Dinar
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Posts posted by Dinar
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30 minutes ago, SharperDingaan said:
Peace .... and an end to 7-months of war.
SD
Peace? What are you smoking? Hamas has claimed time and time again that it will fight until Israel ceases to exist. There was peace on October 6th, so if Hamas is interested in peace, why did it attack on October 7th? Hamas has never shown that it wants peace. It wants a break in hostilities until an opportune time to strike again. https://www.answering-islam.org/Terrorism/peace_concept.html. Read the Quran, and read the history of Islam.
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22 minutes ago, SharperDingaan said:
Keep in mind that as long as the Gaza war remains ‘over-there’, the western world can just wring its hands, and send weapons/money. Different story when it’s ‘here too’, on campuses all over the world; and much more effective when the targets are the kids of the wealthy - with disproportional influence.
It is a simple matter to divert Israeli bound artillery shells, rockets, bullets, etc. to the Ukraine which desperately needs them; and straight forward to ‘delay’ gasoline and money flows as well. It is also hard to prosecute a strike for any length of time with limited reserves, and a horrific daily burn.
Over the weekend, Hamas offered peace and an end to the war; the only reason the war continues today is because Israel chose to walk away in favour of a strike on Rafah. Hot pursuit is defensible, whereas this? …. not so much.
Cut off the oxygen, and even a warlord can only live for so long.
SD
What has Hamas exactly offer, besides bombing a humanitarian crossing?
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1 hour ago, SharperDingaan said:
Check the Jordan Times against Al Jazeera, for a pretty good take on the Arab street; The Times of Israel for the other side. Just keep in mind that the nuttier Israel gets, the harder the Israeli propaganda will be.
The Israelis are about to experience a world of hurt for walking away from the peace talks. Expect the IDF to be branded as 'baby killers', with lurid pics of naked dead/starving Gaza infants at the feet of actors dressed in IDF uniform. Expect the IDF to be branded 'out of control' with lurid examples of units made up of particular sects committing war crimes in the settler communities. Expect comparisons of the IDF vs the German Army under the control of Hitler; they didn't act either, and it wiped out millions of the Allied/Axis population - the same as the deliberate famine/disease in Gaza. Then add the new IDF casualties from the Rafah offensive, where the intent will be as much maiming as possible.
Whatever ones view; this worked very well during the Vietnam era, and in 2024 the targets will be Israeli students on American campuses (new hostages). Served in the IDF before school? baby killer. Haven't served yet? draft-dodging coward. How long before the parents of those privileged students make themselves felt?
They need a way out, and the sooner the better.
SD
WTF are you talking about? Millions of dead in Gaza? If Israel acted as Nazi Germany, you would not have had this war, there would have been no Arabs in Israel, Gaza and West Bank since 1967.
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I cut my position by roughly 80% post Q1 results in February, and I sold the rest today. I just don't think the company is analyzable today, and if we go into recession it can be a zero.
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26 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:
Started with small positions today in :
BALB B.STO [Fastighetsbolaget Balder AB, ser. B, Göteborg, Sweden], &
CAST.STO [Castellum AB, Stockholm, Sweden].
I may change my mind about them and sell them at any moment, thereby considering the buys of them errors.
Why? ty
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I would like to know is where those losses on equity investments came from. It seems that aside from profit on the swap, return on the equity portfolio was not lousy.
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Buy a farm with a supply of water, learn how to raise animals and fruits & vegetables, source of energy - ideally hydro and solar (both) and far away from civilization yet close enough so you can get it from your house.
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Actually, I think 25-30 year TIPS with 2.4-2.5% real yield are a no-brainer here for non-taxable and tax-deferred accounts, assuming inflation will get measured properly.
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1 hour ago, John Hjorth said:
Hi @Dinar,
Your post above reads as if it perhaps the outcome / conclusion from some kind of screening. Could you please mention one or a few names with tickers?
John, I met with an acquaintance of mine yesterday, he is a retired hedge fund manager who had an incredible track record for many years. As many other very wealthy people who made their fortunes in 1980-2010 period, he is very bearish in general given the tremendous US budget deficit. He feels that Norwegian savings banks give him an investment that is extremely low risk (loans are mostly to Norwegian consumers who are in very good shape, and will be bailed out by Norwegian sovereign wealth fund), additional quirks (40% ownership by Norwegian foundations) further lowers credit risk, trade at 10x p/e with 12-13% ROE, 5%+ dividend yields, and possibly appreciating currency vs USD. So call it a 10% return in NOK and more in USD.
Saw I was curious if anybody had looked at these things.
He did not mention any specific names, and I have not looked into these things yet.
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Has anyone looked at them?
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@thepupil just make sure that you can deduct margin interest on your tax return. I got hit with that last year, got the deduction on the federal level but did not get on the state level. Painful in a place like NYC
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44 minutes ago, ValueMaven said:
Also bought MSCI today ... was down -15% at one point. Huge switching costs and I like their approach to capital allocation. Rare to get a quality compounder like this on sale.
I disagree with you. There are no switching costs, and tremendous customer concentration with customers incentivized to switch.
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6 hours ago, Luca said:
The United States has given Israel more aid than any other nation since World War II, granting it more than $260 billion.
