mjm
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Posts posted by mjm
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40 minutes ago, Xerxes said:
Finished the book. The last few pages cover like 10 years or so.
The show is at episode 9. One more to go. Episode 8 and 9 were straight from the book (with minor changes that made it better). It is incredible to see how the producers were able to create a show based on such complicated book without oversimplifying it.
Reading this book I have learned more about Japanese people in that era, culture wise than the past 25 years of my life reading history books about Asia.
This novel somehow seeps in all the cultural nuances that gets missed just by reading history books.
I think I will read Tai-pan next that deals with merchant families in Hong Kong.
According to Wiki:
Four of the six books—Tai-Pan, Gai-Jin, Noble House, and Whirlwind—follow the dealings of the great trading company Struan's, the Noble House of Asia (based on Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited), its founder Dirk Struan, and his various descendants. Gai-Jin provides the major link between the Shōgun and Struan's storylines.
thought shogun the best of that lot. think King Rat , believe his first book, and have read/enjoyed it. also the old King Rat movie that is in black and white is enjoyable.
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1 hour ago, Spekulatius said:
$CAR down from ~$170 to $113 since discussed here. Weak operating results and a ton of leverage do this. I think 2024 results are going to be way down, it seems.
what do you base that on? poor economy? curious?
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2 hours ago, Spekulatius said:
Also bought just a bit of PARA so I stay interested in the soap opera. Added a few shares of PM premarket (earnings looked alright to me).
I bought a starter in KWS.DE (seed company) as well on a weak earnings report. They did keep the annual forecast but we will see.
what's you thoughts on SDF? kinda same business. nice balance sheet.
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1 hour ago, Spekulatius said:
I am more interested in CAR than in HTZ - just based on how they seem to think based on CC transcripts but they both could be great bets.
What is fascinating about CAR is their bonkers capital returns. They almost retired 2/3 of their shares and even so the shares have more than tripled, the market cap is actually not up that much. Bonkers, since the business is so much more profitable than in 2016. Even paid a $10 special dividend this year.
The capital structure is also something to behold. $6B in market cap and they slapped $4.64B in corporate debt on it. The next layer is secured debt for the cars themselves - ~$17.5B. So it's leverage and top of leverage and just beautiful as long as it works and a zero if they run into trouble like like HTZ did in 2020. I think Europcar also went teats up and needed to be recapitalized. So you really need a management team that knows what they are doing.
We should probably open a thread on those rental car co, as there sure is more input.
I would recommend the warrants if you are looking at HTZ.
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7 hours ago, gfp said:
The book value is like ~$48 Billion. I have no idea where the $82 Billion came from but it certainly isn't a crazy value. UNP is still at around $120B market cap. I don't think there is any way this gets re-marked on Brk's books.
my question is why do it? Only reason I can think of( and I know next to nothing about it) is to give more capital to parent company if he thinks market may melt down and he wants to make a run at a company and may need some extra financing?
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9 hours ago, Cigarbutt said:
It's been reported that Mr. Buffett met Jack Byrne, then recently appointed CEO in May of that year and immediately after (starting the next day) started to buy large blocks of shares in the open market. Mr. Buffett had also contacted and met a person named Wallach, a key boss (insurance commissioner) at a small but critical regulatory agency (it seems somehow that Mr. Buffett became convinced that Geico was not to be put in receivership). A key concurrent move was to contribute capital before visible improvements in the bottom line and any financial or operational moves that would support Geico.
so he had a dog in the fight already. thanks. interesting
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2 hours ago, gfp said:
I don't know where this came from, but I happened across this letter between Buffett and George Young, of National Indemnity, while cleaning up an old stack of papers in my office. The letter is from July 22nd, 1976 and might be interesting to some because it offers a glimpse into Warren's decision making in a letter that was never intended for public disclosure. I thought it was interesting anyway. PDF attached.
thanks for sharing. do you think he wanted the business to kind of keep tabs on GEICO and how they operated, looking to buy shares and eventually the company?
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36 minutes ago, Fundmanagerthrwawy said:
Does anyone know what sort metrics Burry uses to screen opportunities? I keep seeing different possibilities but unsure what is the legitimate one.
Any tips are appreciated!
Cheers
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do know strongest earthquake ever recorded was in Chile
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2 hours ago, formthirteen said:
@Spekulatius Somero seems like almost a too good deal, but I bought a starter position anyways. Thanks for the tip.
Seem to be based US. Why do they trade in London?
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42 minutes ago, TwoCitiesCapital said:
I grew up on the Gulf coast and have plenty of connections down there. Premiums for storm and flood insurance have absolutely exploded in the last 5 years.
