AzCactus

Have your parents buy a solid mutual fund. Here are a few names: RWGFX FPACX LOGIX However, I agree with some of the other comments expecting even slightly better returns without committing time basically leaves you contradicting yourself. The extra work done right equals the extra returns. That being said buy (average into) Berkshire and tell your parents to enjoy retirement.

Per Berkshire's 13F they have securities worth about 110 Billion and a current market cap of about 367 Billion. Anyone who thinks Berkshire just picks stocks and doesn't own businesses would have a hard time explaining the 257 Billion dollar difference.

Didn't Vanguard thank Buffett after he mentioned them during the shareholder meeting last year? Overall I think indexing is a good idea for most investors who don't want to bring a sense of competitiveness to the game.

I think the topic should be titled mistakes rather than misses. A mistake implies something that you did wrong and can learn from. You could have plenty of misses every year and still manage an above average portfolio.

Walk a mile a day on average

I also don't think the burgers at Burger King are that good. In my opinion, there is really only a top three (west coast) but I haven't been to some of the east coast names. 1. In N Out 2. 5 Guys 3. The Habit

Thanks for posting. I will have a look at it later this week.

Rolfe is a decent manager but I have my doubts about his fund. If a guy is managing over a billion, is a "core" type fund and has less than $1,000,000 of his own money in it...I'd be wary. He probably would hold up fairly well in a down market though. I'd say if you're looking to more or less match the S&P 500 with less volatility, this is a decent choice. However, rpad said he doesn't care about volatility. Stahl, I don't own any RWGFX, but two quick things--where did you get information regarding how much of Rolfe's own money is in the fund? Additionally, you say "more or less match the S&P 500" however if you review the link he has clearly outperformed the S&P 500 over longer time horizons unless my data is invalid. Thanks, David Ownership is in the SAI. According to morningstar, the retail class has underperformed (barely) since inception against the S&P 500. However, the drawdowns are less severe. Thanks for the tidbit regarding ownership. In terms of the performance--the numbers in the firm presentation paint a much different picture showing out-performance of about 3% per annum depending on the time frame chosen.

Rolfe is a decent manager but I have my doubts about his fund. If a guy is managing over a billion, is a "core" type fund and has less than $1,000,000 of his own money in it...I'd be wary. He probably would hold up fairly well in a down market though. I'd say if you're looking to more or less match the S&P 500 with less volatility, this is a decent choice. However, rpad said he doesn't care about volatility. Stahl, I don't own any RWGFX, but two quick things--where did you get information regarding how much of Rolfe's own money is in the fund? Additionally, you say "more or less match the S&P 500" however if you review the link he has clearly outperformed the S&P 500 over longer time horizons unless my data is invalid. Thanks, David

I would add RWGFX to that list. Long and short is that they are value oriented, typically hold around 20 stocks and have beat the S&P 500 This will give you some background: http://www.wedgewoodpartners.com/investor-resources/firm-presentation

Although it has been rising I think OUTR can do some good things next year.

Fair point--an adjustment has been made :)

+1

This thread is pretty insulting to women (which I am not). This is like saying I am afraid of the market falling after I buy a stock? Then don't buy! If you think your marriage will fall apart then don't get married. Have a relationship that works for both of you and that'll be that.

With the market an all time high (and me being a natural contrarian) when do you think their will be a recession and how bad will it be? Seth Klarman wrote an excerpt entitled "someday" in his 2013 letter to shareholders highlighting his perspective. Happy Holidays To All

Without knowing anymore its pretty hard to make a judgement. You have 8 securities plus cash. So in terms of the weighting if BRK is 50% that's much different than if its 20%. That aside BRK seems to be pretty expensive to me.

Given how brilliant some people seem to think he is I'm surprised no one mentioned Biglari Holdings.

LOL

Plato-I'm no genius but I would think that the only way to keep cash but earn more is to: *I think commercial might be one way to earn a little bit over the short term. The real problem is that cash will average 30% (0) until you deploy it. And while that might sound bad--it is much better than investing because the market keeps going up or something. Ultimately, the only way to earn more than cash is to buy something more risky/less liquid than cash. Good luck

With 2014 just about over and all three US indexes up---what are everyone's predictions for 2015 for the S&P 500/Nasdaq/Dow/Oil I am aware of the futility of this exercise but thought it might be interesting nonetheless. HAPPY HOLIDAYS :) S&P 500-2200 DJIA-19000 Nasdaq-5000 Oil-70

There's a good quote that goes something like "the harder I work the luckier I get." With that hard work is a large part of having a business eye. Buffett has said he's a better investor because he's a businessman and he's a better businessman because he's an investor. The two are connected to an extent. The other thing we need to realize is opportunity cost of the one thing that we can't get back, time. When Buffett was spending all that time reading 10K's, traveling to New York etc. he was losing time with his kids and family. Effectively, those things took a back seat to his investing and his results were awesome. The key is to find out what's most important and put your focus on those things.

Analogous to every regret people can have. The optimal/better course of action is always revealed with the passage of time. While you might be able to learn from others regrets, often ruminating on your own regrets is a massive waste of time. You can't help but imagine a different course of action leading to a better life. It's weird that we often think about regrets and almost never think about our successes and the actions we are satisfied with. Hi Jay, I'm no psychologist. However, I think one reason that people do not think about their successes as often as their regrets is that to an extent success is expected. I am not saying its easy. However, if someone spends a lot of time (there's another post about that) researching a stock and things work out that is the expected result for two reasons. 1. The market goes up over time. 2. The person put all the time in at the beginning and expects to be rewarded. The regrets basically mean that their is some sort of learning experience that ought to be made and prevented as you mention above.

Im in my 20's also---my biggest regret is not having more money in 2008 :)

Almost CBI

You will get a lot of replies to this I'm sure. In advance, I will summarize them for you. "Buy BRK! Let Warren and Charlie do the work for you. I have 99.95% of my portfolio in it (the remaining .05% is split evenly between FFH, MKL and IBM). I sleep great. If the market closed so that only Methuselah was around when it re-opened I would be thrilled. It's going to be $300,000 soon!" "Buy FFH! Let Prem do the work for you. I have 99.95% of my portfolio in it (the remaining .05% is split evenly between BRK, MKL, BBRY and IBM). I sleep great. It's going to compound at 15% a year guaranteed. It's going to be $1,000 soon!" "Buy SHLD! Let Eddie do the work for you. I have 99.95% of my portfolio in it (the remaining .05% is dry powder to buy more when it falls a bit). Eddie is a genius's genius. I sleep great. It's worth about a million billion dollars." "Buy BH! Let Biglari do the work for you. I have 99.95% of my portfolio in it (the remaining .05% is to buy copies of Maxim as soon as they hit the shelf to read while I eat at Steak & Shake). I sleep great. Sardar is a misunderstood genius." "Forget all of those other guys. They don't know what they're talking about. You have to buy something no one knows about like MKL, L or LUK. If you do what everyone else does, you'll get the same results." I would probably skip SHLD. For starters it's probably a good idea to read The Intelligent Investor. Also, the fact that you have a paper loss does not necessarily mean the stock is a poor investment. While I do not own the names you mentioned maybe CONN will appreciate in the next 2-3 years. In terms of mental models Poor Charlie's Almanackwould probably be a good book to purchase. Good luck. David