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elliott

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Posts posted by elliott

  1. yes, time does not play to Chinas favour at all, least of all with their attitude.

     

    still, for those that think that Taiwan is becoming more actively "independentist" (whatever that means considering the current state of affairs) there are some things to consider:

    1- the independentist candidate won with 40% of the votes (or seats, cant remember), that still means 60% are non independentists

    2- the party of the independentist candidate had also won the previous two elections, and the results of thist last one are the worst of the three

     

    I wouldnt surprised if many in Taiwan were just happy with things the way they are, and so long as this is the case they care less about this matter than about employment, house affordability, and where will they spend their next summer holidays

     

     

     

  2. Its difficult to know what the end goal of the Chinese really is for Taiwan.

    The rhetoric could be like the constant harassing they practice - is it aimed to the Taiwanese politicians, or to American politicians?

     

    I tend to think that China prefers to let fruits fall on their own, but I am not sure time plays on their favour here.

    Maybe they just think that there will be a point in time when Taiwan will prefer to look up to them rather than to the US?

     

     

     

  3. On 10/12/2022 at 7:40 PM, Spekulatius said:

    FWIW, I am in the same age bracket than your father in law.  20% downturns occur about every 3 years on average. The last ones were in 2018, 2020 and now 2022. What we are seeing here is nothing out of the ordinary.

     

    https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/08/19/what-i-plan-to-do-when-the-market-crashes.aspx

     

    how much valuable are statistics like "50% drops occur 2-3 times a century"?

    what I mean is how reasonable it is to expect just a few data points to have much predicting value? (unless of course we take whatever data we have going back to the Roman Empire and consider it valid and relevant, or use other markets data, in which case we would have to add complete wipe offs to the list of possible events)

     

    this is something I usually ask myself also in relation to passive / index investing. you are going to get market returns minus costs, for sure, but to me the important point is whether those returns are going to be satisfactory (to me) or not, and it seems a lot of people in the passive / index community thinks that is going to be the case just so long as you invest for the long term

    (I am 50% passive, and considering becoming 100% actually)

     

  4. Since you mention that you try to understand the thesis behind super investors decisions, have you decided what will you do if you dont share their thinking and thesis? I think it would be better to proceed the same whether you like an idea or not, since cloning is delegating investment decisions to super investors after all, but it is up to you obviously.

  5. On 8/10/2022 at 3:07 PM, hillfronter83 said:

    Top China Strategist Sees Stocks in Limbo as GDP Growth Slows to 2%

     

    Hong is one of the top China analysts. Fired from his job because of his bearish view of Chinese market and banned from all social media. He is quite active on twitter since started "vacationing". Worth a follow IMO.

    I have not read the article, but according to professor Pettis, GDP slowing considerably would not be a bad sign but exactly the opposite, a very positive development for China.

  6. On 11/14/2021 at 5:52 AM, Xerxes said:

    Compare that some guy sitting in NYC flipping options and stocks like burgers.

     

     

    Wiklerson was the boss but as I posted some time ago there was also Pactorum permanently in Africa, and then the rest of the team which I would say included people from FAH that were supposed to review the investment ideas. What I mean is that either those verifying the ideas did poorly, or simply did not do their job, and that I think goes further than Wilkerson.

     

    I am considering this again, but I would love to know if somebody has found a way to invest in African stocks directly, for example in the NSE (kenya).

     

  7. On 6/7/2022 at 12:21 PM, ICUMD said:

    Presently, I think there is a great opportunity for Fairfax India to scoop up all these quality infrastructure assets for a steal.  [...] I bet demand for FIH owned assets will grow at an exponential rate.

     

    How is FIH able to get those kind of assets at a bargain? If their prospects are so good, one would think that sellers would know.

    Additionally, one would expect a certain level of scrutiny from the public, press, and/or political rivals that would keep the sale "honest" - even though it is usually said that there is a lot of corruption in India.

    Thanks.

  8. in the recent investors meeting, Vinall was asked about Grenke.

    it seemed to me that he does not think management did anything really wrong (or so bad, maybe) to have been subjected to such scrutiny by Bafin, and that what happened is in great part Bafin overdoing it to make up for some case or another where Bafin did not do their job

     

     

  9. it would be interesting to read a similar discussion from 5-10 years ago

     

    additionally, have you considered how many of us here are long term investors? from the people posting in the threads I follow I tend to think that few, very few (this is ONLY my gut feeling - not to mention that we all may have our own definition of what a long term investor is). the thing is that while short term investors may give you good long term advice, you may stil want to bear the fact in mind

     

     

  10. 17 hours ago, Gregmal said:

    Absolutely. 100% the media is scum of the earth. An enemy just like Putin except they effect more Americans than he does.

