Castanza

SSD, FRPH

Besides…a higher estate tax doesn’t solve shit. It’s widely known 70% of wealthy families will lose their wealth by the second generation and 90% will lose it by the third. That money is entering the free market the proper way imo. I’d rather see someone piss it away in parties or foolish business ventures than have it go to the govt where immediately 50% is evaporated in bureaucracy…

Yeah and “merit-based” systems like you’re suggesting end in slavery, work camps and genocide. Not to mention they stifle innovation, motivation and happiness. Sorry, I’m not a governmental resource that exists to be tapped because you can’t run a balanced budget and reverse handout programs. The ones writing the laws are subject to the same odds as the ones they write the laws for. Equality can’t be legislated…

Exactly Today you can take MIT courses online for free. You can get into healthcare with a 1-2yr school at a community college for very little money. You can take one year and bang out your A+, N+, SEC+ IT certs with free resources and a few hundred bucks in testing fees, get a entry level IT job and easily within a few years get your CCNA, Azure, AWS, etc. cert and be making 80k+ in LCOL markets before your HS peers even graduate college.... I know a guy who does nothing but snake drains for $250 flat rate. He averages 3-10 a day.....think about that....You don't have to be a rocket scientist to make a good living, you just have to be willing to work and take what the market gives you. Instead we have people paying 60k for a Business Administration degree from a State School to end up working as the manager of a local Sherwin Williams making 50k a year....

How much if that reality is self induced? I’d say the majority of it. A quick glance at spending habits of individuals in the 1950s vs people today will tell you all you need to know. There is a reason my grandmother/grandfather had the same small house, same couch, drove used cars, an outdated kitchen for damn near 40 years. Not because they couldn’t have upgraded but because they were frugal and they weren’t constantly trying to borrow against their future. They understood the value of their time and the value of their money. People today value their things against other peoples things. I don’t feel bad for couples with 80k in student debt, combined income of 160k, a mortgage over 2k and another $1500 in car payments that are struggling to make it.

Do you still work in the construction field?

Nonsense! There are far less barriers to success today than there ever has been in human history. The only thing preventing people from becoming “successful” is motivation and self discipline. The real difference between today and the 1950s post war era is attitude.

Pretty much every young investor who is genuinely interested in the market and investing outside of index funds in their 401k goes through this phase. Eventually you read some Peter Lynch and come to terms that forecasting is a fools errand.

The sooner you accept the world has always been and always will be held together by bubble gum and shoe strings the sooner you can get on with life. There is no positioning that will protect you from the asteroid event you seem to be afraid of. The line of thinking you're stuck in will be more detrimental to your long term market returns than any future market correction you are likely to experience in your lifetime. You either believe in general continued progress of humanity within your lifetime or you don't.

go on....

What does this even mean? What exactly are you expecting to happen?

Thanks for sharing Spooky, this is something I've been working through as well. @ICUMD the CSU thread really has some gems. The first three pages there are some good attempts at valuation based on the approach Mark outlined in his 2013 presidents letter found on their website. It's definitely a completely different beast that has done the unthinkable over the last decade and more. As Spooky said the question is can they continue to move the needle with acquisitions. This has been a question for over a decade now (after doing some research) and has yet to not be true.

~16% across IRAs and Brokerage account Started the year down after a foolish (hindsight) play on SAVE. I believe I was down ~12% last January. Emotion got the best of me and I leaned into a play that carried more risk than I was willing to admit. Lesson learned. Add airlines to sectors I avoid (energy, airlines, retail brands, and most of the time banks). Fairfax was a large boon to my portfolio this year. I had less churn this year and worked on build in out some positions. Picked up a few new positions towards the end of the year with the dip. Overall I am happy with my return and still think I sleep more sound with my current holdings than if I were holding SPY. I Looking forward to the new year. Thanks to everyone on this board for all of their research, insights, professionalism, camaraderie, time and willingness to share ideas and teach us younger guys! To another prosperous 2025 in health and wealth!

Not something I have a good handle on (and clearly the market doesn't either); but a basket play here might not be a bad option.

NVO, FRPH, SSD, RTO

FRPH, JOE, DEA (Thanks Lance and Pupil for putting on the radar)

JOE

What's the thesis on DEA? DOGE fails?

Good stuff! Hell of a ballsy move at the time. Exactly, behind every lucky break or opportunity is a choice. A lot of people never take that chance.

Curious how you ended up in finance/investments? Did you go to school for it and take the trad route?

Per Motley Fool today. “If you look at NVDA's market cap right now, $3.5 trillion, you could buy the entire, if you sold NVDA, you could buy the entire energy sector, all the companies you just talked about, plus the giants like Exxon, Chevron, Oxygen, Petroleum, everything else, you'd still have money leftover to buy Walmart, Coca-Cola and JP Morgan. And by the way, if you did that, you'd be getting more dividends from those companies than NVDA earns an entire year.”

If someone genuinely builds a quantum computer that is reliable, marketable, usable, and packaged in a way that would make it commercially viable; I don't see how govt would not be stepping in to hamstring the tech until there are adequate security solutions developed. Who knows what that looks like in terms of time and rollout. Pauls Security Weekly - has a few solid podcast episodes on cryptography with some experts that discuss the implications and paths forward. Worth a listen in general if you're interested in hacking, security, current trends, company issues, how companies are posturing etc. Lots of business implications discussed on the show daily by actual experts. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/pauls-security-weekly-audio/id1149992167?i=1000639854269

None that discussed the company in depth (as you did), just casual mentions by hosts when discussing WB etc. I believe Chit Chat Stocks was one and The Acquirers Podcast. I’ve seen it pop up on Reddit from time to time. Maybe the same members as on COBF though.

I’m in my early 30’s, been on this board since 2019. Continued to read up on and follow the discussions had here on FFH. Had a small position in 2021 but never owned it in size until 2022. Im just now hearing FFH mentioned by my peers who ascribe to “value investing”. BRK was always a topic of conversation along with the classic investors like Lynch. But Prem is now being mentioned more and more. I have heard FFH discussed on more value oriented podcasts over the last two years as well. Perhaps a new generation of value investors is slowly discovering this gem north of the border? Overall mentions seem to be going up. Especially after the MW short report.

I've gone from 9-14% in the last month. Will probably flex down a few positions that have reached or surpassed fair value either this month or start of the new year.