Dinar
-
Posts
1,789 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
1
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Events
Posts posted by Dinar
-
-
4 minutes ago, Eldad said:
US Combustible is what 30% of sales? I would think that is more than priced in at this price.
If I am not mistaken, the US business is 50% of EBIT, and I would guess that 90-95% is cigarettes.
-
40 minutes ago, fareastwarriors said:
BTI
I'd be careful here. 10% volume declines in the US business are serious business. I was hoping that it'd stop in 2023, but it has continued in 2024.
-
5 hours ago, LC said:
So, what is the solution?
War on drugs? Build a wall? Efforts to constrain the supply side are 0-for-2.
It may be time to look at trying to reduce demand for the product.
What drives people to drug use, what can we do to limit that?
I'd argue the stuff I see posted around: "Late stage capitalism" "The American Dream is Dead" The massive wealth gap, homelessness everywhere...
The chances of upward mobility for a teenager/20-year-old grow smaller and smaller. This leads to hopelessness, depression, and drug use. This is what we should focus on.
I agree. I would suggest vocational schools for many, so that they can learn trades and make hundreds of thousands a year, and very strict immigration restrictions.
-
9 hours ago, gfp said:
Apologies in advance for continuing this thread another day. I do think the "American Dream" is still alive and well for the $20-$30 per hour cash construction worker, painter, etc... There is plenty of full time work available at those wages as a minimum and they often work on Saturday and Sunday as well (not as often on Sundays, there are still church services, quinceaneras and futbol games after all). $25 an hour full time for 6 days a week is $1200 per week for what many mistakenly term "unskilled." (This is a nit pick of mine because I'm tired of carpenters being described as unskilled labor by useless idiots - "okay philosophy professor, build me a staircase"). If the husband earns $1200/week and the wife cleans houses & paints on the side it is change-your-life and your family back home's life type of money.
So how many millions of cleaning ladies and construction workers can the country absorb? A million a year? Two, three?
-
30 minutes ago, changegonnacome said:
A woman who walks/buses/hitchhikes up from Honduras with two or three kids in tow to start a new life in America leaving everything and everyone she knows, saving for months for the journey, strategizing & networking her way to get here while solving upteempth complex issues on the way......is NOT headed to NYC to sit on her ass, collect welfare cheques and watch Dr.Phil. I can assure you of that.
THIS woman and the 1000's or 99% of people like her who enter through the southern border are, in the main, like many many immigrants before them deeply deeply congenitally motivated people...industrious, hardworking, smart etc......
Folks dont get it - look out the window of your home, your train, your airplane....this country is literally built on the positive selection bias that has come from the various waves of immigration (Poles, German, Irish)....each one like this one feared at the time cause it might change the nature of the country but in retrospect turned out to be a boon for everybody here right now and yet to come. This wave is no different - in some respect the positive selection bias has only increased as the immigration system has become ever more byzantine.
Could a system be put in place to make it more structured - for sure - thank the dipshits in D.C......the system in all its craziness right now......has one positive aspect....and it's what I laid out...it is not easy to 'get papers' in the US....those that do have already showed at least a top decile, if not a top 1% level of smarts and industriousness..
Except that they are begging on the streets on NYC and getting free food handouts at neighborhood churches. They don't speak English, and don't have any marketable skills. The world has changed. One hundred years ago, there was plenty of work for unskilled people, today there is very little. As for how great Polish, Irish or German or English immigration was, why don't you ask American Indians whether they are glad that all these people came over here?
-
1 hour ago, gfp said:
The thing about economies is that more is more and less is less. If you have a larger economy with more people producing, consuming, creating, moving, eating, sheltering, and, yes, even convalescing, you have more.
Decisions to hand out money or services or bus immigrants to a high cost city they would not have gone to themselves based on market forces are completely separate policy decisions. They can be stupid or wrong and probably are. They are separate decisions.
An illegal Honduran immigrant just knocked on my door because they needed a key to my neighbors house. They have children attending public school for free. They also pay rent that directly funds the property taxes that fund the school their kids go to. Some of their pay goes back to Honduras as remittances and leaves our country (bad for us). They also pay sales tax on the rest of their income because 100% of what is not remitted to Honduras is spent in the local economy. So they are directly funding city government through property taxes and sales tax. They receive no free money or services, they are here illegally. No hand-outs unless you think the fire department and school that they are funding are hand-outs. I would prefer if they also paid income tax but that is a policy I do not control.
