Xerxes

Staying in the realm of option value, as Petec stated: Here is another one. Few years ago, who would have thought Roku would be anything in the media space in the midst of giants. Yet, precisely because of its size it was able to become the neutral platform that the media giants could be ok with for the last leg; so it triumphed because it became the Switzerland of its space. Blackberry, perhaps has a similar opportunity; John Chen has already indicated what they are doing is being the pipeline of data for the customers, with no economic interest to sell data or monetize it.

I hope he's right. Things are getting crazy. Not just Hertz in bankruptcy anymore. It's everywhere you look. Thanks for posting. i saw it last night and was thinking about posting as well on this very thread. Highly relevant. I loved his description of the Dot.com burst and how it was in slow motion. First the junk got shot down, then the less junk, then better quality ... then the whole thing start rolling like an iceberg for the next 2 years. I liked his comment that he is not saying you should sell everything, but to re-allocate to value and outside the U.S. And that best time to sell/trim, is when you can sell but you dont want to sell as oppose to you want to sell but you cannot sell because its prices has come down. I also recommend his letter released in Jan 2021. https://www.gmo.com/americas/research-library/waiting-for-the-last-dance/ I think they key point is that most of Grantham's interview was focused on technology names so that is why he was bearish. Fun facts: he drives a Tesla. If he were to the an interview on his views on cyclical/value names, i am sure he would sound far more bullish overall. I also highly recommend reading/viewing views from Mike Wilson from Morgan Stanley (not fully on bubble territory for him). Somehow he seems to get it right. His latest interview with Bloomberg, he describe how the overall market is broadening compared to how narrow (i.e. FANG) it was in Q2 and Q3 and how that is a good thing. So saying that while S&P500 might not move a lot in 2021, underneath the hood, the other 495 companies, will have good things happening to them. I recall back in March-April, in the midst of the mayhem, he was saying this is the foundation of a new bull market (i hope i remember correctly and that i am not misquoting). Now he sees a new economic cycle, which naturally lags the bull market, which started in March-April 2020. no disagreement there.

even a well conceived analysis that would suggest that BB is capable of pounding outa $400 million earning with a 20X multiple slapped on with be ok as well :) Sadly, i sold the shares that i bought @ $4CAD in March for $6CAD earlier in summer and bought IAC with it. Happy about IAC but should have used new capital. I still have another set of BB shares that I had bought $10CAD two years prior.

Dazel That was a great read. Thank you. Although, this is from 20 years ago, if you have any opinion or insight on Onex today and that you would like to share, please do not be a stranger to the Onex thread.

AtlCDore On your note, while i cannot comment on the technical details that you had bought up, just because i dont know those things (volumes on open or close) very well. My hypothesis (based on the fact that this could be FFH last chance to do so) has always been that FFH will do one big buyback in Q4/Q1 period. And that we will see it in the 2020 letter to shareholders and might even seen Prem on BNN after the fact. Others have disagreed with me pointing the need to fuel up the subs etc.

