dcollon

For as much as CNBC drives me nuts, I always enjoyed Mark Haines. He will be missed.

Misterstockwell, That's a good question, but it’s hard to know where to start. One large topic that stuck me was the use of energy in various cities. My initial comment would be, if they ever starting consuming oil/gas/electricity like we do here look out. Prices of those commodities will be much higher. For example, in one city I was in they turned the power off, city wide, from 8am until 7pm. We received a notice from the hotel the night before, so we wouldn't get stuck on the 22nd floor of our hotel without the use of an elevator. We ate breakfast that morning using candles. This is a city of 1mm plus people and a ton of manufacturing. I was told this is not uncommon throughout many parts of the country (I saw it in another city on a smaller scale). In addition, every factor we were in used almost no power outside the actually factory. They had heat in the offices, but didn't turn it on. They had lights, but didn't use many of them. It was very interesting to see. I never took my coat off (winter coat) in the meetings. The hotels we stayed in were decent, but the multifamily facilities nearby would make places in Detroit look nice. No one ever asked me for money, but they are definitely not living on much money per day. Some of the farm houses (if you can call them that) were very poor. I doubt many of the ones I saw had running water and most didn’t have windows. I have tried to keep this very brief. There are so many amazing things from the new airports, to the high speed rail lines that aren’t yet finished, to the pollution that I could talk about, but it would take pages. Again, these areas that I’m highlighting with my comments above are not the big cities (Shanghai/Beijing). Those cities are amazing. Beautiful and huge. Great restaurants and tons of people. I guess that is another thing I would say. I have never seen so many people. When I returned home it felt weird not being completely surrounded. Truly an amazing country, for so many reasons.

I would highly suggest going to visit China with someone that knows the country. I was fortunate enough to spend 10 days traveling in the small towns (only about 1mm people) :). I was able to see first hand the factories, standard of living, energy problems, etc...I ended up visiting 5 different cities and it was eye opening. I find that there are many misconceptions of people here when I talk to them about what's going on over there. If you have the chance, you should really go see it.

I always find Steve's comments interesting. Below is his presentation at the Value Investing Congress. http://www.fpafunds.com/news_05052011_valueinvesting.pdf

I thought some of you might find this quick story from Bloomberg interesting http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-16/chinese-spreading-wealth-make-vancouver-homes-pricier-than-nyc.html

Great idea. Thank you Sanjeev.

I'm assuming you all know this already, but there is a great book if you aren't aware of it titled Fortune's Formula. Well worth reading if you haven't had a chance yet.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-06/u-s-prosecutors-probe-steve-cohen-hedge-fund-trades-wsj-says.html

They appear to be very busy. The amount of transactions was nice to see. I especially like the first mortgage they bought on the hotel in NYC for a discount that has a 9.3% rate. I'm glad they are finding uses for the capital they are raising.

In case anyone is interested... http://news.morningstar.com/all/business-wire/20110503008023/fairholme-funds-inc-announces-shareholder-conference-call.aspx

Pretty weak rebuttal in my opinion.

Thanks for the laugh Bookie. I love that video.

Thanks Harry. I guess I will have to keep watching to see if those trends change. Take care

Harry, I noticed on an old RLI thread that you mentioned TWGP. I would appreciate your brief thoughts on TWGP if you have done work on it. Thanks in advance.

Thanks for posting it Myth.

That is a great presentation. Thanks

http://jeffmatthewsisnotmakingthisup.blogspot.com/

Thanks for posting it.

I think Seth Klarman is probably the best I have seen, but I'm sure there are plenty of individuals that are managing smaller pools of capital that are doing very well. I just don't read about them.

I prefer to buy my alcohol in bulk at Costco, so even when I'm drinking I'm still a value investor. :)

http://contenta.mkt1710.com/lp/26966/115068/D10717TheCoffeeCanApproach.pdf

Always worth reading http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ONE/1128889829x0x457315/cc3470a5-514f-4ade-9084-17db45e870dc/2010_JPMC_AR_letter.pdf

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-28/berkshire-wrote-down-u-s-bancorp-swiss-re-after-sec-query.html

Thanks for posting the link. I love being able to see the interviews with Sokol, Jain, etc...It helps to getting an even better understanding of why Mr. Buffett thinks so highly of them.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-25/most-networking-site-companies-will-be-overpriced-buffett-says.html