ValueArb

Here is the first query I gave Perplexity, asking for a list of public companies in the US that are net-nets. None of the tickers it gave me are trading, some went private 5 years ago, others I have no idea if they ever existed.

Outsourcing to China is one of the few drivers of higher wages the US has. Because of chinese labor Apple gets to sell iPhones at lower prices, which means they sell more iPhones, which means they generate more sales of services and IOS developers (mostly american) sell more apps and iPhone accessory makers (mostly american) sell more accessories. That means Apple and third party developers create more high paying developer, designer, engineer, testing, marketing, and sales jobs. All for sending what we consider the worst, lowest paying jobs to China, where they are considered such great high paying jobs compared to the brutal rural farm work many Chinese do that Chinese stand in line for days in order to get one. Or we could build a massive infrastructure of low paying assembly jobs in the US to make iPhones in order to make Samsung's phones even cheaper relative to the iPhone so Samsung can take even more of the market.

This is true, but this is just a compliance fine from a regulator. The fraud allegations are likely going to be dealt with (litigated) separately.

People blaming automation for slow wage growth are missing the forest for a tree. Government spending as a percentage of GDP has increased massively since the great depression, especially over the last twenty years. That leads to less investment in productivity increases and slower growth, ultimately giving us the tepid wage growth of today. Automation helps, not hurts, but it can't help as much if a third of our economy is government directed spending.

You totally missed my point. Its not just size, its also shape and feel. Only the rich today can afford implants that are more natural in appearance and softness. I'm ready to march in the streets, who wants to join me!

You'd be wrong. Inflation adjusted, median incomes have increased nearly 50% in the last 38 years alone. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N Automatization means your factory with 1000 workers can now produce significantly more product with same number of workers. It means an end to scarcity, not work.

The inequitable distribution of wealth will only become acceptable when every working man can afford to buy their girlfriends a set of fake cans as big as Bezo's girlfriend has.

Gemini settled with NY. It appears to me they only got a slap on the wrist ($37M), the regulator is using the $1.1B number to make it seem like a big win, but that's just returning customer funds they were going to return any ways. And no indication that Gemini will have trouble coming up with the funds, though the wording of what is being returned is "will result in all Earn users receiving all of their digital assets back in kind" which I am too lazy to go to regulators press release to parse out what that means. https://www.wsj.com/articles/gemini-to-return-1-1-billion-to-customers-in-new-york-regulator-settlement-9b647f30?st=fs21y2ruuuqnj5b&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

All I see is "spacer.png" and a blue box with a question mark inside it? This is not the first time, why am I not seeing images in a lot of posts on this site any more?

I'm not anti-automation, eliminating jobs through automation has been going on for thousands of years and why global standards of living have increased exponentially. I'm just uber skeptical of those who think we are going to build flexible general purpose robots (like Tesla optimus) any time soon (within the next two decades) that are cost effective and productive. Robots have been and will be specialized tools for doing very narrowly defined work tasks. AI will help make them more useful. The chief beneficiaries will be everyone. The "working man" will be doing less manual labor and more robot configuration, herding, maintenance and repair, and get paid more for doing so. Just like it's been throughout history. An example is auto production, where we produce far more sophisticated cars with a fraction of the man-hours than a hundred years ago. Robots are a part of that, but also just specialized tools and better production systems. The auto workers today make a vastly higher income than they did a hundred years ago, but we need far fewer of them to make even more cars. That freed up a huge amount of the workforce for other work and other industries, that also pay vastly more today than auto manufacturers did a hundred years ago. Its ironic that people think AI and robotics are going to lead to massive unemployment, when the process is already well underway and unemployment is lower than ever.

If only it was that easy for most manufacturers. Four years and $1M and people are still better at straightening candle wicks. https://www.wsj.com/business/robot-straighten-candle-wick-difficult-e1c80bb8?mod=Searchresults_pos20&page=3 Robots on PIPs (performance improvement programs) because they don't perform correctly. https://www.wsj.com/story/the-factory-workers-that-corral-wandering-robots-66afc9fc?mod=Searchresults_pos9&page=1

I don't know, if my favorite burger at Wendy's was normally $8 but if I knew that if I went at 2 pm it would be $5, I think I would go a lot more often. Thats how it was described in at least one article, that Wendy's would offer off-hour discounts.