Allow me to dig in: 2018 letter; that is the latest i could find, it is worth nothing that this was prior to the new convert; so very likely that the fully diluted cost has changed. "On a fully converted basis we own 95 million shares at a net cost of $12.30 per share." 2013 letter: there were some trimming back in 2013 as they got into the convertibles. "We purchased $500 million of the BlackBerry convertible debentures and have said that we would sell some of our common shares over time to rebalance our position (we have sold 5 million shares at about $10 per share as of this writing). The rest of the convertible debentures were purchased by six contrarian long term investors, of whom four were Canadian." From 2013; in hindsight Prem had a great point about Twitter when he compared to Blackberry. Twitter didn't do anything for its shareholders. Its market cap today stands at $37 billion. Both Twitter and BB didnt do to well over the next 7 years but just goes to show that every unicorn story doesn't also pan out. "Interestingly, Twitter went public, just after BlackBerry announced its convertible debt issue, at $26 per share, giving it a market value of $18 billion. It had revenues of $665 million and losses of $645 million, and most investors could not get a single share unless they were very good clients of the major houses underwriting the issue. On that day, BlackBerry traded in excess of 100 million shares at $6 per share, giving it a market value of $3 billion. BlackBerry had revenues of approximately $8 billion with cash of $2.6 billion and no debt other than the new convertible debt to be issued. If you thought that Twitter was grossly overvalued at $26 per share, it promptly doubled and currently is selling at $55 per share, with a market value of $39 billion." 2012 letter; that is where i remember the $17 USD break-even. The initial mistake to SJ's point, was the position sizing that made it probably too hard for them to move away from, once they realize that they were off on the thesis. A year later once they probably realized their long journey, they compensated that with the interest payment on the convertibles. Nothing is wrong with being wrong, but in this case looking back, the attrition war took its toll. "At its low of approximately $61⁄2 per share, it sold at 1⁄3 of book value per share and a little above cash per share (it has no debt). The stock price had declined 95% from its high! The company produces the BlackBerry which for years was synonymous with the smart phone. The BlackBerry brand name is perhaps one of the more recognizable brand names in the world and the company has 79 million subscribers worldwide. Revenues went from essentially zero to $20 billion in about 15 years – and then it hit an air pocket! The company got complacent, perhaps overconfident, and did not respond quickly enough to Apple and Android. Mike Lazaridis, the founder and a technological genius – and a good friend – asked me to join the Board, which I did after meeting Thorsten Heins, whom Mike recommended as the next CEO of the firm. Thorsten’s 27 years of experience in all types of leadership jobs in small and large divisions at Siemens, combined with his five years at BlackBerry, were exactly what was needed. Thorsten hired a very capable management team and then focused on producing a high quality BB10 – the next generation of BlackBerries. The brand name, a security system second to none, a distribution network across 650 telecom carriers worldwide, a 79 million subscriber base, enterprise customers accounting for 90% of the Fortune 500, almost exclusive usage by governments in Canada, the U.S. and the U.K., a huge original patent portfolio, an outstanding new operating system developed by QNX and $2.9 billion in cash with no debt, are all formidable strengths as BlackBerry makes its comeback! The stock price recently moved as high as $18 per share, a far cry from the $140 per share it sold at a few years ago. And please note, 1.8 billion cell phones are sold worldwide annually, and of the 6 billion cell phones in the world, only 1 billion are smart phones. Lots of opportunity for Canada’s greatest technology company! What is striking, even for a person like me who has seen many bull and bear markets, is that at $61⁄2 per share, all the Wall Street and Bay Street analysts were uniformly negative – just as they were uniformly positive only a few years ago at prices north of $100 per share. John Templeton’s advice to us: “Buy at the point of maximum pessimism”, still rings in our ears!! We own approximately 10% of the company at an average cost of $17 per share and we are excited about its prospects under Thorsten’s leadership and Mike’s technical genius."

The big boys got the cash; but even the big boys wont waste capital on something that is not something, which what Blackberry was few years ago. Big Techs are not in the business of private equity, where they would buy company and surgically remove what they really like and sell off the pieces. They need to have jewel already polished and in a presentable form, and then ,,, they will pay top dollar and open their checkbooks. That is what John is doing. FFH started as a value investor in BB, but as the initial bet went off, it confused itself/role with that of a passive private equity. If you were to read Watsa' comment about BB back in 2013 in his letter, you will see how irrelevant those comments are today vis a vis what BB looks like today and where it is going. If you were to read Buffet's comment on Apple in late 2016 when he started to swing his bat at Apple in slow motion, you will see his comments are valid 4 years later and in fact have aged well. So definitely the initial thesis was off for BB and Watsa was wrong as he has freely admitted. But that "wrong" is now sunked, and now that you are in the cusp of really getting traction on that investment on the business front, and i am not talking about the short-term non-sticky YOLO, it is not time to exit BB in the way they exited Overstock. Or for that matter when they sold Johnson & Johnson and other holdings higher on the quality ladder. They seem to leave a lot of money on the table. Sure, they can use derivative intelligently as previous posts to lock in some gains. For BB only, I (the short complainer) authorize the intelligent use of shorts to offset a partial downdraft from here. As for position sizing, although myself, I complain about position sizing when it comes to FFH and its market timing (i.e. Stelco), I also admit what i like about FFH is the concentration in its common equity bets. BTW i believe we are still far from the breakeven price for FFH on the commons. I believe it is $17 USD.

