Parsad

Garbage! After my first couple of years investing in stocks, I decided I wasn't going to read another analyst report ever again in my life! It is an absolutely unnecessary industry and a racket for investment banks. Although, if you get them free they make great fire starters for your wood fireplace or in a crunch...toilet paper! Cheers!

Who are you talking about? Murray Pezim? Cheers!

Hilarious! That's pretty damn funny. Cheers!

Based on current drone technology, I'm sure people will be mistakenly spotting more UFO's based on what they can now do: https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/skymagic-drones-dubai-spc-intl/index.html Cheers!

Some of the numbers of manipulation of crypto markets is mind boggling if accurate! Cheers! https://www.thestreet.com/investing/cryptocurrency/billionaire-mark-cuban-warns-of-potential-new-crypto-scandal-fraud?puc=yahoo&cm_ven=YAHOO

This probably belongs in the crypto thread but still a very good example of how institutions (old and new) forget or underestimate correlated risk. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/winklevoss-twins-big-mess-crypto-205838099.html I think Buffett and Ajit Jain's greatest strengths compared to virtually all other investment managers or insurance managers is this complete understanding around, and conviction to avoid, excessive correlated risk. One of the most amazing things I've ever seen was when Berkshire acquired GenRe, Buffett instantly began dismantling thousands and thousands of derivatives contracts...avoiding the blowups seen in 2008. He also unwound their position in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac years ahead of everyone else as well, after they watched Fannie and Freddie start to do things where they had forgotten about correlated risk and excessive leverage. In 70 years of investing, I don't think Buffett has ever underestimated this one thing! Thus the reason why there are very few down years and those are usually insignificant. Cheers!

I'm just throwing out a low number based on other analyst reports for what the overall portfolio is worth. For me, the $500M value is the ownership in tZero alone. Cheers! https://www.tzero.com/ https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/14/overstock-com-ceo-aims-to-sell-or-reorganize-e-commerce-biz-so-he-can-focus-on-blockchain.html

Another example of small players being able to manipulate massive amounts of crypto. There were/are probably thousands of such small players trading billions and billions in total every day. Cheers! https://finance.yahoo.com/news/25-old-traded-2-billion-113812994.html

I'm going to stick to what I threw out last year...it's just become a bigger bargain and ridiculously cheap. Maybe the cheapest it's ever been other than during the March 2020 pandemic. OSTK - Overstock.com Jonathan Johnson runs it now instead of the erratic Patrick Byrne. They switched over to selling higher margin "Home" goods instead of everything, so that cut into sales over the last 6 months. But essentially: You have a $2B revenue online retailer that is completely profitable selling for $850M. But they have $430M of cash on hand that they don't use...plus a corporate office that is worth north of $70M. Only about $35M of debt that was issued to build the corporate office for $50M. Finally, you have their entire Medici Ventures portfolio, including the stake in tZero, that is now managed by tech private equity firm Pelion Ventures. That portfolio is worth a minimum of $500M and could be worth up to $4-5B depending on what they can do with it and how they monetize it over the next few years. So you're paying net $400M or so for the entire retail business that does $2B in revenue and a no expiry call option on all of Medici Ventures. If you believe in blockchain long-term, this one is frickin' cheap and a true deep value stock! Cheers!

Shocking what happened in the Buffalo/Bengals game. I saw it happen live…Hamlin just got up, paused, and fell backwards like a rock. I knew it was a cardiac arrest right away, since there was no helmet to helmet. The helmet hit him right in the chest. He’s in critical condition. Poor guy came in for their hurt starter last week. Best wishes to Buffalo and their fans! Cheers!

Over the weekend, I binge watched the 2020-2021 seasons of Larry David's "Curb Your Enthusiasm". They were just awesome! I've watched all of the other seasons and they were great, but the hilarity, wit and maniacal level of comedy in these two seasons reminded me of "Fawlty Towers" spectacular single season. Amazing, how David remains so annoying and entertaining at 75! And he continues to attack society's norms fearlessly. Cheers!

I'm sure some of the rich even get annoyed when their assets fall in value...thinking about Elon Musk and his margin calls on TSLA due to his Twitter purchase. The smart ones like Buffett never get overleveraged and live well below their means. If you do it like Buffett, even if you are getting only average returns, you will slowly become financially independent and never get into financial trouble. Few people are patient enough to build it through their life time. Everyone wants to be rich tomorrow! The irony is that if you just live below your means...you are already in better shape than 60% of people! No matter how much you are earning. Cheers!

It's not institutionally inspired, but just human nature. The institutions do a good job of propagating it. Human's are always more psychologically traumatized by loss of money, rather than the equivalent amount gained. Almost everyone will buy more of something when it is on sale, but God only knows why 90%+ of society doesn't feel the same way when their house, stocks, bonds, etc drop in value. Only about 2 in a 100 people are built where they feel the reverse...they get excited when stocks fall. I'm actually even more perverse...I actually get more fearful when they start rising! I'm happy loading up when the world is apparently "collapsing", but start getting more fearful when something goes up 50-100% in short succession! Cheers!

