Parsad

What business would you buy, (Price does matter here) if you were looking for a starting point for a Berkshire Hathaway, Leucadia, Loews, Sears Holdings style company? You will be the controlling shareholder. You control capital allocation. You can buy anything you want with the excess capital or free cash flow that your business produces. I doubt there are too many on this board, if anyone, that could buy an insurance business and run it profitably, so the best idea is to hire the best insurance executive out there. There is only one way to be the next Berkshire Hathaway...hire Ajit Jain and start from scratch again! ;D Cheers!

I put Faber and Abbie Joseph Cohen in the same category. Like a broken clock has the correct time twice a day, Faber and Cohen's predictions are correct twice every 25 years. He's been a permabear for so long now, and briefly turned his opinion the other way in late 2010, once the markets had already moved up enormously. There is a significant chance of a global recession, but not because Faber called it. And there is significant chance of another bull market 2-3 years from now, not because Cohen called it either. Cheers!

Article on how home sales are improving dramatically in some areas. Cheers! http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-25/hoboken-homes-gone-in-60-minutes-signal-u-s-recovery-mortgages.html

Good article on the tough role Heins has taken over. Cheers! http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-magazine/thorsten-heins-no-good-very-bad-first-100-days-as-rims-ceo/article2441702/

I love articles like this, because I love hearing what entrepreneurs are willing to put themselves through to make something (their dream) happen. You know this kid is going to be successful! Cheers! http://news.yahoo.com/meet-the-tireless-entrepreneur-who-squatted-at-aol.html

Another email...this one between Tim Geithner and William Dudley on separating Lehman into a good bank/bad bank to save it. Interesting stuff...historical stuff as it happened! Cheers! http://www.jenner.com/lehman/docs/frbny/FRBNY%20to%20Exam.%20034332-034333.pdf

I know, I know, many of you are going to disagree with this, especially after Warren has said such great things about him, but like Sokol, Dimon deserves all of the blame for what happened at JPM. I thought he deserved some of the blame, but after reading this article, he deserves all of the blame. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-25/jpmorgan-gave-risk-oversight-to-museum-head-who-sat-on-aig-board.html This is a corporate America problem with board selection and you would think Dimon would know better...but boards like to be very collegial...so you don't actually get the oversight you need. Happens from small companies like ITEX to large companies like JPM. How these three were the ones selected to sit on the risk committee, I don't know. And the fact that Dimon was ok with it, just makes it worse. Cheers!

I got the information only today about 73 making it to IIT-JEE rank. Fantastic effort by foundation. Just a quick information: 560,000 students appeared this year. All 73 might not get a seat in IIT even though they are in rank list. Rank list has almost twice the number of seats available in IIT. I do think that majority of them will get a seat because lot of students at Dakshana are from underprivileged class. There are reserved seats for them once they get a rank in IIT. I was trying to convince some one else to replicate this approach in different country. They wanted to set up a foundation but wanted biggest bang for money used. Problem was finding a leveraged set up like IIT, where only cost is to put the students there. Fantastic execution by Mohnish and team. It was not easy to pull it off. Once of the similar effort is done by another person. See below, http://www.super30.org/ Infact, Mohnish wanted this guy to scale it up and he wanted to give money to him but he did not take the offer. I think he did provide some help in setting up a process for identifying bright but poor students at Dakshana who can be further coached to join IIT. Hi Rranjan, Thanks for the updated information! Also, many of those that don't make it to IIT get accepted to other top universities, including full scholarships to some American and European schools. So that's still a significant improvement in their total lifetime income, and then the eventual trickle down effect it has on their families and community. Cheers!

Corner Market Capital supports two non-profits. One is obviously "The Crohn's & Colitis Foundation of Canada" in memory of JoAnn Butler. The other is Mohnish's foundation "Dakshana". Mohnish just released the results from this year's class, and 66% of his students were accepted by the various campuses of the "Indian Institute of Technology" or "IIT's". Both Prem and Ajit Jain are IIT graduates. These are extraordinary numbers! Some 400,000 students apply to the IIT's every year, and I believe they only accept 4,000...73 came from Dakshana, out of 110 that were enrolled in Dakshana's preparatory class! Every improverished student from Dakshana that eventually graduates from IIT, will change the lives of so many more within their family and extended family, simply because their income level would climb from the average income of about $1,200 a year to $25,000 a year...which would be the equivalent of about $125,000 a year in North America. This leverage is what attracted us to Mohnish's foundation. For more information, please go to www.dakshana.org. Congratulations to this year's class! Cheers!

Was that him refusing to buy Lehman, or was Paulson just telling him about investment banks needing cash? I remember the scene, but can't remember exactly what was said other than him telling his grandkids "They always think it's important!". Cheers!

Sorry Watsa, I thought they were talking about capital leases. Cheers!

Article on a memo Buffett wrote, saying they will probably buy more newspapers. Cheers! http://finance.yahoo.com/news/warren-buffett-eyes-more-newspapers-160801285.html;_ylt=AjpNkVvec1ULTUyLlOKwh6.iuYdG;_ylu=X3oDMTQ0dDNvMTlwBG1pdANGaW5hbmNlIEZQIFRvcCBTdG9yeSBSaWdodARwa2cDNGI2YTQ0MDItZDBmMS0zMzE0LTg2MjQtZDc2ZTMzNDhjOGI4BHBvcwM0BHNlYwN0b3Bfc3RvcnkEdmVyA2Q3Zjc3YzEwLWE1YzAtMTFlMS1iZmRlLTU2MjE3ZjMzMTMxYg--;_ylg=X3oDMTFpNzk0NjhtBGludGwDdXMEbGFuZwNlbi11cwRwc3RhaWQDBHBzdGNhdANob21lBHB0A3NlY3Rpb25z;_ylv=3

No. Leases are already on the balance sheet, and they are a liability. If the leasee does not sublease the property when not in use, then it is a liability, so there should be no offsetting asset unless it is under a sublease agreement...if it is not in use, then how can it be considered an asset? It's plainly understandable the way it is, and by putting an offsetting asset only gives the impression that liabilities are less than in actuality. Cheers!