V what is the based on ? The difference between the old valuation and the one just announced ;) Thanks ... haha Didn't realize it was that big and it was re-valued recently. Thought it was a walnut size investment. Actually, i remember now that Amazon was also an investor in it (small amount). 09/30/2019: $100-$500 million valuation 12/10/2020: $800-$900 million valuation 01/15/2021: $1.9 billion valuation Mind you, these unholy valuations are in the age of low interest rate. Was there a strategic rationale that you recall as to why Digit was not part of FIH's portfolio ? Good news is that tomorrow, is the ex-dividend date, so if the share price was being bid up by unholy traders bent on capturing the jumbo-dividend, that should take some wind out of its sail. On a different note, for the hope-FFH-sell/trim Blackberry crowd. Imagine if BB was a private company (wholly owned by FFH), you wouldn't see any of these emotions and reactions. When was the last time anyone here complained about AGT Food strategy on a quarterly basis. The fact is BB had to transition from a $20 billion phone business into $+1 billion software business all in a public forum for all to see as it went 2 steps forward, 1 step back, but always moving forward. That and also it is not that there are no suitors. There is always a buyer at a price. Chen's job is to complete his job before being able to sell it at a valuation worth of its potential (if needed) for an agreed upon purchase price.

Not sure if folks had read this. https://crypto-anonymous-2021.medium.com/the-bit-short-inside-cryptos-doomsday-machine-f8dcf78a64d3

V what is the based on ?

I sold Bank of Nova Scotia at break-even prices. I guess i got the dividends for now. I added this week to these three to my existing positions all at higher dollars: - Couche Tard - BIP.UN - Berkshire

