cwericb

Pertinent thread. I feel I am probably sitting on too much cash right now. My largest holding by far is FFH as well as some reasonably well balanced mutual funds. But when I look at people who are making 15-20% or more in the market I get a little uncomfortable with that much cash. Therein lies my interest in the question posed here. However, my thinking is that at some point reality will prevail and Mr. Trump will be gone. When that happens I think it may precipitate a major (overdue) correction. And remember, the longer the time between corrections, usually means the deeper the correction. But this is just the way I see things in my little mind. In the meantime I am comfortable trusting FFH but ask myself if I want more shares at the present level and I don’t like having too many eggs in one basket. Here is the 10 year chart for FFH vs BRK.B if I can get it posted.

Bought FFH at $228 in 2007. Have no regrets. Wanted to buy it earlier at under $100 but didn’t have a trading account back then. Once the account was set up FFH was the first stock I purchased and have added to it from time to time. When I compare FFH to BRK.B since 2007 the charts appear to show that FFH considerably out performed, but then I may be missing something. I think FFH is still as good as anywhere to have money invested.

Think one may have landed in Washington DC back about a year ago.

Trying to figure out if these guys in Washington are crooks or just delusional. Or both.

Last couple of cars I bought new because there was not enough price difference to justify buying used. In buying used cars or boats I have always found that in private sales, the quality of the individual is every bit as important as what you think of the vehicle. Last year I bought upscale model of the Kia Sorento EX V6, all wheel drive, panoramic sunroof, leather and more standard features than I know how to use. Had to swallow a little pride, but Kia is making some of the best cars on the market today. They robbed Audi's chief designer and BMW's chief engineer and they apparently use a better grade of steel since Hyundai makes their own steel. Watch out for KIa! Rated #1 in initial quality by JD Power of all brands sold in North America in the last 2 years - and that includes all those fancy upscale brands. AND the 5 year warranty means a lot.

augustabound: Ditto, If you ever find a good replacement let me know. Google comes up with features like the personalized home page - which i found excellent - and after a while you tend to rely on it but then Google just drops it. I have used igHome but it is not near as good as Google was. I don't know how much it would take on Google's part to keep features like these going but one would think it would be very small in the overall picture.

Google is soooo annoying. It seems that every time I have set up something with Google it gets discontinued after a few years. Google’s personalized home page, Picasa, Google’s portfolio feature. They have had some very nice features, but as soon as you begin to rely on them they tend to vanish.

A little bit more of POE - PAN ORIENT ENERGY CORP Speculative, but a lot of short term upside potential and reasonably limited downside.

Good move boss.

Thanks for this Dazel. Think you are right on in what you say. A lot of people seem to overlook the fact that Fairfax has been building a world class insurance company over the past few years. Believe Fairfax are releasing Q2 results next week. May be interesting. Brian Bradstreet didn't buy 2,000 shares last month just for fun. Welcome back "newbie". :) Any chance of getting your 2 cents worth over on the ALS thread?

“Michael Wacek, VP & Chief Risk Officer at Odyssey Re, has also picked up 500 shares” So between Wacek (500 shares) and Bradstreet (2,000 shares) they have accumulated over $1.5 million dollars in Faitfax stock over the past week and a half. That has to tell you something when they are purchasing that sort of volume of Fairfax shares. The short write up in the Canadian Insider said... “F. Brian Bradstreet, a Subsidiary Executive, acquired 1,000 Subordinate Voting Shares on a direct ownership basis at a price of $562.314 and 1,000 Subordinate Voting Shares on an indirect ownership basis for registered holder The Bradstreet Family Foundation at a price of $562.416 on June 16th, 2017. This represents a $1,124,730 investment into the company's shares and an account share holdings change of 4.9%.”

