watsa_is_a_randian_hero

First in this country? Get real. NY dem AG is going after Trump right now. Obama didn't just threaten, he actually used the IRS to target his political opponents. Also, think about what you are arguing for - those in power would never be able to enforce the law against law-breaking political enemies, without fear that their actions be construed as biased. How would you ever enforce the law against politicians who broke the law? Think about what you are saying. That is the whole point of the concept of a Special Prosecutor.

What is not accounted for is that in a rising interest rate environment, there will likely be inflation. Prices may come down in real terms due to payment affordability, but will be adjusted upwards with inflation. If you have leveraged equity in a property, 3-5% inflation can translate into multiple return on your equity.

IO ? A few days ago I checked if Brexit had cause rates to drop enough for me to refinance. Costco Mortgage Services showed me 3.375 for a 30 year fixed. Wells Fargo shows 3.375 for 30 year Jumbo which is lower than the rate for conforming. https://www.wellsfargo.com/mortgage/rates/ I'm currently working with Citi in Illinois. They will give 30 year fixed on Jumbos up to $1mm loan with 15% down at as low as 3.25% if you move $250k of money to their bank/brokerage, no PMI. The rate is 3.5% for 15% down with no $ moved to their brokerage. The same loan with 20% down drops the rate by 12.5bps.

Indeed. The other flaw in comparing trump to S&P is his holdings have been real estate rather than diversified across S&P 500. Real estate arguably has a different cost of capital.

What? His net worth is 10+ Billion. Not gifted enough in business or economics? http://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-probably-better-investing-donald-233020366.html I've seen these articles before talking about how trump would have been better investing in index funds. These are simplified analyses that just look at starting net worth and ending net worth, with dividends reinvested. 2 Fatal Flaws in this Analysis: (1) What they dont take into account is spending along the way. Dividends would not have been reinvested, and there may have been drawdowns on principal. They assume all of your wealth remains invested with no drawdowns. Trump lives an extremely expensive lifestyle (he owns his own 757). (2) The word "Tax" is not even mentioned in this article. index funds are tax-efficient, but dividends would still have been taxed.

This is an even more absurd number than the wedding cost. Consider the median family income is $50k and the average family has 2 kids. That means on average this average family will pay $500k to raise two kids over 20 years (kids 2 years apart). That means 55% of a family's pre-tax income goes to raising kids, or 74% of their after tax income. Does this even make sense? I think this is another case similar to the wedding cost where many people have get help from friends/family. Childcare is extremely expensive...but many people either chose to have a stay at home parent (opportunity cost) or are gifted free services from a grandparent or other family member. Just because there was no cash exchanged doesnt mean that it didnt cost something. Also, not sure where you were getting to 41k/year. 250 / 20 = 12.5k per year per child. This is easily doable and not at all skewed by affluent.

I guess in addition to the points I made below about (a) guest count, (b) cutting corners and/or © dry wedding, the other common theme I'm seeing on here from people who claim to have had cheap weddings is a lot of "I did" or "x friend did". That doesnt reduce the cost of your wedding...you either had to do the work yourself (time = money) or someone gave you a gift of below-cost services. Agreed, with the corollary that if you can't afford to meet those expectations, you are better off not hosting an event or paring down guestlist and doing something much smaller.

The only way you get wedding for 10k all in when doing it at marriott is some combination of (a) smaller than average guest count, (b) cutting corners on other venders, such as invitations, photos, limos, music, and florist, and/or © dry wedding. Ours was >50k all in for around 150 people. I think the cost is a function of (a) guestlist size, (b) bridal party size, and © quality level. At a given quality level (like a hotel like marriott), the cost is affected by your guestlist size obviously, but less obviously by bridal party size (which affects transportation costs, rehearsal dinner, gifts for bridal party are customary). Venue - ~25k for around 150 people with a bridal party of 19 (8 groomsmen + 8 bridesmaids + 2 flower girls + 1 ring bearer). Dinner around $45 per person pretip/tax; Alcohol open bar + wine with dinner another $40 per adult. Passed Appetizers, tent, valet, etc all makes up the rest. We were at a yacht club, but in my experience all of the major hotels were around the same price point when you broke it out per person. Photographer + printed photos - $4k DJ - $1k Gown + Tux - $3k Florist - $1.5k Transportation - $1.5k Rehearsal Dinner - $2k Bridal Party Gifts - $3k Church donation + Priest donation - $1.5k Wedding Rings (not even counting engagement ring) - $4k other odds and ends make up the rest. I offered eloping or destination wedding as options, but we didnt do that. Additionally, if we're going to host guests were not going to serve bad food or cut major corners (the event is a reflection on you, you're better off not having a ceremony at all then hosting an event that isnt up to the standard levels customary with your socio-economic family/friend group). Luckily for us the cost was manageable and represented around 6 months of savings at the time, and we received a large amount in gifts from our guests too, which was helpful. I would reiterate my prior post...if you are spending more than a year's worth of savings (or worse, going into debt), its not a financially smart idea. You're better off not hosting a reception or doing a very small reception.