The SPACS and the Teslsa* that Gremal mentioned are like the "sponges" in the market; they are there to soak-up excess liquidity that is there and will be there for some years. When you own a nice property on a street, prices go up, then that price appreciation spills into the next street and then the next. At some point even garbage goes up because of the multiplier effect on that excess liquidity. Until that changes either through QT and/or higher interest rate environment sponges will remain sponges and I agree with wabuffo about the 'anchor' role of the cost of capital. As far as the 1999 bias i mentioned, i am not saying that we should ignore it and not learn from it. Bear markets are painful. But it is our choice to turn the 1999 lesson either into an asset or a liability/handicap, because we chose to draw to close of parallels. There is a strong case for a pivot to value/cyclical in 2021, and rightly so, but that does not mean that the "sponges" that i had alluded to earlier will go up in smoke and get knee-capped. There would be a relative decline not an absolute decline. The classical 1999-2000 value investor narrative is that "Thou (tech) shall crash & burn, from it ashes value shall rise like phoenixes and thus prophecy fulfilled" I myself, got impacted on my own biases. I felt in March that the best investment was Berkshire, Brookfield and Fairfax and bought only those in Q2. Because i saw that as they will have their moment kind of moment. That was my 2008-09 bias impacting me in 2020. Thank god, I had a very healthy dosage of technology companies in the portfolio to correct my bias. The truth is, each case is very unique and i should have been more thoughtful. It is also truth that the new generation that heavily bought the dip in 2020 as their first investment ever will also have bias. That of Fed put and buy the dip. There might be a point, where the bond market may no longer play ball with US central bank' printing press (i.e. yield going up significantly), and its ramification will be felt in the stock market. One last example that relates to my own industry (aerospace). In Feb 2020, even as Covid 19 was hitting shores of Northern Italy, the industry was complete oblivious to a global pandemic. The only data point they had (i.e. the only bias they had) was the 2003 SARS, and we collectively chose that data point and handicap ourselves in terms of thinking how far things could go wrong. It was SARS 10X on steroids. One final final point involving geo-politics. I finished reading Niall Ferguson's Ascent of Money this Christmas. There is a chapter in which he explains how the world (developed economies anyways) was so globalized in the immediate 30 years leading to the First World War. Globalized in terms of trade in between the powers and the colonies and each other. That tailwind of economic boom and the fact that the economies that were so integrated made it felt that at the time, that it would be impossible for a Great Power to engage in any major military conflict anymore as the cost would be shared by all. He showed references in the years right before 1914, with analysts making those points. Yet in hindsight the whole thing was sitting on a time bomb and the good Archduke was just the trigger. Germany had to have its place in the sun and there was to be a collision with the incumbent. In a different book that I read few years ago, i recall reading that either a German (Krupp?) or UK company was a supplier of the fuse for the bombs that the other government were using against each other (to show how integrated the economies were), until the government put a stop to it. Fast forward to 21st century, there could be a non-nuclear military conflict with the People' Republic and that would knee cap the market, just because the market absolutely does not have that on its radar and its probability distribution curve. The market has a bias that military conflict are much less likely in the age of globalization. The market doesn't not remember 1914, but remembers every wars since as ideological conflict or a cold war with USSR that was not integrated into the global economy. ------------------------------------------------------------- *Tesla: i have been thinking about this; the only way i can explain it is that through the massive demand destruction that the oil and gas industry suffered in 2020, and the fact that they had to cut CAPEX so much, that caused the "green energy" to move to the forefront, given that capital markets wont be supplying any more incremental capital into an old industry. That accelerated the "green energy", EVs, wind turbine makers, BEP.UNs of the world with their share price appreciating it. I could not have foreseen that in March-April, looking back the pandemic changed the pecking order of investment capital dollars in the energy industry. Yes, O&G industry will enjoy one last hurrah on the back of higher commodity prices coming out of the lockdown, but that higher dollar price will not be rewarded by more investment dollars for more moonshots project in the Arctic, instead the capital market will supply even more dollars to the "green energy" industries. Pre-pandemic, Tesla was a car company that had a minor solar business. Market is pricing an energy giant that has a auto-business on the side.

Why does history needs to repeat itself the way it did in 1999-2000. If the 1999-2000 debacle never happened or if it did happened but we were not born or too young to remember, we would not have that bias. The new generation as they grow old in the next 10 years will remember the pandemic and the 2020 March market crash for what it was: the shaking out of the previous generation of investors who cashed out in a great hurry (close to retirement etc,) while opening door for them to build foundations. Sure there are the Robinhood gangs on WSB but many are not. The same way that value investors, youngsters then, fondly remember the Dot.com crash and how it presented opportunities to them ... while also providing them with a gift of a bias - point of reference - forever seared into their minds: Remember 1999 There are many ways to see the past. We chose to see things in a linear way and choose to draw clear parallels between events, because it suits us. The question to ask is then, is experiencing 1999 a handicap ? is the gift of a bias a curse.

Thanks so same idea as the banks then. The reserved capital being released (assuming that will happen), will allow equity being unlocked in the subs to do its works in lieue of injecting fresh capital, allowing the latter to be used elsewhere at the headquarters.

I think both Watsa and Buffet have been waiting for the long term bear market in the bond, that doesn't seem to want to come. Watsa switched in the fall of 2016 to short term, i think as well. The so-called first innings of that long term bear market in the bond are literally taking a decade to unfold.

I am seeing not as high class problem but as an opportunity for BRK to capture some low hanging fruits by arbitraging away by trimming Apple and buying at higher prices its own shares without feeling squeamish about it. The whole BRK sum-of-the-parts thing being more than market value thing, but using Apple position market value as a yardstick as what is the rest of Berkshire is really worth.

