FlyingArrow

Eric, My comment was this:I'm still trying to wrap my head around this. We've seen the US/CAD dollar swing wildly over the past year and I don't ever recall seeing any discussion of combined ratio points swing associated with currency movements (either way) in previous quarterly or annual reports. I hope they make a point of discussing this on the call tomorrow. The issue was adequately addressed on the conference call and I was more than satisfied. I also figured that it must then have been in previous reports and I just couldn't recall it. Thanks for digging into this and pointing out for all what is in fact reality. I haven't had the time and I'm quite pleased that the swing the other way was just as big. Cheers,

Thanks for doing the work on the Archive Sanjeev. I actually find it humerous that one of the biggest missing features from MSN was the search feature and they close the site and move everyone to Multiply which has neither a search feature nor does it appear to be a proper message board. I think that's why I've never invested in Microsoft... Maybe in a year or two they'll add a search to Multiply and we'll be able to get at some of that great stuff built up over the years.

If it wasn't yesterday it sure is today... ;D

Very well said Partner. I have nothing to add to that except to reinforce your point on runoff. What a difference a couple of years makes.

Judging by Mister Market's response so far today it looks like I'll have no trouble accumulating all I want at or below book value! Mister Market never ceases to amaze me. Just wish I had more powder! Al, you might be scraping some more to pick up a few more leaps. Wow, I guess I really didn't need to worry about having time to accumulate at less than 1.3x BV!! Very interesting times indeed. The leaps may prove once again an opportunity to enhance ones wealth when everyone is running for the exits.

Very good article and nice to see some recognition. That explains why the stock is dropping today... ::)

And I want to personally thank those willing B shareholders who sold me mine today ;)

Just picked up some BRK.B as well. Too good to pass up. Mungerville, if you don't mind me asking what vehicle have you used to hedge and what do you think is the least expensive hedge at this juncture?

I just picked some GE up at $9.30 Sniffing at some BRK now. Interesting times.

Judging by Mister Market's response so far today it looks like I'll have no trouble accumulating all I want at or below book value! Mister Market never ceases to amaze me. Just wish I had more powder! Al, you might be scraping some more to pick up a few more leaps.

Thanks Prem and team. It seems I'm not the only one confused. The first question was related to this and both Prem and Greg did a great job clarifying. Pretty straight forward. Great call overall. I actually didn't realize how big Ike was (3rd biggest cat ever). While the massive gains this year on CDS and hedges won't repeat next year the combination of the increased income returns on the muni's, the reduction in minority interest due to NB purchase and ORH increased ownership, the upside associated with the common stock purchases (particularly since we took a nice OTTI) position us very well. Man it's great to be a FFH shareholder! Congrats everyone and great job Prem and Team!!

Can't say if it is a good buy. This is a great example of why I'm happy to own FFH and not try and mimic their portfolio. They have 8M plus shares. The impact on the overall portfolio is minimal but for an individual this could have hurt.

I was fishing to do the same but didn't get any. Which ones did you get and at what price? Regardless of how we feel about this report and the longer term prospects I simply have no prediction on what Mr. Market will do tomorrow with this stock. Very interesting times. Other than worrying about the odd margin call which I can deal with by balancing various account I'm glad that I'm in for the very long term and couldn't care less what it does tomorrow.

Consolidated net gains on investments in 2008 of $2,720.5 included $2,079.6 of net gains related to short equity and equity index positions, $1,290.5 of net gains related to credit default swaps, net gains of $273.7 on bonds, $20.6 of net gains on common stocks and $60.2 of net gains related to foreign currency, partially offset by $996.4 of other than temporary impairments recorded on common stock and bond investments. Anyone have any thoughts on the $996.4 of OTTI's? What are the rules for OTTI and is this really like mark to market? If these impairments don't truly materialize because they are really value investments made by a top notch jockey does this really represent conservative accounting as we really don't expect to see these losses materialize? That's almost $57 per share! That plus the investments held at equity which hide another $20/share in book value really has me thinking about the future. And it looks very bright!