Some are paying higher premiums for insurance than their current mortgage. The insurance companies absolutely seem to be responding to this threat - my real concern is how anyone other than the ultra wealthy will be able to live anywhere along the coast line given how expensive the combination of housing and premiums have become.
not even counting the extreme mispricing of NFIP insurance
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53 minutes ago, bizaro86 said:
My prediction is that in 10 years people will be saying fusion is 10 years away. Just like what they're saying now, and what they were saying 10 years ago.
might take a few years
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he must be quite concerned with sea levels rising
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2 hours ago, Spekulatius said:
I am with Quincy mutual and a “Robinson” in Progressive Lingo. I have seen rate rises, but nothing too crazy. I like the Mutual insurers and have been using them for a while. They don’t have telematics or any of the fancy stuff at all.
I ran a comparison and could save some bucks going with Liberty Mutual, but according to my broker, their claim experience is worse than with Quincy , so I stayed away from them.
Curious as to what you think on SAFT and Plymouth Rock as carriers?
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1 hour ago, MCR said:
As a result of following this conversation, I decided to review my auto (and home) insurance. Just switched providers, saving over $5K for 2023 for auto policy. New 2023 policy for home is effectively same as 2022, but I consider this a gain as I avoid the inevitable increase that's coming from my current provider (increase was just over 26% in 2022).
what state are you in?
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1 hour ago, Spekulatius said:
All these foibles around crude and oil are annoying when NG is really the energy source that matters, both in Europe and in the US. Biden should do all he can to encourage NG production in the US to allow exports to Europe and to make sure there is no problem in the US. having high NG prices in the US will cause all sorts of negative externalities, much more so than high prices at the pump.
I do not really know myself, but are there enough LNG tankers and unloading terminals to accommodate the NG if it was shipped to Europe? Believe they were shifting tankers from Asia to Europe.
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29 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:
@Cigarbutt There is no particular reason I stuck this BNB drama in this thread other than it fits loosely the narrative here and I found the situation mildly interesting and entertaining.
You could absolutely play the stock here with the expectations that the dividend comes back in a few years and the stock recovers. I do think that there may be risk that the Belgium state takes advantage of the situation and either buys out the public shares cheaply or recapitalizes it's central bank and zeros the shares that way.
I would guess however that this is probably unlikely and perhaps not even possible by law (but I have no idea). So not investment from me but I keep watching the stock as perhaps a situation arises that makes me put a little money in.
I think there is a broader applicability for regular banks stocks that have large bond portfolios (EXSR, I am looking at you!) that are market to market in GAAP but apparently those unrealized losses don't affect statutory capital
Feels a bit like Coyote going over the cliff but keep defying gravity unless he decides to look down....
remember the Bank for International Settlements in Swizterland and it appears that individuals can no longer own shares in it it appears. It was kind of like a Central bank for Central banks if I remember correctly.
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7 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:
And yet, Germany's gas storage is 87% full, ahead of schedule. Track the data, not the stories.
where do you track your data?
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7 hours ago, Spekulatius said:
What makes you think that Berkshire will drop much at all when WEB passes on the baton? I think BRK will drop less than 5% in this case. I would not be surprised, if the fall would be very small (<2%) and quickly reversed.
always think of Buffett's quip saying that he hoped the stock did not rise too much when he died.
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1 hour ago, Parsad said:
There is an easy solution. Berkshire should just buy Markel and make Tom Gaynor vice-president of insurance operations and president of portfolio management, while Ajit Jain is president of insurance operations and Greg Abel is president of non-insurance operations.
Gaynor has worked in a co-leader position and is a terrific investor and insurance manager. Abel is presently working as a co-leader with Buffett, and then would not have to worry about float, insurance or portfolio management if something happened to Warren and Ajit. The two T's probably know Gaynor well, and would fit in nicely as a team. Ajit already knows Markel and Gaynor, and Ajit's lack of ego would be a good environment for Gaynor. And Gaynor's better at risk management than say the likes of Joe Brandon at Alleghany or many of the other Berkshire insurance subs other than National Indemnity.
Cheers!
Do you think Buffett may have bought Allegheny mainly for the people running it? it did not seem to be that great a bargain. No other bids, pretty high price, overlap of business, etc. just musing.
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noticed WTM is also selling their pet insurance. competition worse, high valuations?
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not sure if discussed, but finished Tehran and found it very good.
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Can some of the extremely knowledgeable Canadian investors here tell me the time length requirements on filing buyback info on normal course bids? Seems longer than US requirements.
Shōgun - James Clavell
in Books
Posted
watch the movie if you can. believe main character is a young George Seigel