolio manager/CIO at Cundill Group. My biggest criticism of Tim (and it's not that big, otherwise I wouldn't have rec'd McElvaine to my dad) is that he holds onto positions too long that become fully valued such as Sun-Rype in the mid-teens (although there are worse things in life than holding fully valued high ROIC companies). With the small size of his asset base, he has the ability to move in and out of positions a lot easier. I actually like the fact that he has become a little more active in the portfolio selling positions that have run up a lot over a short period, such as Sotheby's, even though they have gone on to higher highs.

Writing and blogging about Buffett the person, and not just Buffett the investor appeals to a much wider audience of readers. I mean how many people outside of the investing community want to hear about how great of an investment Mid-Continent Tab Card Company was? I wish it was focused solely on examples like that from Buffett's early trading years. But I just can't see my wife (a non-investor) reading a book like that, but she would probably read the book the way it was written by Schroeder.

Often, the proxies and fairness opinions in the public filings associated with M&A transactions have great info on comparable transaction multiples. Michael Price mentioned this in a talk a few years ago at Columbia.

You may find this recent fool.com thread on the Falling Knives board interesting: http://boards.fool.com/Messages.asp?mid=28110885&bid=117341

In my city, which is just outside of Edmonton, the gross rent multiplier is roughly about 16-17. So, the annual gross rental income is around 6% of purchase price. Net operating income would be less than 4% of purchase price, for a cap rate of about 25 - not particularly distressed conditions if you ask me.

We own one residential rental property in a resort town that is currently rented to family - we get below market rent, but get to use it whenever we want. I don't regard it as an investment, even though we did buy at 25% below market value. Properties in my city are not cheap by any measure of value - cap rates, multiples of gross rents etc. even after they have dropped by 20-25% from peak levels. But I figure if I can expand my circle and learn about owning/managing rental property, at some point in my lifetime I am fairly certain that I will have a few opportunities to purchase real estate at no brainer prices. If I am unprepared, I will not be able to make the quick decision that will probably be required. I think learning about the rental property industry has improved my investment thought process outside of real estate as well. On that note, anyone have any good books on residential single family or multi-family rental properties. I have read a few by William Nickerson (good), Ozzie Jurrock (waste of time), Al Lowry (OK), H. Roger Neal (good), and I have Leigh Robinson's Landlording (I have glanced through, and it looks good), and also everything free on John T. Reed's site (good). I have browsed through a few of Jay DeCima's books (seemed good) and John Schaub's (seemed good) and Don Campbell Canadian Real Estate books (seemed like a waste of time). Any other recs? Chip