The letter was actually posted at the website below first. That's where I saw it a few days ago. http://www.jenner.com/lehman/docs/debtors/LBHI_SEC07940_849386-849388.pdf Cheers!

A board member sent me the letter on the weekend. It looked like it was a draft, and they had not actually come to a full agreement or anything. There was talk that Buffett kicked the tires on Lehman, but there was no offer or agreement. Cheers!

Article on the donor who salvaged the charitable dinner auction at Buffett's childhood home. Cheers! http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2012/05/23/donation-makes-up-for-failed-dinner-auction-at-buffetts-childhood-home/?mod=yahoo_hs

Interesting article on the originated loans that BofA is buying back. Moynihan will whittle all of the litigation down like this over time. Cheers! http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-23/bofa-will-buy-back-330-million-of-mortgages-from-freddie.html

What the hell were they thinking? This was a black box! Don't know how Dimon let this happen. Cheers! http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/23/jpmorgan-cio-fed-idUSL1E8GND2A20120523?feedType=RSS&feedName=marketsNews&rpc=43

If this guy isn't the successor, it would be a real shame and mistake! I can't see anyone else truly suited to the job, and can handle the Buffett legacy. I've met him on a couple of occasions as well, and he is incredibly nice. Cheers! http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-23/buffett-s-idiot-challenge-seized-by-jain-in-premium-growth-hunt.html?cmpid=yhoo

This is always something I feel kind of bad about. Sometimes people post an idea and I'm really happy to see a new idea, and I check it out, but it doesn't quite get through my first line of filters so I never research it quite deeply enough to have something to say about it. So on one hand I wish I could post and start a conversation and make it clear that I really appreciate people posting ideas and encourage more, but on the other, I can't really motivate myself to look deeply into things that I don't feel are what I'm looking for. I wish I had a way out of this dilemma. Maybe I just need to start reading more about stuff that doesn't appeal to me just to get more exposure to a variety of things and build up more experience researching companies... That sounds very good in the abstract, but in practice, I find it tough... You only need 20 punches in your punchcard Liberty, so I wouldn't really change anything. I find that most investors, including those that believe they have a very wide circle of competence, tend to ignore the most obvious investments that are 3 foot hurdles, and chase after 9-10 foot hurdles because they think no one is looking at them. BAC at $5 was staring everyone in the face, yet very few investors swung. You had guys like Paulsen selling all of it and buying gold! It was the same way with Steak'n Shake below $5...and same thing with FFH below $80. People ask for ideas, but I find that virtually no one swings at them when fears are the greatest. People can generate tons of ideas here, original or otherwise, but what is the point? You aren't going to buy all of them. In fact, anyone with any sense wouldn't even buy 10 of them! I get so many white papers from people. Very in-depth analysis of various ideas. It's incredibly commendable work in virtually every circumstance...voluminous, detailed, technical with very expansive anecdotes about moats, competitors, etc. But I have yet to read one that explains to me in simple terms why something is a good idea. None have ever been 3-foot hurdles! ;D It's one of the reasons I personally can't stand white papers or analyst reports, but I will read them and provide feedback if someone asks. When I look at something, the first thing I go to straight away is the balance sheet. I don't like it, it goes in the garbage. That filter, or perhaps bias, is built in and I can't turn it off. But it works! So don't change your methods if they work...plain and simple! I've found that nothing is original. It's all been done before. Cheers!

Hi Guys, Some comments on the questions: - In regards to the ideas...they tend to go through periods where there is less discussion and then more...so you do go through periods of less analysis. - There are quite a few ideas on the "Investment Ideas" board. The whole idea is to get people to go through there, and then they may notice that some idea from a long time ago is suddenly cheap, and they have past analysis and comments to use as a historical guideline...ideally, anyways...and then that person tends to bring the subject back to the front because it becomes active again! - Small cap ideas tend to dissipate a bit when larger caps are cheaper. As markets move up and prices increase, people have to dig around for cheap stocks and they start looking at small caps again. - The only way to adjust the number of threads and messages you see is from your own profile settings, and the maximum is 50 visible at anytime. Lastly, asking where the original ideas are, because you want some ideas, is like someone asking "Where's my birthday cake, because it's my birthday?" You only get out what you put in! Throw an idea into the ring, and you'll find that others will throw an idea out as well, or at least get the discussion going in the right direction. Cheers!

I still don't think DELL is really cheap. It's fair to slightly undervalued in my mind based on its ability to grow its cash flows, and the lack of competitive advantages. Cheers!

Yup, he did! Cheers!

Can't believe he even had a shot! Newt apparently loves more than just his account at Bloomingdales. Cheers! http://www.cnbc.com/id/47515942

Article on how most Greeks don't think they'll be kicked out of the Euro, and how this could all be resolved by simply taxing the rich. Yikes! Cheers! http://www.cnbc.com/id/47518874