ValueMaven

ACG has been DEAD wrong over the past 18-24 months. I've seen there research. It stinks - they have little insight. Dont forget they were pushing IntelSat very hard as well.

Berk still getting little love. Rails booming, APPL all-time high again (or near it)...insurance extremely profitable - although GEICO is giving money back to customers. Buying back stock, some pipeline deals etc. Very interested to see next Q's earnings.

What does Berkshire 2030 look like? Have we made another major acquisition at this point? Has GEICO overtaken State Farm? Is headquarters paying a dividend? What does the float look like?! Interested in what folks have to say!

Another preferred + warrant transaction for grandpa Warren Berkshire plans to make a $600 million preferred-equity investment in Scripps to help finance the purchase of closely held ION, the people said. Berkshire will also get a warrant to purchase as many as 23.1 million Class A Scripps shares at $13 apiece. Scripps stock closed Wednesday at $10.47.

Interesting. DaVita has been an interesting one for BERK. I'm glad they didnt buy it...

Let me throw this out to the group - how does your valuation of BERK change if 1) They start paying an annual 2% dividend, and/or 2) state that they will be more active on the buyback front. Since Buffett worships at the memory of Singleton, I cant help to think how Teledyne developed throughout the years (no divy for 25yrs and then started paying one, and specials etc before being broken-up). Frankly, I still think the stock is cheap here.

Really interesting to see how not a single comment on the BRK board regarding Llyod's $3.3B loss due to Covid-19 exposure this week. Just think about that --- while insurance was profitable for BRK in the quarter ... granted we are more diversified and GEICO underwriting wont be as profitable going forward (combined ratio at 77%!!) ... but wow - so interesting... thoughts from others??

Why would I want to buy FFH - which has struggled w/underwriting historically for sometime - when I can get BRK which is highly profitable, CHEAP, and has much better insurance exposure & other businesses overall. I wonder on a risk-adjusted basis which is cheaper for the long-term... FFH or BRK ?

yup...my bad. Based on Friday’s closing prices for the trading houses, a 5% stake in each would be valued at roughly $6.25 billion.

toll roll ? how do you figure? I thought these Japanese trading houses had questionable pasts/weak ROEs ?? ie: doing dumb things at dumb times (writing puts on the nikkei, in late 80s, buying US subprime in 06/07 etc) - but who I am to question the great one. Also, imagine what Berk cash pile would be without this $30B investment ... no wonder he has let cash build ....

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has acquired a slightly more than 5% stake in each of the five leading Japanese trading companies. Berkshire acquired the holdings in Itochu Corp., Marubeni Corp., Mitsubishi Corp., Mitsui & Co., and Sumitomo Corp. over a roughly 12-month period through regular purchases on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. Based on Friday’s closing prices for the trading houses, a 5% stake in each would be valued at roughly $6.25 billion. Berkshire says it intends to hold the investments for the long term, and that it may increase its holdings in any of the companies up to a maximum of 9.9%, depending on price. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/30/warren-buffetts-berkshire-hathaway-buys-stakes-in-japans-five-leading-trading-companies.html Thats a $30B investment ... whoa...

https://omaha.com/business/local/omaha-s-megabillionaire-down-the-street-warren-buffett-set-to-celebrate-his-90th-birthday/article_52ccc925-378c-5094-8a1f-b57b3d3fb8bc.html

Barron's had some really interesting comments on BRK in this weekends paper. I'd suggest you read it. Nothing we already dont know. Said BRK is cheap on a P/BV basis @ below 1.2x; comments on more buybacks from WEB, and an estimated 2% divy yield after WEB is no longer around. Pegged A-share b/v $267,000; which would put the B's @ $178 or so.

The stability of the operating income is remarkable. I'm having a hard time however figuring out what normalized operating income are for BRK is however. While I understand the writedown of PCP - I wouldnt totally write off this investment just yet...1) other aerospace part suppliers are up over 75% - 100% from the March bottom; and are generally lower quality then PCP - although have less oil & gas exposure, and 2) Initially everyone thought GenRe was a terrible acquisition in 00-01', only to have the co' in a few years really turnaround and help fuel BRK's growth in flow. I am also of the view that at some point in the not to distance future - I believe Berk will start a small divy...not while Warren is around - but likely under Abel. Kudos to everyone who was flagging this in the low $170s and $180s as being extremely cheap...will be an interesting 12-18months

This reminded me of previous comments about principles guiding goodwill impairment. It involved GenRe and the adjustments that had been made before (adjustments made without a requirement) to more conservative discounting of workers comp reserves. Combining what both said, i guess the goodwill impairment means facing reality with a dose of a margin of safety. The way it's always been. The comment about decreasing transparency with modern (and more detailed) disclosure (1960s vs 2000s) is food for thought. AWESOME FIND!! Thank you

the more I look over the Q - to me the story is: 1) How strong the operating biz's are and 2) the aggressive nature of the buyback post AGM... looks like its going to be close to $9-$10B including July....

In terms of valuation – I view BRK right now as a 65-68 cent dollar, with limited downside due to cash. I’ve valued the biz all sorts of ways: DCF, SOTP, float as a negative carry, % of stock portfolio income etc etc. For me the purest and simplest way know; knowing full well, that it is better to be roughly right, then precisely wrong: •BRK Market Cap ($500B) – stock portfolio ($230B) – BNSF ($110B) – Cash ($145b) = $480B. This tells me you are getting ALL Insurance – which generates 45% of pre-tax income, Utilities – which is extremely stable, and the whole MSR group of businesses at call it $20B. Does that make sense from a valuation perspective? NO. Which is why we’ve seen nice buybacks over the past few months. •The real question is what the IV of the BIZ is

What do you have current B.V. pegged at given the current Q? Also - it looks like BNSF was better slightly better then expected IMHO

yes - but my point was that if he really views it as Berk's 3rd largest biz - he is unlikely to sell anytime soon

https://www.wsj.com/articles/private-equity-firms-discuss-bid-for-kansas-city-southern-11596223106?st=anc0qqplbu68up3&reflink=article_copyURL_share Private-Equity Firms Discuss Bid for Kansas City Southern Blackstone’s infrastructure arm and Global Infrastructure Partners explore potential deal Would love to see the multiple they put on this much lower quality rail and how that translates to BNSF ....

RationalWalk posted this on twitter - interesting way to look at it Every $BRKA share has an indirect position of ~153 $AAPL Every $BRKB share has an indirect position of ~0.102 $AAPL It's easy to calculate your indirect ownership interest in Apple. Buffett owns ~248,741 BRKA, so he indirectly owns a bit over 38 million AAPL worth ~$16 bn

Berkshire purchase of Apple (~253M shares @ $130) less than 3 years ago. In terms of sheer P&L, this is the greatest trade ever.

How does todays move in Apple change how you view Berkshires current valuation? This is easily one of Buffett's biggest homerun's of all time. If I think how Apple ($100B) position balances out the Rails, Uts, and Insurance businesses; it is extremely complementary. Few investors understand the consumer as well as WEB - and this highlights it. 5G roll-out, A.I., new product cycle and the whole Apple ecosystem.

WOW!! Congrats mate. There does come a point when you should always leave a stub position on -- just to see how far something goes!

Decent outperformance this week for our favorite (and extremely cheap) company! Up +1.7% vs. -1.7% for the S&P 500...it's one week - but I wonder if the market - or maybe Berkshire - is starting to notice cheap this thing is. There might be some gaming ahead of what his likely the August results which will show Berkshire bought back $5B in equity. Thoughts?