sleepydragon

Sold CASH yesterday and then today it opened 5% higher… also sold WRB and CKHUY

By this standard , I am holding 75% in equity cash equivalent because of my Brk holdings.

trimmed CASH

people has to keep in mind there are different camps in China's political systems too. You can tell from the social media reaction of Yellen's visits to the Chinese restaurant. People I know in china are all talking about Yellen ordered 3 mushroom dishes. Yellen's visit is going to strengthen the pro-western camps in China.

yeah, I own both Brk and FFH. I am just saying for mom and pop investors it’s easier to hold on to Brk. Brk’s price is more stable also because Brk’s execution is more consistent. But I bought because like Vikings said the past hedging program hid the true earning power of the business.

it’s not just returns . It’s also about risk adjusted returns, the sharpe ratio and maximum drawdowns. Brk is much better in that sense. Smaller drawdowns needs to longer holding periods. One is less likely to sell when the stock is down.

the book rank appears to be genuine. Xi’s book sold a lot people all SOEs, govt, schools are requested to buy them. one of the book ranked high (#15) is a history book — not a business book but a book of changing dynasty, reflecting people’s thoughts. Xi is in a very dangerous position

At least number 15 is a history novel, about how people got rid of the previous ruler who ruled Chinese people with iron fists

except in Japan people “work” late. They actually stopped working at 4pm, and then just stared at the computer screen till 10pm, then the whole team go to drinks till midnight. in China, people actually do work past 11 and weekends too. The work ethics of Chinese are unbelievable

The vpns has be bought online. Apparently she didnt know how to (and never try to) cross the China internet wall before. But now like other out of job young people, everyone is doing it. I don’t know how to buy vpns too, and I have more tech experience than her.

I know someone who lives in China. She was a big fan of CCP, posting CCP flags on her wechat whenever there’s some international news about China. She also worked for baba and her income was very high compared to average Chinese and certainly compare to her parents’ peak earnings. Then when CCP cracked down on tech firms, she lost her job. Then she found a new job in Shanghai for a company doing HR back office for other companies. Lost her jobs again after a year. Then she found a new job with an IT company but hasn’t been paid for the last 3 months because the IT company’s only customer is the local government who ran out of money to pay the company’s bill . So yeah, she now is very pissed off with the govt and is asking how to buy a VPN account so she can visit oversea internet and play with ChatGPT.

I suspect at least some of the bad execution of Xi’s policies is due to his lack of support from people working for him. I suspect sometimes people intentionally make things look bad when carrying out his policies. today there are news that Tencent and Ant will link foreign credit card to their payment systems. Currently a foreigner who travel to China can’t use wechat pay unless he has a Chinese resident ID. My hope is Chinese companies and people keep finding ways to cope with the bad policies.

I know a lot Chinese. They might disagree with each other on topics like Taiwan, Russia or if China has better systems than US. But i have yet to meet one Chinese think Xi is not stupid.

He’s not mad, but he’s not smart and he’s arrogant. if he’s smart he won’t push the zero Covid policy. He will either invade Taiwan or not but it’s dumb to making threats if he plans to invade Taiwan (even more dumb if he doesn’t want to)

If the zero Covid had lasted longer, it might be better for Chinese people — because Xi might have been removed by now. CCP was losing country due to widespread riots. if Xi invade Taiwan, it would have done the same to CCP’s ruling.

There's also a possibility this is an elaborated cover to enable Wagner to launch a surprise attack from Belarus..

A while ago, I said Russian tank could reach Beijing in just a few hours and someone said Russia is never going to invade China. Now if Russia is taken over by someone who oppose Xi's best buddy, Xi's plan to invade Taiwan can go out of the windows.

my account is using margin, so I am looking for names to sell. On POAHY I have bought twice, overall I lost money. The rational behind buying POAHY were: 1. NAV discount, and 2. Porsche is almost like Ferrari, and 3. valuation of VW is cheap. For 1, it doesn't seem it's closing soon. The family doesn't seem that motivated, otherwise, they would be buying back aggressively. For 2, I am having second thought on whether Porsche is like a Ferrari or just premium car like BMW. I think the distinction is if Porsche needs to keep investing to upgrade its car. Ferrari doesn't need to do that much. For 3, VW 's valuation has been forever cheap, and they have a lot of exposure to Chinese economy which is a mess now.

sold LNSTY and POAHY

I own baba. And it’s obvious to me that Xi’s attitude towards the Taiwan issue is totally different from previous leaders. He likes to quote Chinese history and ancient words. And he probably knows the handful greatest rulers in Chinese history all had great military success. yet the fact they are making all these noises and threats show war is not imminent. In the end, he doesn’t have money to do it. If he does it, the economy is going to crash and that will be the end of his or CCP’s ruling. So I don’t think there will be a war.

seemed cherry picking to me. They didn’t even mention 0001.HK, the biggest company listed in Hong Kong.

Bought some UBS today

TSM's customers will ask TSM to move their plants to America and Japan, where it will cost a lot more for TSM to build plants and train employees. Not just plants, they also need need other stuffs like electricity to be in place. An earthquake in Taiwan would knock out powers .. it's not just china's invasion risk I think, though it's probably one of them. On the other hand, a lot of stocks Buffett hold and then sold turned out to do very well, historically.

Imo, China is a fine country. A lot of smart want to make money and had achieved a lot. Unfortunately at this moment some of the dumbest people are running the country.

IBKR charged me $1 commission. Bought at 701 today