Me too. But I'm greedy... When others are fearful ;)

Point taken on Q4 impact. I agree that the $80M commutation should come out. Those are good things for us as we know what Prem and team can do with the money! That's another 2% off the CR so we're at 101.4% They just need to improve by $100M over the year and we're at 99% in a year with some good cat losses. Very achievable going forward. But seriously Eric, you've got to stop pumping this stock. I want to accumulate more before we get to 1.3x BV!! ;D

Al, I was going to write many of these positives but you beat me to it! That's so we can keep accumulating and accelerate "Freedom Fifty Hello"

Eric, in general I'm very pleased with the quarter and won't be selling anytime soon. There are lot's of pluses I really like. However, I think your analysis is not accurate if you're suggesting that Advent and USD made up all of the problem. Underwriting results in 2008 also included the effect of foreign currency movements (affecting both current year and prior years’ reserves) which added a total of 4.2 combined ratio points ($189.2) to the combined ratio of the company’s insurance and reinsurance operations (compared to a benefit of 0.9 combined ratio points ($41.3) in 2007). The company generally mitigates the impact of foreign currency movements on its foreign currencydenominated claims liabilities by holding foreign currency-denominated investments. As a result, the impact of foreign currency translation gains and losses included in incurred losses generally is partially or wholly mitigated by foreign currency translation gains and losses on investment assets that are included in financial results as investment income in net earnings or in other comprehensive income. Take out the currency part of it and we have a combined ratio of 110.1-4.2 = 105.9% Advent had an underwriting loss of $112.4 and a combined ratio of 242.5% for the portion of 2008 (since September 11, 2008) that its results were included in the consolidated Fairfax results. I agree we shouldn't beat the team up for this. So take out advent for about 2.5% (a quarter of our $457M and 10% underwriting loss) and we're still at 103.4% Like others I don't agree with removing catastrophes to show an artificial combined ratio. We have enough fingers in various pies that there will be some catastrophe every year. Bottom line, I still wish underwriting was better.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around this. We've seen the US/CAD dollar swing wildly over the past year and I don't ever recall seeing any discussion of combined ratio points swing associated with currency movements (either way) in previous quarterly or annual reports. I hope they make a point of discussing this on the call tomorrow. Can anyone give me the "idiots guide to combined ratio impact due to prior years adverse reserve impact associated with US dollar strengthening" ???

The new text is working. A google of "Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders message board" or "Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders board" now results in both the blog and message board site coming up on page 2 of the results. A little more activity here and we'll be on page one of the results.

Sanj, If you google "berkshire hathaway shareholders message board" your blog board now shows up on around page 8 of the search. Of course our old home is the first result. There are a number of search optimization things that can be done to move the result up. But the search "spiders" are now seeing the text you added to the sites. I will share some thoughts off line, as there are clearly competitors trying to recruit the family ;)

I think that's a good idea and will help Sanjeev. Tariq is correct in his understanding of what I was suggesting. Search engines are very particular in what they use to assign page rank (whether you are on page 1 of the result or page 100) I would still suggest naming the board "Corner of Berkshire and Fairfax - Formerly Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders on MSN" for at least 6 months. This is the first and most prominent item on the home page so the search engines will give this a higher page rank and people searching on google for "Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders" or Berkshire Hathaway MSN" will find our site. Sanjeev, try those two searches now on Google and you'll see that the old site is the number one result in both cases. Once they shut MSN down the result will disappear or will still show but the link won't work because MSN will be shut down. People who remember the old site name but not "Corner of Berkshire and Fairfax" will never find us. If you put what I'm suggesting at the top of the home page it will help to get our new site higher up in the results. It won't likely get to the top for some time as the search engines look at a whole bunch of things and the MSN site in general will rank high due to it's affiliation with MSN. Anyway, thanks again for your work on this. I've found the site and our "family" is here. And what a great site and board it is. I for one am happy to leave MSN behind. Cheers!

Crip - Thanks. I don't use IM right now so PM's on the site would be useful to me. Sanjeev - I think it would be worthwhile and yes, it is usually only for members.

Sanj, To help people find our new home and ease the transition it would be useful to put some SEO tactics to work so that when people Google "Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders" they get a link to here. Currently the MSN board site is the #1 google hit on this search. You may wish to include these words in the title and other places on the site to help people get here quicker. I believe if you simply put "Formerly BerkshireHathawayShareholders.com" in the header after Corner of Berkshire and Fairfax the spiders will see this and will likely place this site high in the search results. I'm sure other web SEO guru's can advise on additional SEO strategies to help. This will ensure that less frequent visitors and guests of the old site can find their way here. Just a suggestion. Cheers!

Sanj, Can you check your settings on PM's (Private Messages)? I would think this would be a useful tool for members to contact each other. I was just trying to send you a PM but don't seem to be able to. Unless I'm missing where.