One of the best "features" of immigrants is that they will move around in response to market forces to meet the needs of the economy much more than native born workers. They are not going to sit in the rust belt doing nothing waiting for some long-gone economic paradigm to return because that is what and where they used to do it.
What is exactly the property tax that the illegal is paying and what is the cost of the kids attending public school? Who is paying for the health insurance for the family? Given that the cost of the educating a kid in public school is at least $15K per annum, and the cost of health insurance is at least several thousand per person per annum, is the family really paying $30K per annum in property tax? Yes, the family is a drain on the economy under any honest accounting, before taking into account the fact that the family depresses wages and increases cost of housing for the working class.
-
55 minutes ago, thepupil said:
can you point to any data that backs this impression?
it goes against my anecdata (which is that immigrants are, for the most part, working their asses off to make the next generation better)
Talk to people in the Section 8 office in NY, go to doctors' offices in immigrant neighborhoods and see what medical insurance they use, go to immigrant neighborhoods and see how many pay with EBT (food stamps.) Try to hire a Russian speaking nanny in NYC on the books, and you will be surprised how difficult it is. A friend tried and out of three dozen offers he made, not a single one was accepted. They were all on the dole (Medicaid, food stamps, subsidized housing), or working officially as home attendants for forty hours a week already...
-
2 hours ago, gfp said:
Right. So everything you are saying is causing a problem is about policy and the social safety net, giving free stuff and services to immigrants and locals. Not what I am talking about, which is immigration being positive for the economy. I'm not debating you on the policies above, those sound problematic. Immigration isn't the issue - those policies are.
No crime either from immigrants.
-
1 minute ago, gfp said:
There is work for everyone, including immigrants. Not working is a choice. The price of labor is not suggesting we are near a problem like you describe. I'll take more hard working immigrants over the unskilled American currently choosing not to work.
You clearly have not been to immigrant neighborhoods. When 70 year olds come over, and immediately get Medicaid, subsidized housing, food stamps, supplemental security income and home attendants, that's a drain on the economy. (And yes, I personally know a few examples.) Work for everyone? When unskilled wages are less than government benefits, why would people work? Fifteen years ago Economist magazine published a study that stated that a woman with two kids in NYC would need to make over $100K per annum before she was better of financially working than being on the dole in NYC. Today, the figure would be over $200K. How many single mothers with kids can make over $200K?
-
58 minutes ago, thepupil said:
From henceforth, 80-90% of you all won’t pay income taxes…lol
The problem is that for many low income Americans, it does not pay to hold down a job, since due to withdrawal of benefits + income tax, marginal tax rates could easily be 70-80%+. Think someone making $19K in NY and on Medicaid, then income goes to $30K and you lose Medicaid.
-
1 hour ago, gfp said:
Immigration might be a drag on certain state and local economies but it is a positive for the national economy. Especially when you have labor shortages, low birth rates, undesirable demographic issues.
Actually, that is not true. It is if you import Phds in STEM and doctors & nurses. Not true if you import people without a high school education and no skills. Also, immigration drastically reduces wages for workers in the US and leads to social problems as people cannot find work or welfare pays more. Why hire an American comp sci major for $100K when an Indian or Russian or Chinese immigrant will do the job for $50K? Why hire an American high school drop out for $20 dollars an hour when an African immigrant will work harder for $5 or $10 per hour? Then watch the unskilled Americans go on welfare, and engage in alcoholism and drugs.
-
1 hour ago, Cod Liver Oil said:
Mike, This is a big number!!!! Can you post a link to the cost? I am confused about our immigration policies.
Do we have any? What is the rationale?
Free food, lodging, medical care, schools, et cetera.
-
15 minutes ago, gfp said:
My biggest forward looking concern about inflation is a Trump presidency. Trade wars, tariffs, deglobalization, tighter immigration. I would add replacing Jay Powell if I thought the Federal Reserve had anything to do with inflation.
Actually it depends on what Trump does. If he does everything that you say, but guts social programs and eliminates income tax for singles with income under say $50K, $100K if single+kids, and say $100K for married couple, and $200K for married couple with kids, then you will have massive increase in the labor force keeping a lid on wages, and much lower budget deficit as social spending plummets while GDP grows sharply, and federal income taxes increase.
Keep in mind, immigration is a massive drag on the economy right now. Look how much NYC is spending on illegal immigrants - billions a year.
-
I am sorry, but I do not get the attraction. Let's assume normalized revenues = $14bn, let's assume that (EBITDA - cap ex) / sales can = 40%, which would imply a 50% operating ratio, I doubt that the company can achieve it but let me dream... Then, let's assume annual EBITDA - cap ex can grow at 1% + inflation per annum purely driven by pricing, then, using a real r = 6%, value: 20 * 14bn * 0.4 = $112bn before debt and tax, or $100bn post debt and $75bn post tax, using 226mM s/o, that is $331 per share.