It is one thing if the parents helping, or if the two getting married have high incomes/assets themselves. However, I think in most situations the wedding ceremony and the engagement ring are terrible financial decisions. If you are spending more than 12 months worth of savings, or worse going into debt, you are starting your marriage in a bad place.

why would we as a country invest years of infrastructure development into an area like southeast michigan? No offense (I'm from rust belt myself), but population is already very low and in decline there. "bridge to nowhere" comes to mind. Investing in rural and non-coastal areas doesnt make sense when the population is trending away from those areas. Think about it if infrastructure were privatized...If you managed a private infrastructure company would you want to invest in toll roads/bridges/utilities in SE michigan or Florida? Or California? Or NYC? Or Jersey? Or Washington? Or SC/NC? Or just about anywhere else?

On a P/B basis, the MSCI EM never had a 12 month negative return following point in time when its P/B was this cheap or cheaper over the period of 1995-2015.

same with EM

Caveat - posting this as devil's advocate argument - not necessarily something I fully believe myself (1) Download Shiller PE data from his website (2) Invert CAPE (so it is an earnings yield) (3) take difference between earnings yield and long term interest rates (in his dataset, column G) (4) Median difference between CAPE earnings yield and long term interest rates over 135 years is 2.16%. We are currently at 2.24%, implying the market is slightly cheaper than its long term average. Also, another devil's advocate argument for this is that this dataset begins in 1871. The US was an emerging market at that point. So much is different today in terms of financial controls, governance, regulations, liquidity, transparency, data availability, costs of trading, precedents for certain events existing that the US market today is very different than it was in the 1800's or early 1900's and deserves to trade at a premium. Think of where China is today and where it might be 50 years from now - if it progresses in terms of financial controls, governance, regulations, liquidity, transparency, data availability, costs of trading, etc, won't it deserve to trade at a premium to the CAPE it trades at today? It always baffles me that people think that a historical dataset is gold and that things must revert to the same mean through all of history... That said, my personal take on it is that many pockets of the market feel rich (notably US large caps), but value can be found in many areas.

idk how anyone can consider the stock's rise without considering the depreciation in the CAD for a company whose functional reporting currency is USD?

I believe it is because their strategies are more similar to those of a high frequency/market making, not investing. People should think of marketing making more like a business. It requires investment in systems, algorithms, relationships, etc. Do you think of a car dealer as an investor in cars, only worth liquidation value at any given time? the returns are huge because they are measured with a denominator of liquidation value. Market makers make up for this by charging huge fees. I believe Renaissance's medallion fund has a 50% performance fee, on top of a large management fee.

Check out: NHS -fund at discount to NAV FEO -fund at discount to NAV NSL -fund at discount to NAV - This is nice because it offers retail investors the chance to buy exposure to senior loans. Many of the high yield bonds listed below have a revolver that is senior to them, so they are really mezz SSWN - 2019 senior bonds that trade in $25 par increments for SSW. Less liquidity, but 8-9% yields. Atwood 2020 6.5s - $34 / 41% YTM Seacor 2019 7.375s - $83 / 13% YTM Era 2022 7.75s - $80 / 11% YTM Fairfax 2037 7.75s - $113 / 6.5% YTM Gulfmark 2022 6.375s - $32 / 32% YTM Hornbeck 2021 5.0s - $55 / 18 YTM JC Penney 2097 7.625s - $63 / 11.5% YTM Keys Energy 2021 6.75s - $15 / 64% YTM PHI 2019 5.25s - $81 / 12% YTM Resolute Forest 2023 5.875s - $63 / 14% YTM *Fairfax has indicated in the past that they own these

I see the same bonds offered in my IB account at much better pricing than ameritrade or etrade.