If you read the article, you will realize that the numbers are cooked, they are simply NOT correct.
a) The figures are adjusted for inflation, however not properly. If the money for arms purchases was granted in 1960, but not spent until 1970, there is no adjustment for the fact that 1970 dollar bought far less than 1960 dollar. So when the article translates 1960 dollar into 2021 dollar, it does not differentiate between the 1960 aid spent in 1960 and in 1970. So methodology is fatally flawed.
b) The chart does NOT support the $260 bn figure, more like half that.
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2 hours ago, Luca said:
Yeah I mean that's nothing really, Israel received 250b since its founding?
But also, yes, they can not be made partners or stabilized. Not worth spending money on, especially with radical Islam, etc.
Dude, I generally agree with you, but your numbers cannot be correct. How do you figure that Israel received $250bn since its founding. From which governments?
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1 hour ago, Xerxes said:
That is a little bit overdramatic.
Europe is fine for vacationing. All the way to Poland.
My biggest regret is not being
able to see St Petersburg and Moscow and do the transiberian train.
That is a goner for the next 10-15 years
I am with you. I wanted to do this during the world cup in 2018, but my wife would not let me (we had a 2 year old and she was pregnant - she could not go, while she thought I'd come back with a girlfriend from there...)
The country in incredibly beautiful both nature wise and architecture wise, while we are on the subject of regrets, I'd add Kiev, Palmyra & Damascus. I cannot wait for regime change in Iran - I would love to visit Isfahan, Shiraz, Persepolis, et all.
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@MMM20, Look I own the stock, and I give Prem credit for the correct calls on the bond market, the building of the insurance business, and investments in India. If Prem is comfortable with venture capital - Digit, Tyke/Davos, etc.., then he is certainly comfortable with GARPY names or should be.
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26 minutes ago, SafetyinNumbers said:
I think Fairfax is an absolute return investor and not a relative return investor. They aren’t trying to beat the S&P/500.And they should be, however what is then the appropriate benchmark? In other words, how do you judge the performance of the portfolio?
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30 minutes ago, MMM20 said:
Some people believe that Fairfax has performed poorly on the investment side and won’t be convinced otherwise by any amount of data or examples.
O'k, wise guy, what has been the return on the equity & quasi equity portfolio over the past 5, 10, and 20 years and how does that compare with the S&P? Then adjust for the fact that Shawkei, Tyku/Davos Brands and Eurobank where way riskier investments than the S&P 500, and that Fairfax should have earned liquidity and risk premiums above the S&P.
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1 hour ago, Viking said:
@Dinar If Fairfax has performed so poorly on the investment side, how did they compound book value at 18.4% over 38 years? Insurance/underwriting?Leverage in a bull market, coupled with a good insurance business.
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I think the big risks are the northeast wind that Prem referred to (what is that by the way?), general major catastrophe - say massive earthquake in NY, 5-10% annual inflation that causes reserves to be inadequate, and lousy performance on the investment side. While everyone is cheering for Prem, I remain a skeptic on the investment side. (Tyku/Davos Brands, Shawkei, BDT, Blackberry - none of these were any good, and Eurobank was not exactly a home run.) Their equity and quasi-equity - BDT has massively underperformed S&P while taking much greater risk - Shawkei is clearly quite levered, so is Eurobank, and Tyku/Davos from what I heard, could be a mistake, was never profitable, and without a greater fool - Diageo could have been a zero.
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6 hours ago, whatstheofficerproblem said:
My very elaborate plan to become a Wintaai shareholder wasn't a complete failure.
I would make sure that this is not a PFIC for US tax purposes, if it is, you will probably bitterly regret getting involved.
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5 hours ago, Gregmal said:
Add to Fairfax
No Clipper for you?
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59 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:
My guess is that Iran really didn’t want to do that much damage. They were just forced to “do something” to save face after Israel bombed their assets and are probably glad if this does not escalate.
Not that Iran government are great guys, but I think they want to stay out of the Gaza conflict. They are more rational than many in the west think, but they are also bound by constraints that can force them into a Zugzwang situation.
I don't know what Iran wanted or wants, but according to his obituary published by the Iranian press, the Iranian general who was killed planned the October 7th massacre. So if that is true, it is clear that Iran wanted a war with Israel or at least was fine with it.
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10 hours ago, ourkid8 said:
So you are saying Gaza is not an open-air prison and Palestinians are free to leave at any time without permission?
come on, now you are just being silly.
You stated that Israelies are occupiers, and therefore they can be killed and raped with impunity. Using your logic, anybody in North America who is not 100% descendant of Indians should be murdered since they are all occupiers. Also, 100% of Turks must killed as well since they are on Greek and Armenian land. So do you support killing all Turks in Turkey and all 100% non American Indians in North America? If not, why do you support killing Jews but not other "occupiers"?
Iran - Israel - Gaza Conflict
in General Discussion
Posted
The argument is that Allies did not give a damn about saving Jews, and fought Nazis for their own reason and not for the purpose of saving Jews. This does not take anything away from the sacrifice of millions of young men who lost their lives or became seriously injured. I and everyone in the West owes them a deep debt of gratitude. However to say that Allies fought to save Jews when they took every opportunity not to is absurd.