Rod

I have one of the crappy PDFs of this book. I think it's a good book, but not great. I would say it's overrated actually. Good for it's time, but there are better books available now. I think if it were easily available it wouldn't be thought of as highly as it is.

There are also significant tax loss carryforwards that should have some value.

It all depends on what you value. My aim as an investor is to beat the market by a large margin, which I have for over 20 years. I don't aim to be famous or seen as a great success like Tom Brady. I would prefer to be anonymous. I already live off my investments, but I would like to have more just for the added security. I would also like to build up tens of millions that I could donate to favourite causes later in life. I don't desire luxuries. I have lived very frugally my entire life and have found that I enjoy simple things that cost little. Investing has always been an interesting challenge and a means to support me beyond all else. I spend about 1 week a month doing investment research and the rest of the time pursuing other interests. If/when I have more money I may choose to go the passive ETF route and retire from active investing so I can devote that 1 week a month to other things.

Can't see anything to envy in this video. I prefer having my time to myself, a nice place to ride my bike, and a good book to read. I bet I'm happier than Tom Brady when I do that ;)

On Union, the impairment was made in the 4q and in the 1q call they simply noted that ICC's share price had risen and so they'd moved the value up marginally. Whether they have any way of extracting the value of ICC, I don't know. On Blue Goose, the land was damaged in the fire but as of the 4q call they could not assess the extent due to snow cover (ironic) and this was not updated on the 1q call. My uninformed guess given that this is grazing land (not, for example, standing timber) is that the value should not be permanently impaired by a fire. Grass grows back fast and fires can be part of the regenerative process. Correct me if I am wildly wrong (which is quite possible). Does anyone know what's happened to Canadian grazing land and rights prices since 2006? I don't think that the land is damaged. The biggest cost issue was that Blue Goose would need to pay for supplemental feed in the interim, which is a major expense, hence the decision to reduce the herd size. Farmland in the Caribou region of BC averages $2,500 per acre. https://www.fcc-fac.ca/fcc/about-fcc/reports/2017-farmland-values-report-e.pdf Blue Goose owns about 45,000 acres. "Blue Goose owns over 45,000 acres of farm land in British Columbia, and is a recognized consumer brand with beef, chicken, and fish products distributed to over 640 retail locations across Canada, making Blue Goose well-positioned to capitalize on the high-growth organic food market." So a $100 million value would seem likely.

That's because they're puttable, which in effect means they rank senior to the other prefs. The YTM would be sky high if they traded much below par! Interestingly they are also convertible at the company's option into common at the current price, which enhances the value of the other prefs IMHO and is potentially very dilutive to the common given the current market cap. Actually the E shares are convertible into common at the current price or $2, whichever is greater. You might think the E holders would be a little worried about that with the common currently below $2.

You can hear audio of the AGM at this link: Commentary and Q/A begin at 10 minute mark.

Agreed on Delonex. Apparently they expect a well to be drilled this calendar year, so a reasonably near term potential catalyst. Do you mind sharing his response to being pushed on the prefs? I understand the company not buying back the common at this point. I don't understand insiders staying out of the market -- not even a nibble -- and I really don't understand why the company doesn't at least make an attempt at taking out some of those prefs. Instead, they're talking about building out a merchant banking business. Do they seriously think they can outlay capital in any manner that competes with the risk-free return they'd get from buying the prefs? Of course there's very likely not enough liquidity for them to buy much anyway, and I don't know the costs of maintaining a buyback program. Maybe those are big factors. But my guess is that they overestimate their ability as investors/businessmen and are simply being irrational. I believe that Richard McIntyre exercised 45,000 rights in April. Unless I am misunderstanding this, that would represent a commitment of about $90,000

Parq Vancouver could be a big win as well. It's opening into one of the best hotel markets in North America. Commercial properties are selling for very high valuations. It's hard to believe that there aren't Chinese investors taking an interest in it. And, hopefully this isn't culturally insensitive, but a gold building in Vancouver with a large casino... Can you think of anything more appealing to Chinese investors?

This is probably not the answer you're looking for, but to my mind it doesn't matter what business you own if you're choice is to pay the intrinsic value. By definition, you will get the same return out of each one.

I’m split half and half between B prefs and common. I’ve been reinvesting the dividends from the prefs into common. I don’t average down—I set a position size at the beginning, so reinvesting divs is all I can do. Feels good to get a 12% yield then reinvest that in assets that seem to be worth at least double or triple the price I’m paying.

Costs are way lower than 59M. I think that number includes capital investment into Parq Vancouver

I certainly got the impression that Jonathan is going to be more aggressive on the restructuring front than David was. Agree with you about lots of opportunities to create value. The upside versus downside on this stock is very attractive.

Probability that I'm the patsy is increasing every day! ;) Ugly results. I expected the Blue Goose writeoff. The Union Group impairment was a surprise and I think should be viewed as a permanent loss of capital, despite their commentary about future revaluations. I must say that, aside from publicly traded securities, I value all of their holdings at a very substantial discount -- but it's still amazing to see them go to zero one by one. Interesting call today. An analyst from Intrepid Capital (which has a legacy position in Dundee via its Endurance Fund) challenged Jon Goodman to give any examples where Dundee has actually added value over the past few years, and openly pushed for liquidation. Not going to happen, although management is embarking on a strategic review of their holdings and was guiding to end of summer as a date by which we should expect to see some disposals. My other takeaway from the call was that we shouldn't expect too much out of Parq too soon. They expect EBITDA to be $50-$75 million this year, ramping up to $100 in coming years. But they'll be putting another $20-25 million of capital into the project in the very near term, and will continue paying exorbitant interest during the ramp-up period. Dundee was hit pretty hard by natural disasters in 2017: Blue Goose had TWO major fires, one in the Tender Choice plant and the other a major fire in the cattle ranch in BC. Also, Union Group had a dam under construction washed away by floods in Peru. I think that may have had a large impact on Union Group and led directly to the writedown. Throw in a CEO concussion for good measure... If I remember correctly the refinancing of Parq doesn't need to wait until the project has fully ramped. I believe they are planning to do it this year.