This popped up today: Insider Filings: Jun 21/17 Jun 16/17 Bradstreet, F. Brian Indirect Ownership Subordinate Voting Shares 10 - Acquisition in the public market 1,000 $562.42 Jun 21/17 Jun 16/17 Bradstreet, F. Brian Direct Ownership Subordinate Voting Shares 10 - Acquisition in the public market 1,000 $562.31 https://www.canadianinsider.com/company?menu_tickersearch=ffh

investmd My portfolio sucks right now, especially since I have so much FFH, but I just bit the bullet & bought a few more shares at about $565 CDN. When I buy it is usually a signal that the stock price will take a dive. Hope you can benefit :) eb

Several of Fairfax’s holdings are doing quite well (as noted in the Tembec thread - Blackberry, Tembec, ICI Lombard and Eurobank all up substantially). I don’t see any major catastrophic events that would effect combined ratios dramatically, yet the share price of FFH continues to drop. Would anyone venture to guess at any particular reason for this steady downward spiral in the share price? What am I missing? We are down from $760 CDN in Sept to $570 today (about 25%). Doesn’t FFH seem to be under priced at this point? I would be buying here, and may do so, but it is my largest holding already. I am starting to think that there has to be a decent pop in price by the time we get the second quarter’s results next month. Anyone buying here?

I also see that Blackberry share price is up about 60% since the end of March.

Every time I hear someone predicting that autonomous vehicles are just around the corner it makes me seriously question their credibility. The day I see an autonomous vehicle drive through a snowstorm, dodging snow drifts and whiteouts, then perhaps, just perhaps I might believe autonomous cars might have a future. Until then they belong with the Jetsons.

Hold on pete, given the concentration of wealth in the US, one might suggest they have yet to give up their serfs

Excuse me, but WWI started in 1914 and the US finally helped mop up in 1917 when it was almost over. WWII started in 1939 and the US didn’t enter until 1941. If memory serves me correctly I believe there were a few other nations involved in both those wars. Now what other wars do you include in “won many wars”? Vietnam? Afghanistan?

"I am just a poor Canadian who knows more about the US than most Americans.... :-)" Ditto. It is unfortunate that so many Americans don't think outside the box and can't see their country as does the rest of the world.

UCCMAL Your comments on the US military are right on. I also believe that there is a correlation between the end of the draft and the increase in the crime rate in the US, and particularly the rise in gang related activity. At one time the youth in the inner cities were inducted into the military where they found a new family, received excellent training and were given a moral compass.

Americans have always had a rather naive view of themselves in perspective to the rest of the world. One only has to look at the President as an example. Rich? What is rich? Is it strictly monetary? Are you rich if you make a comfortable living, yet a medical emergency could bankrupt you at any time? Are you rich when your murder rate in a single city is multiples of that of whole countries?

Anyone who disagrees with the conservative view now gets called a “Leftie”. Right wing conservatives used to use the word “Commie”. Given the present administration’s Russian connections that terminology now would seem a bit awkward.

" I wouldn’t talk about 15% annualized anymore, nor I have any idea which kind of return should we expect from now on" Ditto

Put me in the camp with those who firmly believe that FFH will continue to do well. As to past performance, I have owned this company for ten years, my initial investment has nearly tripled in value, and I have no complaints. Too many people have been looking at Fairfax almost as some sort of investment fund. It is not. Sure, their investment strategy has been spotty at times, but look at the world wide insurance company they have been putting together in the meantime. Yes, they have made some investment bets that have not paid off. But personally I like to make relatively safe investments with the bulk of my own portfolio so that I can afford take the odd long shot on the side. I see Fairfax’s investment strategy as having been somewhat the same. Their hedges received a lot of criticism and while they may not have paid off, they did serve their purpose - yet a lot of people refuse to acknowledge that. This is an insurance company, I can’t criticize them for buying insurance. If I my house doesn’t burn down, did I make a mistake in buying insurance? We might also remember that Fairfax received similar criticism for their CDS holdings and we all know how that worked out. People tend to focus on Fairfax’s poor investments and ignore the fact that they have also made many successful investments at the same time as they have been putting together a world wide insurance conglomerate. Now they want to concentrate on refining those insurance operations and growing their own business. Prem warned, returns would be “lumpy”. That’s just fine with me. I am in this for the long haul and am excited about the future.

Liberty, I think that is probably the crux of the matter. We are having a national/international discussion on something that is actually very regional. Where I am, probably not that far from you, I would be willing to bet that if the housing market in some of the major cities were to crash, prices in my area would actually continue to increase in value.