One other big catalyst in terms of re-rating has been in my opinion, Berkshire shedding itself of financial services (not all i.e. BAC). How could the "Apple trade" really shine through the mud (that is BRK) when the whole conglomerate was perceived of being "big on financials". This has been partially rectified in my opinion by getting rid of financial names. Another way for the "Apple trade" to shine through the mud is to be simply more relaxed about Berkshire's buyback program and be willing to do buyback at higher and higher level dollar level, while trimming Apple here and there to fund those higher and higher purchase levels. Seems like a fair exchange: trim Apple/buyback BRK with the same dollar amount. There has also been a structural change on how we should perceive BRK cash pile as well: (1) in a world of money supply expansion, the risk of sitting on cash (more than it actually needs) can be determinantal. (2) in a world embedded with a Fed put, the universe of quality targets has also shrunk. Both of these interrelated items were not a concern in 2018 or in 2019, but now look to be a long term term concern.

Dazel/Parsad Apologies if i am bit slow on the insurance related acronyms. There seems to be a inconsistency in the statements above. If the redundancy is high, that means the insurance businesses are well capitalized; if they are well capitalized what is this theme about "we need to invest first in our insurance business". Maybe i am not catching the overall concept, but it seems to me that the statement (1) there is enough redundancy and reserves being in excellent shape doesn't square with (2) FFH investing and adding capital into to those very same businesses. Am i missing something very obvious

Hi Dazel, great post. If you don't mind me asking since i am not verse in the history from 20 years ago in 2003. Are you suggesting that FFH was unable to take advantage of the environment in 2003 just like today. Was 2007-09 the only time they really nailed it ?

Currently, BRK is a 12% position size for me (in my RRSP). After seeing this post, I am itching to bring it up. I got a Citigroup position that i am itching to dump, but it dropped 7% today. My breakeven (my emotional anchor) is set at $70 USD. I did not add to it during the bear market. Thinking to dump most of that on BRK. That would bring BRK to 16%, make the portfolio ever tighter. BUT my BRK average cost would go from $192 USD (my emotional anchor) to $200 USD.

I am all against FFH' taking advantage of the price increase. Blackberry is a secular play, not a cyclical play, stick with it. If there are things to take advantage by selling partially, it is the cyclical names. The only time BB would become unbearable as a position if it goes-to-the-moon (borrowed terminology from the other side); this is hardly it. When (or if) it pulls a Overstock it might be time to trim. But this far off.

Here is a video that i watched over the Holidays from Chen. The video was filmed right before Atlas holding was formed. For those interested to see how he is like, this should serve. WARNING: this was filmed pre-Covid, therefore, it might cause you anxiety to see two people so close together. It caused me discomfort.

https://www.fool.ca/2021/01/14/blackberry-stock-could-be-on-the-verge-of-a-parabolic-move/ or articles with headlines like this "BlackBerry Stock Could Be on the Verge of a Parabolic Move!"

Xerxes this comment intrigued me. I actually think many of Fairfax's investments could do 2-3x or more from these levels. Very rudimentary analysis on my behalf but Iam estimating FFH could be trading at $USD1000/share in 2025. The caveat as always is that they have to do sensible not "clever" things. Guess it also depends what we call a multi-bagger, in this day and age the expectation is set by Tesla so 20% compounding is pretty mediocre ;) “What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know. It's what we know for sure that just ain't so.” Mark Twain cheers nwoodman Multi-bagger for me is more than triple. in this environment, you need at least two bags when you come to the party.

haha; it would. Only 5 years ago Ms. Wood were seen to be on the fringe and weird (outside mainstream), now she came out of the pandemic as a hero. Her AUM is shooting up and now launching ETFX Space as new product offering. Cycles come and go. 10 years ago, FFH came out of financial crisis as a hero, Prem's AUM was shooting up (not exactly AUM but interest in his stock), he also launched new products (FIH and FAH). Cycles come and go. With the 10-year yield perking up, FFH may yet have its day in the sun. FFH will not outperform as a multi-bagger on an absolute sense even if there is a huge pivot to value, but may outperform on relative sense if all fancy stuff start to deflate a bit.