Williams406

Aren't all corporate managers capital allocators on some level? BH generates low cost float from insurance and invests it in railroads and Apple and utility projects. Some public, some private. Cool. JOE decides to invest capital in building some hotels? Also cool. Constellation decides to acquire yet another software company. What's the distinction? So those managers who bought BH say, 20 years ago and have done very well for their clients overall should do what, exactly? Sell the position? Forgo fees on that part of the fund/account?

Berkshire constitutes a large percentage of my portfolio but I did not commit capital equal to the current size of the position. The seed capital has grown since my late 90's first buys and there exists a daunting capital gain I'd rather not realize. I have just added periodically. I can imagine some portfolio managers are in the same position. Not sure why it would be dishonest for them to assess fees on that capital. Plenty of intelligent people choose not to engage directly in investment decisions either because they have limited time or want to stay in their professional lane. The depth of knowledge members of this Board have regarding BH is very uncommon. A portfolio manager who has accumulated solid BH knowledge, bought, and exercised patience in holding over years is demonstrating some virtue that has value and they should be compensated. Some decisions--financial and otherwise--are wise, keep adding value, and distributing fees/dividends--financial or otherwise.

The firm behind the website is one of the few commodity voices I pay attention to. No one gets every call right, but Goehring & Rozencwajg offer pretty good detail behind their calls in their quarterly reports. No opinion on the shale peak call.

Speaking of mafia adjacency, the mob tried to take over the waste business in Chicago in the 40's or 50's and were unsuccessful as several families of Dutch heritage dominated the business. Huizenga's family being one. Swierenga's 'Dutch Chicago' is excellent for anyone interested in the early history of the waste business in Chicago. Years ago, the Big 3--Allied Waste, Republic, and Waste Management--all had ethnic Dutch roots. Perhaps not super relevant to an investment decision today, but that chapter is great if you like a bit of industry history.

Bought my first shares of BRK in 1998 after a book club I was in did the Intelligent Investor, introducing me to Graham, Buffett, and Munger, then added a lot during the BRK drop in 1999 and the market drop in early 2000. Really just sat on the shares with small adds periodically until the GFC. I did not feel confident I could put together enough potential 20x'ers that might also go bankrupt to diversify so I loaded up on BRK, ORH common, FFH, and a couple ORH preferreds. Felt like a bunt at the time but all worked out well. Unlike my earlier smaller buys, I put a fair bit of capital in to BRK between $45 and $60 in the spring of 2009 and that decision continues to define my portfolio today. I convinced myself early on that Buffett/Munger were very unique and good and that they had built a magnificent machine that would outlast them. So I bought opportunistically at what proved to be decent times to do so and just didn't sell. With access to almost unlimited sell-side research through work, I did a fair bit of insurance-industry reading and a couple of analysts really did a good job explaining the mechanics of float. Fenimore Asset Management put out some really nice work on Berkshire mid 2000's as well. I read all the old Berkshire annual reports. It is easy to look at a long run of successful compounding like BRK has done and think it should have been easy to ID as great, then buy and hold. But I recall a lot of negative press along the lines of "Buffett has lost it" during the late innings of the tech bubble and the share price suggested that might be true. What am I doing with BRK when I could buy Dell or JDS Uniphase and double my money next quarter? The long run consists of a lot of short runs, not all of which make it easy to sit on one's bum and just not do anything. Another case in point is when BRK got slammed along with everything else during the GFC, Fort Knox balance sheet and the Buffett "imprimatur" notwithstanding. It was not an obvious portfolio "anchor to windward" during that time from purely a stock performance standpoint. As others have mentioned on this thread, understanding float is not common knowledge among most investors. This board is unique that way, but the insurance biz is a weird animal to many investors. Berkshire stock picks get all the press, not sure many investors even know Berkshire is a massive insurance operation, utility, RR, etc. BRK has been good to me, but I often wish one or two sets of grandparents had been well-to-do Omahans who were impressed with "that young Buffett fellow" back in the 50's.