I beat you by 1 cent--bought a little at $1.98. I don't think the sellers are engaged in any long term thinking here. In fact, I feel that about the market generally. I've seen a lot of stocks that just sit there at very cheap prices and nobody wants them because they don't see any immediate catalyst. In seems to me we are in one of those markets where investors refuse to look more than a few months ahead and want immediate returns. Reminds me of the late 1990s.

Interesting story. You can see a little of Warren Buffett and Ed Thorp in Jerry.

I always use DLR an DLR.U to move cash between currencies at a very low cost.

The language in the AIF is not clear (or even accurate?). Look at the Series 2 prospectus. The rate is calculated as follows: - The payment period for the dividend just declared runs from December 31 to March 30, which is 90 days. - The "floating rate calculation date" (FRCD) is 30 days prior to December 31, so December 1 - The T-bill rate is the 3-month average yield from the auction immediately prior to the FRCD. This auction was on Nov 28, with avg yield 0.87. (see https://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/interest-rates/t-bill-yields/selected-treasury-bill-yields-10-year-lookup/ ) - The dividend paid is then (4.10 + 0.87)/100 * 90/365 * 25 = 0.30637 Well, that explains it. Thank you. Note to future self: "check the prospectus".

I'm confused about how the dividend on the Series 3 (DC.PR.D) shares is being calculated. Today the dividends on the three series of preferred shares were declared by press release. The D shares will be getting $0.30637, which is $1.225 annualized. This is a yield of 4.90% on face value of $25. The dividend is supposed to be set at the rate of the 3-month Government of Canada T-bill plus 4.10%. So why is the dividend set as if the T-bill is 0.80%? I see today that it is trading at 1.15%. Does anyone understand this? From the AIF: "The holders of Series 3 Shares are entitled to receive a quarterly floating rate dividend, as and when declared by the board of directors of the Company, equal to the then current three-month Government of Canada Treasury Bill Yield plus 4.10%."

Please elaborate a bit about your line of thinking here, Ballinvarosig Investors, It would be much appreciated, thanks. Do I really need to go there? There is just so much wrong with what Warren Buffett is saying these days. For a start, he continues to beat the very worn drum that a basket of hedge fund, fund of funds will under perform an pre-specified index of his choosing. What's worse, is that he conflates that statement with the notion that all types of active management is bad. Not only that, but he states that in all his career (60 years plus of being in the market), that a maximum of ten people he has ever met can hope to achieve the goal of out-performing the index. It seems to me that he is in complete opposition with his previous teachings, namely that an investor with a small amount of capital has a very realistic chance of out-performing the market. John Hjorth - I take it that you are an adherent of the cult of Buffett? If you are a devotee, then may I ask, have you adopted the advice of your protegé (excuse the pun) and adopted the index strategy? From the recent statements of Buffett, I think it's fairly clear that the circle of ten people that he identified as having the ability to out-perform the market are extremely unlikely to be inhabiting this particular discussion forum. It seems to me that yourself and other adherents of Warren Buffett would do much better in your present investment strategies than to sell all your holdings and adopt index weighted holdings in the likes of Tesla and Snapchat, companies that truly represent the dynamism of American business (clearly, anything that is not American is abysmal by the standards of Buffet). Maybe I'm wrong but in referring to the 10 investors, didn't Buffett say that he only has met 10 than he could predict in ADVANCE would beat the market? That is a very different statement from saying there are only 10 people that can beat the market.

I would guess that Cannabis stocks are in some sense "over-earning", more through expectation than current fact. Investors in these stocks seem to believe that Cannabis margins will be around 80% or so based on current prices. They seem to ignore the surge in supply that is coming, which will crater the price.

Perhaps Dream deserves it's own thread, but I have followed it for several years and don't understand the capital allocation, in particular the huge amount of capital they've devoted to buying shares in what ought to be the retail-oriented REITs they manage. The largest part of their shares in Dream Office were obtained in exchange for giving up the management contract. They have been more active in buying shares in Dream Alternatives. I would guess there are a few reasons why they are doing it. One, they want to increase the level of recurring income to balance the volatility of the development business. Two, they see the shares as undervalued. Three, and this applies mostly to Dream Alternatives, they want to be able to demonstrate to the market that they are large investors in their own fund. They have ambitions to grow Dream Alternatives by issuing new equity at NAV. Currently it trades well below NAV. This is a similar strategy that Brookfield uses. Reason number two has been confirmed by management, one and three are my own guesses.

Land developers active in Alberta and Saskatchewan. Residential land development is slow due to the crash in oil. The prices of the developers stocks do not reflect any expectation of recovery. Case in point: Dream Unlimited (DRM-T), also Melcor Developments (MRD-T).

I think it's just part of a plan to reduce their holdings generally. I don't think there's more to it than that.

It's worth noting that the B shares will reset next year and given the 5-year bond is at 2.15%, that would produce a 13% yield on the B's at $12.00. And would anyone be that surprised if the 5-year was 3% by next year? If we reset at 3% then the yield on the B's will be very close to 15%!