My tiny "fund" does. I don't think there is a specific number, its just net-nets get rarer and rarer the larger the market cap (and more importantly, the greater the trading liquidity). I believe Walter Schloss closed his fund at $130M in 2000, and that was probably too large for a net-net only fund (I think his returns the previous decade showed this). Translating that to today's dollars I would guess a similar fund size would be around $250M, so I'm going to guess that a net-net only approach can work up to $100M. The truth is as your fund grows you'll need to add quality businesses, or accept lower quality net-nets than you did previously. There are obviously foreign markets (like japan until recently) where you could focus as well, but I'm trying to avoid that for now.

BTW: I forgot to mention the reason I came across it was it announced a restructuring to increase margins. I don't know if its trying to focus more on that segment, like I said I haven't done the research but that would make sense. They've been focused on increasing margins and ROE for the last 3 years, and say all the right things from the limited amount of filings I did read. Okay, now I have to research it, its just getting too interesting even if I don't buy it.

Russia has lost ten of its most advanced planes in the last week (SU-34s, SU-35s and A-50s). I haven’t seen any authoritative explanation for how Ukraine has done it, there was one claim they had added modern targeting systems to giant obsolete S-200 missiles and secretly moved them close to the front lines. Russia may have to rename the SU-34 “Hell Ducks” to SU-34 “Sitting Ducks”;)

That’s correct, Warren was forced to turn away from higher return net nets because they didn’t have enough liquidity for a large portfolio. Charlie correctly pointed to buying quality businesses as the least bad alternative (though Buffett continued to mix in the occasional net-net during the 70s). I don’t ever expect to grow my portfolio until it’s too large for net-nets, but it would be a fantastic problem to have.

Perplexity seems like a perfect name for an AI tool. Is it cool? Hell yes! is it accurate? I’m perplexed!

After Charlie lifted the scales from Warrens eyes, Warrens annualized returns declined significantly and permanently, so no thank you.

Just came across Apogee Enterprises (APOG). A "leading provider of architectural products and services for enclosing buildings, and high-performance glass and acrylic products used in applications for preservation, protection and enhanced viewing". Last decade has grown revenues at a decent clip (7%), while growing profits at a higher rate (10% ish). Dividend yield close to 2% while it has retired about a quarter of its shares over the last 6 years. This doesn't meet my purchase criteria (its not a net-net) so I stopped my research there, but mr market is offering it at a 10 PE for those who like this kind of thing.

This. Anyone could buy Berkshire blindly in the 70s and 80s and do very well. But by the end of the century Buffett's portfolio had grown so large that his edge had declined dramatically. Since 2000 he's trailed the S&P for long periods, and the only way to beat the market significantly owning Berkshire is to buy it very selectively when its trading at a large discount to intrinsic value. Today if you can't estimate BRK's IV with reasonable confidence, you should just own index funds like Warren tells you to.

Not quite what the next Buffett would do. Though I once knew a very astute value guy who would buy half million dollar sports cars, keep them a year, then flip them for a profit. Ultimately did not work out for him.

Has Keith Gill ever disclosed how much he ended up making on Gamestop? I know he claimed he was holding for quite a while after the peak, and I believe the value of his holdings peaked at $50M or so, so I'm guessing he go out a lot lower?

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/macron-keeps-options-open-on-sending-troops-to-ukraine-riling-allies-19645362 The last time France sent an army into Russia, it burned down two thirds of Moscow. My money is on Poland however, if they ever enter the war the Polish army will be in Moscow within weeks;)

Sounds a little like, Abraham Lincoln? Give out one million work visas to emigres who can pass background checks and problem solved. Corruption has declined significantly since Russian FSB agents started getting arrested.

Hanlons Razor: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity carelessness. No reason to assume he was trying to move markets by talking his book when he could just have been honestly venting about things he had been thinking intensely about for the month.