From my post on the PANR thread back in December: "Anyone still following this? Quite a lot has transpired since year end 2022. David Hobbs (Telemachus) joined the BOD in March and is now Executive Chairman. He is on every webcast and Pantheon needed his communication skills. His active role in the business and ownership stake lend a lot of credibility in my mind. Just last week the company revealed it added 66,000 acres to the 193,000 it previously held. The acreage additions are essentially extensions to both Kodiak and Ahpun which Pantheon had proprietary seismic data on that management estimates adds 500 million net recoverable barrels to Kodiak and 300 million barrels to Ahpun. $2 million up-front lease cost. Netherland Sewell issued an independent expert report recently on Kodiak (one billion barrels of recoverable oil) and one should be issued 1H 2024 on Ahpun. The Kodiak IER will be revised to incorporate the new acreage--the one billion barrel estimate pre-dated the recent acquisition. Pantheon's financing strategy entails using vendor financing and reserve-based lending a few wells in to developing Ahpun with a goal of minimizing equity dilution. If Pantheon succeeds in lining up development capital this way, hard to see this staying at $270 million market cap. My initial purchases got hit hard by the sell off late last year (premature accumulation) but I added very aggressively in the $0.15-$0.20 range (PTHRF, US $) and made a material add at 0.25 post lease announcement last week. I like the set up here." I think a lot of prospective shareholders dropped off this one around the same time and I understand that--speculative play, short attack, confusing communication around the production test results...Hobbs is now the front-facing company rep. A week ago Hobbs did an interview with Chuck Yates that was excellent. Search youtube for "David Hobbs Chuck Yates". Worth an hour if you have some interest. Key catalyst would be the announcement of a financing package for Ahpun that is attractive with minimal equity dilution, which could come at any time. If we don't get that in the first quarter, the risk that potential vendors see the data differently than the Pantheon team rises, which would be a big negative. I'll be very surprised if we don't see at least 2 billion barrels of estimated recoverable resource in official IER's by the end of the 1H 2024 as a base case.

Still more Pantheon.

https://www.gorozen.com/commentaries/3q2023 the latest from G&R. As usual, quite a bit on oil/gas.

In celebration of International Commodity Stock Day, small add to Cameco and large add to Pantheon Resources.

small adds to Altius and FRP Holdings

Lightfoot's music always get a lot of airtime in my car on road trips. I think the really good musicians offer the world one of the better legacies a person can in the form of their music that can be enjoyed after they are gone.

FRP: Still more units coming on line in 2023. Good cash balance with management team that might find something to do if RE really gets squirrelly. JOE: Demand remains very strong. Development delays have pushed a lot of Camp Creek lot sales to 2023; same story with Origins. Many lodging assets coming on line. Should be very good comps throughout the year. Oil/Gas: Looking for continued shift from debt paydown to divs/repurchases. Altius: Lots of material, potential catalysts here: Silicon update, Kami feasibility study, IPO for Lithium Royalty Corp.

Have two aeron chairs, one of which I've had for 20+ years. Had the armpads replaced but otherwise as good as new. Haven't experienced enough other chairs to know how it compares to others, but I've been happy with it.

Only geologists with access to Pantheon's data room. Without David Hobbs' input based on his team's work, I'm not making this investment, or at least not sizing it the way I did. But even Hobbs went with the 80% success probability for Alkaid 2, which strikes me as something of a guess. An informed guess, sure. The dilemma: if the oil flows commercially, this investment can change one's financial future if sized sufficiently. If it doesn't flow well, you will be facing some quasi permanent capital impairment unless one of the other plays flows. Everyone is going to have a different answer about making the investment and how to size it. I won't lie--today was fun and reminds me of my $2,000 win day-trading Safeskin a few decades ago (one and only day trade--took the wife out to Chili's to celebrate). Just a few more zeroes now and I'm not in this one for 20% gains. May we both do well.

Yesterday JOE and Pantheon adds.