Done. You can answer in the poll now too. Cheers!

My whole point when I started this thread: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/u-charges-accused-mango-crypto-223055202.html If this one guy can manipulate a smaller crypto market by himself, why couldn't larger players manipulate larger cryptocurrencies? Without more oversight, regulation and disclosure, there is no reliability at all around any current cryptocurrencies. Cheers!

So you're saying that aliens have no use for anything on earth. Wouldn't that include crypto? So the discussion around "intrinsic value" has absolutely zero meaning...regardless of what we are talking about. The truth is that in OUR world..."intrinsic value" matters immensely. Since we do find gold useful...our fiat currencies useful...and the products/goods our corporations make are very useful to us. Aliens be damned! Cheers!

The cheese looks wonderful, but those home made baguettes look spectacular! The crust looks perfect. Hard to find a proper baguette anywhere other than a French bakery! Cheers!

Hi Viking, yes we hit 20 years on February 20, 2022...going on our 21st year this February! Cheers!

Thank you for another interesting year! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to All! Cheers!

She used a check that will take two days to clear through a data center. You used a form of payment that debited your credit card or account instantaneously. But at the end of the day, you both used the same fiat currency. Neither of you paid through crypto. Cheers!

Hi rkbabang, 1) I've followed cryptocurrency and blockchain technology probably longer than anyone on here...since Overstock.com started accepting and buying BTC and buying up blockchain companies in 2013. So to generalize and say there is a broad unwillingness to understand crypto is not fair. 2) That's not why the post was deleted or moved. The "Investment Ideas" Board is for stock-exchange listed stocks only. Not for commodities, fixed income, currency, real estate, etc. It acts as a library and research base for those listed stocks. Many postings on there are moved to the "General Discussion" board if it does not fit that criteria. Cheers!

While control is important...if control was the only thing motivating the Watsa family, they would have bought the total return swaps directly instead of through the company...he's good for it! They knew the business was undervalued...but they bought them for the company...not themselves. Cheers!

Not necessarily death. If Prem is no longer CEO or Chairman, the company can have a vote to retain the super voting shares as they are. If it is voted down, they can be diluted by share issuances. If a vote is not held within 5 years of Prem no longer being CEO or Chairman, then that would also remove the protection of the super voting shares. https://www.fairfax.ca/news/press-releases/press-release-details/2015/Fairfax-Announces-Modifications-to-Multiple-Voting-Share-Proposal-and-Postponement-of-Special-Meeting--of-Shareholders-to-August-24-2015/default.aspx Cheers!

I don't like Cathy Wood, but that video looks heavily edited. I suspect some Twit edited it to give the impression she is throwing those numbers around in that manner, which is probably not the actual context of the interview. Cheers!

Yes. That remains very true. Prem had appointed Paul Rivett as President. After Paul left, Peter Clarke was appointed President. Peter has been with Fairfax forever. So if something happens to Prem, Peter Clarke would take over as CEO with Andy Barnard overseeing Insurance as he does and Wade Burton leading Hamblin-Watsa. I would imagine Jean Cloutier would take over as President and COO...who has also been with Fairfax forever. You also still have many of the old guard like Chandran overseeing India...Brian (bond guru) Bradstreet overseeing Fixed Income investments...Jennifer Allen as CFO...pretty much all of the VP's at all of the insurance subs have been in that position for 10+ years. You have Lawrence Chin backing Wade at Hamblin-Watsa and if there ever was a pinch, Francis is a phone call away! Lastly, the board of directors retains a lot of the old guard experience like David Johnston, Timothy Price, Brandon Sweitzer, while adding newer, younger capable directors like Lauren Templeton. The Watsa Family would remain well represented with Ben and Christine on the board. I also wouldn't be surprised to see Paul Rivett back on the FFH board some time in the future, as Nordstar is now under arbitration and will be divided. I'm far less worried about Fairfax than I would be with Berkshire. The current team under Prem has shown years of success. If something happens to Buffett, Charlie and Ajit...that's three guys that are completely irreplaceable. Prem as a leader is irreplaceable, but the investment and insurance teams at Fairfax are as capable as him. Fairfax will keep rolling as usual, just shareholder's won't have that voice and face to lean on which is mighty comforting like Buffett & Charlie. Can someone run National Indemnity like Ajit? Can someone make acquisitions like Buffett? Maybe they will just roll all of the excess cash flow to Ted and Todd, and let the CEO's of each sub make their own acquisitions rather than leaving it to the parent company. It's simpler at Fairfax...everything flows through Andy to make insurance acquisitions or Wade to make investments. Prem and eventually Peter just gives the ok. Cheers!