beerbaron

http://www.usdebtclock.org/

Thanks for the clarification. Can someone else explain to me the national deficit? preferably with some concrete numbers? The answer to your question is another question: What do you want to include in your calculation? Federal debt? Federal entities deb Federal pension plan liability Federal Mecidaid and Medicare liability States debts States entities debts States entities pension plans deficit Cities debt Cities pension plans deficit Other liabilities (promised guarantees, etc...)

On prenups: It's a no brainer to get one. No matter how the assets are separated. I find it incredible that people sign the most important contract of their lives without setting the rules (in Quebec, if you don't set the rules, the government gives you a standard set of rules that sucks big time). Furthermore, when I got married I insisted that me and my fiancée go see a notary so that he can explain what are the laws/ rights and responsibilities associated with a marriage. Best 500$ I ever spent, after the meeting, my girlfriend knew what she was getting into and she totally agreed that setting the terms of separation while in good terms was a lot easier than the other way around. I'm sure that if I ever divorce that 500$ will pay at least 20 times because of all the problems avoided (conflicts, lawyers, stress, etc...). This what I call a good bet 20 to 1 payout with the odds at 50%. On a similar note, the day of your marriage you might consider setting up new trading accounts. Usually the old money and all it's capital gains thereafter are non-divisible (at least in Quebec). So separating the before and after makes the calculation much easier to do if divorce ever happens. BeerBaron BeerBaron

+16% not a bad year. With 20% cash I can't complain too much. I'm happy about the turnover tough, probably did 4-5 (buys) transactions this year. If that continues my broker will call me to tell me I'm it's worst customer. Regards BeerBaron

Lol, good story. I'm sure this guy now talks at CNBC every week. BeerBaron

I think yahoo finance has options data. BeerBaron

Not buying it, the inelasticity is not so tight. BeerBaron

This is hilarious. NOBODY predicted the drop in oil prices a year ago. Yet today, we have charts in Bloomberg saying it's an absolute fact. What changed so much in the following to provoke a 40% drop in price? Vehicle fuel efficiency New generation moving to cities Wind and solar power generation Public transport usage Baby boomers retiring It seems to me people are putting up a bunch of shit together to explain the sudden collapse. The only facts are: Shale gas has increased supply China's slowdow has reduced demand I don't see how a player that consumes 10% of oil (falling to 9% maybe) and a producer going from 10% to 12% could mark a drop of 40%. It just does not add up.

I hope they translate it into a language I can actually understand. BeerBaron

Amazing presentation. I always appreciate Bruce putting applying theory on top of practice. Not sure I understood it's argument against Porter's competitive advantage tough. BeerBaron

You an I don't seem to have the same definition of a jackpot. Don't get me wrong, I like their results but a jackpot is at least a double. BeerBaron

You can also buy Jack Welch book "Winning", I heard it's quite good. BeerBaron

Where is Bruce Berkowitz 13F? BeerBaron

You mean just like we do for Africa... it doesn't seem like it's good for us in the long term. In sociology, instability breeds instability nothing good would come out of it. What's needed in the middle east like anywhere else for that matter is good incentives for the leaders to act on the best interests of the population they represent. Get that straightened out and you have another bright billion people to solve the world's problems. BeerBaron

I have a pumpkin beer fermenting as well, did you actually put pumpkin in there? I just took a red ale and added about 1 teaspoon of spices. This is my first try with pumpkin beer. BeerBaron

Small caps are all over the place in terms of valuations. Every time I go trough the S&P TSX Small Cap List I scratch my head at each valuations. BeerBaron

That's a good question tough. How would those cards show off in the books? As sales? As an asset with Liabilities attached to it? BeerBaron

A few years ago I spent a good amount of time thinking of what should be the criterias for successful cloning. I came out with the following criterias: Concentrated portfolio Low turnover Long history of outperformance Value investor History of ethical behaviour Very few money managers fit the bill: Buffett Watsa Chou Berkowitz Einhorn To tell you guys the truth I don't think the strategy has produced above average returns. I attribute the poor performance to two reasons: [*]In an up market you can never buy at the same price that the Guru has bought. [*]You are always 45 days late Overall I am seriously thinking of going back to a more active management of my portfolio. I could access much more companies that the big guys could not and that gave me a major hedge. Much better than what I can have right now. BeerBaron

Problems can be solved easily if prior solutions are available, in that case you are tweaking the previous solutions and voilà. When it comes to problems with unknown solutions (at the moment) than it's much harder, it requires deep research, lots of tests and lots of errors are done in the process, it's almost a trial and error process. To paraphrase someone well know on this forum: "It's much easier to learn from other's people mistakes" BeerBaron

A thousand of things can go wrong with these technologies. Every engineer will tell you that on paper a lot of things look great but as soon as you start designing you find problems. In most engineering area, those problems are surmountable but that is mainly because of the current knowledge of the subject around the planet. With a cutting edge technology like nuclear fusion, you are on your own because the knowledge base is limited. Therefore, every problem represents thousand of hours of research. Hence, the incredibly long timeline to achieve a commercial design. I sincerely hope controlled nuclear fusion will see the day during my lifetime but I have my doubts. BeerBaron

Full spectrum LEDs have been around since the mid 90s. Nobel Prizes take a while to determine a technology was a breaktrough. White LEDs have changed the lighting world by as much as fluorescent lighting. Today it's used in all electronic equipments and is slowly supplementing all other traditional lighting. LEDs, have a much longer lifetime, higher efficiency and color rendering than their competing technology. Here is a small excerpt about lack of vision by corporate executives: In 2001, Nakamura sued his former employer Nichia over his bonus for the discovery, which was originally ¥20,000 (~US$180). Although Nakamura originally won an appeal for ¥20 billion (~US$180 million), Nichia appealed the award and the parties settled in 2005 for ¥840 million (~US$9 million), at the time the largest bonus ever paid by a Japanese company. BeerBaron

Congratulation uncle Parsad. BeerBaron

Good video. A few comments: [*]What a huge waste of human potential. Those brilliant people could be building more value painting walls. [*]They are really fighting a losing game against HFT. Talks about being a one legged man in an ass kicking contest. [*]Why is it that someone thinks they have an information advantage about the FED announcement? Hubris, hubirs, hubris. [*]Altough I am completely against HFT, I do believe they are helping society... by bringing those trader on the street and get them to do something usefull.

Weren't they talking about their return on capital invested? BeerBaron

I think David Winter uses 3 different discount rates. Off the top of my head I think it's about: 8% for stable companies with a dominant market position. 10% for smaller companies with less dominant positions. 12% for bets that are speculative in nature. BeerBaron