What am I missing? @dealraker?
-
31 minutes ago, Gregmal said:
One of the Ten Commandments of Trading, which at its core, is what every SELL decision is, is to never sell a 52 week high.
I just violated it - I sold my HCA
-
31 minutes ago, Libs said:
So there's been talk of Russia taking on NATO, which on the surface sounds preposterous, just given the overwhelming power of NATO forces relative to Russia. But what if, instead of taking on all of NATO, they nibbled at the corners, so to speak, in a such a way that the NATO members say to themselves: "I'm not risking our soldiers / WW3 breaking out by fighting for X."
In other words, the plan is to destroy NATO by exposing it as toothless. Then, over time, Russia starts to take the smaller / weaker countries.
This guy explains it. The example he gives is a remote outpost in Finland with little strategic value to anyone. Technically, it's a violation of Article 5 if Russia takes a small slice. Will that be worth a full-scale war with a nuclear power?
What do you guys think?
This guy doesn't know his history. Last time USSR attacked Finland, it was clobbered. Finns will give the Russian army a bloody nose. Post Ukraine invasion, Russia will not invade anyone - its army isn't capable of winning a war.
-
There is a tax angle that is not being discussed. When a dividend gets paid and you own shares, in the US, it can be a qualified dividend, which puts you either into a 15% or 20% federal tax bracket on dividends + 3.8% Obama tax. If you had lent out your shares, then it is NOT a qualified dividend, but instead payment in lieu of dividend, and can be taxed as high 37.8% + Obama tax.
-
You guys do not take into account taxes. Paying 3-4% interest that is not deductible to receive 5-6% that is taxable depending on your tax bracket could be a negative cash flow event.
-
2 hours ago, dealraker said:
Spek, I can't figure AJG because of its dividend being historically (not today) so much higher. My cousin though will do it for me if I ask. It certainly will be close.
Charlie, if you provide the purchase date and price, I will run the return for you on bloomberg
-
8 minutes ago, Blugolds11 said:
Logged into my Fidelity account and saw something at the top of the screen telling me that I am eligible for additional income by lending shares of a security. Happened to be Fairfax…Anyone else see this?
I didnt enroll, but have never seen that before….thoughts? Not necessarily as to if I should, but why they are doing it? Due to daily volume?
I have seen it many times. I never enrolled for regular accounts because of adverse tax treatment, but may make sense for IRAs. IBKR tried to get me enrolled, but they promised 5 basis points a year in lending income, so I passed
-
1 hour ago, backtothebeach said:
Selling 1/6 of my irresponsibly overweight FFH.TO, sniff.
Months ago I planned to lighten up once it hit 1.1 * BV. I think it is pretty close to that on soon to be reported BV.
Trying to be prudent, but feels like leaving money on the table.
If you mark to market their investments particularly the investment in Fairfax India, and private investments held through Fairfax india, including the airport, the tangible book value is closer to $1100 per share. Also, AJG Gallagher was very bullish on the call yesterday regarding insurance pricing for the next several years.
-
8 hours ago, Munger_Disciple said:
GenRe had problems and they cost Berkshire money and focus in the 2000-2004 time period, yes. But they were fixed by Joe Brandon and it has been a good business since. Hardly a disaster IMO. You make it sound like the AOL-Time Warner deal, or Altria-Juul deal.
Anyway if you disappointed with Berkshire, it is very easy to exit.In my opinion, the purchase of Gen Re by Buffett was brilliant.
-
There is another way to look at this. Let's look at the price to book multiples of other reinsurers - Everest, RNR, et all. I think that they are trading at a price / book = 1.45 for Everest, 1.57 for RNR, so clearly markets expect good times to last. I have not by the way checked if it is accurate book, in other words were bonds marked to market? If we mark Fairfax's investments to market - airport, etc..., then price to book is 0.9, may be 0.8? So clearly cheap vs the rest of the reinsurance space?
-
@Viking, why do you think underwriting and reinsurance profits will be done in 2024 from 2023? Thank you.
What are you buying today?
in General Discussion
Posted
Don't forget there is a lot of debt, if I remember correctly, L 40bn, now you do have a stake in ITC that is worth around L 15bn, but if you look at it on EV/EBIT basis, the multiple is not cheap 6x EBIT or 8x post tax.