     

    unfortunately, I dont think thats US exclusive.

    another thing that strikes me about all this, and which the media has a lot to do, is the suppression of diversity of thinking. for example, if you have business in Russia and dont leave the country, you have become evil. so companies must leave Russia even when their actions are only going to hurt the Russian population, not Putin and company.

     

    this may deviate from the topic too much, but I think this conflict has made this so much clear. the media has taken their side, and either you are on theirs or you are on the enemys. there is no other option.

     

  11. how will the relationship between Ukraine and NATO change after this? or, rather, how is it already changing now?

     

    if the west/nato and ukraine flirted about becoming allies, but now the west/nato doesnt provide the support the Ukraine needs, one would think the relationship would somehow change.

    now, the Ukraine knows they are not in NATO yet, but they are being invaded. that must have some effect on how they think their requests for help should be handled regardless of their membership status.

     

  12. 2 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

    I do like that Olaf Scholz (new chancellor) seem to run a much harder stance than Merkel (see that he agreed to shutting of SWIFT for Russian banks and more importantly  delivers weapons to the Ukraine military from the Bundeswehr. Merkel would never have done this, Imo.

     

    Source?

    My understanding is that they were asking for precise, targeted measures that may possibly use SWIFT, but not an exclusion like the one you mention.

     

    Thanks!

  13.  

     

    Quote

    He asked Mr Biden if he could "vow to protect Taiwan", and what he would do to keep up with China's military development.

    Mr Biden responded: "Yes and yes."

    ...

    He was then queried a second time by CNN anchor Anderson Cooper if the US would come to Taiwan's defence in the event of an attack by China. Mr Biden replied: "Yes, we have a commitment to do that."

     

    october 2021

     

    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-59005300

  14. By the way, I remark this case because RV pays a lot of attention to management. He specifically has mentioned several times how important it is to have managers with integrity and skin in the game. He usually interviews with leaders in the businesses he invests in to get to know them, and I think that must have been the case with Grenke, given their relatively small size and how close they are physically.

  15. By the way, have you followed the case of Grenke?

    In 2020, a short seller published a report on Grenke where they...

     

    quote from a rv letter

    Quote

    claimed that Grenke is a fraud, i.e. its lease receivables are worthless, its dealer network fabricated and its cash non-existent. These allegations [RV states his opinion here] are, frankly, absurd.

     

    However, looking at Grenke I just found out that they were later (I dont know if because of the reort) subjected to two special audits from a German regulatory body - Bafin. Bafin found several accounting defficiencies. For example...

     

    quote from Grenkes newsletter

    Quote

    Another point of criticism expressed by BaFin relates to the impairments of lease receivables and the related determination of risk provisioning. BaFin points out that, in its opinion, the lease receivables reported under current assets were reported too high.

    [...]

    BaFin states that, in its opinion, the related impairment test was not based on the planning that applied on the valuation date, but on overly optimistic revenue estimates and an excessively low cost growth factor.

     

    I dont know how "big" the figures related to these defficiencies are since I have not work on this yet, but still, its not the kind of thing you want to hear from any company.

    Following this, there seems to have been changes in the executive office and the board.

  16. 52 minutes ago, Thelilyinvestor said:

    Almost all of his investments have crashed in the last 3 months, so could be an interesting hunting ground.

     

    Just my opinion 🙂

     

    thats exactly what I am doing, even if, at least partially, I agree with throw123. RVs returns for the next decade might not be so good anymore.

  17. I have been following him for a few years.

    I like his investment philosophy, and I am glad he is so successful (20% CAGR since inception, about 14 years ago if I am not mistaken).

     

    However, I do wonder how much of his performance is due to him finding great businesses vs his style matching what has become hot.

    It is one thing to see your investments share price go up like crazy while they also grow revenues, quite another to see your invesments share price going up AND not only grow revenues but becoming profitable to the point of matching their valuations.

     

    To be clear, though, I am perfectly aware not all of his investments are high growth + (according to management) soon profitable.

  18. On 11/23/2021 at 3:37 AM, clutch said:

     

    Android was an acquisition.

     

    So what? That is precisely the point made here, that companies such as Meta just buy others to kickstart their incursions somewhere else.

     

    Not to mention that Android, when it was acquired in 2005 for an estimated amount of $50 million, was nothing like what it is today.

  19. Dalio seems to be an individual with an open mind. Of course, that does not mean he would come to invest in bitcoin eventually, but sill.

    In november, he was asking people to help him figure it out.

     

    I might be missing something about Bitcoin so I’d love to be corrected.

     

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