I would argue long-run FV of oil equals the price at which the marginal supply projects have an IRR = to cost of capital. Right now we are far below FV if the cost to extract the marginal barrel is in the $60's...Capitalists are pulling back on capex/exploration, but I am beginning to think it may require a country like Russia or Venezuela to go BK before they'll stop investing in NPV negative projects. Eventually it will correct.

+1. If you ask most people why deflation is bad they give you the same look as if you asked them why they believe in dinosaurs. I do agree with Cardboard that low oil prices are beginning to be have deeper negative effects. While there's a fair argument that $65 oil is better for the economy than $100 dollar, $33 oil presents a lot of difficulties around the world. At the least, it seems like a good time to cap off the strategic petroleum reserves. Instead of doing the opposite? This is how stupid our policy makers are. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-27/u-s-plans-to-sell-down-strategic-oil-reserve-to-raise-cash

Thanks. SA article for future review and thinking: http://seekingalpha.com/article/3753506-high-yield-carnage-and-closed-end-funds Tickers for search: DHF, PHK (still trading at premium? :o ), PHT. I own NHS

You didnt read what I wrote then. I said there are ways to short without risk of margin calls. Buy puts. Short + Buy call. Buy Put Spread. Short Call Spread. All of these have specific amounts of capital at risk.

Sometimes simply shorting the VIX can be a good value. The VIX levels are mean-reverting and the futures curve is typically contago, allowing a shorter over the long term to make a reasonable profit. Additionally, there are leveraged ETFs (TVIX & UVXY) that compound this with the structural issues that naturally cause decay to value over time. Check out the long-term charts of VXX, TVIX, and UVXY. The problem with this is the VIX can shoot up to multiples of where it was at recently (and theoretically to unlimited high levels), thus exposes a shorter to risk of complete loss of capital. This can be mitigated by capitalizing your trade with far more capital that required by your broker and limiting your position size to a very small portion of your overall portfolio. TVIX's history only goes back a few years, but I calculated over the last few decades, the index that TVIX is hinged to produced a maximum trough-to-peak rise of 15x. You can further reduce your risk by shorting at times the TVIX/UVXY has already risen multiples from a recent trough. For instance, shorting TVIX @ 15, I would suggest having a minimum cash set aside of roughly $80 per share (15x trough of $5.31). Double-digit annualized returns (on the full capitalized trade amount) can easily be earned by shorting at points like these. If the risk mitigation of overcapitalizing the trade and shorting only at points where it has already risen multiples is still too much risk for you, you can cap your risk entirely by simply buying calls against your short or just by buying puts. edit: The "unlimited" risk potential of a rise in the VIX is already organically hedged to a degree in that the "natural decay" of leveraged ETFs accelerates as volatility increases. So as S&P 500 volatility increases, so will the value of the futures held by TVIX/UVXY...however, there will also be a corresponding increase in VIX futures volatility, which will accelerate the natural decay of the ETF.

this is part of their strategy...not just get rid of current production, but create fear of future collapses thereby suppressing investment thereby keeping supply tight for years to come.

I purchased JC penney's 100 year bonds due 2097. I did it expecting a high likelihood they would file bankruptcy eventually.

I would suggest looking for brk threads in the brk sub forum, ffh threads in the ffh sub forum and value stock ideas in the investment ideas sub forum..... This section is called general chat for a reason. I like to use the Recent Posts section on the main page to see at-a-glance what new posts have been put up. It takes more time to open each subforum and check the latest posting date on each thread within. I agree that General Discussion is largely noise. I would prefer that posts from General Discussion did not show up in Recent Posts at all for the same reason that watsa_is_a_randian_hero mentioned, it clutters up and obscures the posts I'm interested in. It would be nice option to have. thats all I'm saying...without that option (or any other option for filtering the main page) this board becomes less valuable as it becomes more littered. It would be nice *option* to have. At least then those not interested in banter can ignore it. Even better would be a post rating/ranking system of some sort. And still better would be the ability to "follow" posters or filter stock ideas in other ways. Someone mentioned the 2 points of founder's withdrawal and Twitter as other reasons for the decline here. I think both of those are valid. However, I would suggest that the twitters-bloggers rise, like seekingalpha's rise, isn't solely due to posters seeking to monetize (as other forums like VIC and Microcapclub are still active), it is also due to the higher level of functionality of those media forums through filtering/following mechanisms. Twitter-bloggers and seekingalpha have filtering functionality and controlled commentary while VIC and microcapclub have controlled membership.