berkshiremystery

Well, WOW! bmichaud, thank you very much! You just wrote a treaty!! You see, by now I can claim to have read many posts on this board, and I can say I have come to know a lot of great people and thoughtful investors (and you are certainly among the ones I admire and respect the most!). So, please, I hope nobody takes what I am going to say as a criticism, but just as an observation I have made during these months of membership: generalization tends to be present a little bit too often on this board (I want to be clear: it is by far the best board I know of, and the only one I follow daily!), and generalization imho is very dangerous. Let’s take, for instance, my firm’s performance in 2012: 1) It generated fcf equal to 16% (dividends excluded) of its capital on December 31, 2011; 2) It lost 4.78% of its capital on December 31, 2011, on short positions; 3) It lost 5.94% of its capital on December 31, 2011, on its long position in FFH; 4) It broke even on its other long positions; 5) It distributed dividends equal to 2% of its capital on December 31, 2011. So, we increased capital by 16% - 4.78% - 5.94% = 5.28%. If you consider dividends, 7,28%. Now, if FFH hadn’t declined from CAD$437 on December 31, 2011, to CAD$357 last Friday, our results would have been in line with the S&P Composite: 5.28% + 5.94% + 2% (dividends) = 13.22% (AMiS) vs. 10.84% + 2.11% (dividends) = 12.95% (S&P Composite). Furthermore, if my firm’s long positions had done better than just break even, and FFH had advanced, instead of declining, we would have outperformed the S&P Composite by far (like it happened in 2011: AMiS +26% vs. S&P Composite +2.1%). And all of that without renouncing to the optionality that holding some short positions gives us! So, what’s my problem here? Well, the numbers seem to suggest my problem really is that I am not good at choosing my firm’s investments…! But that I SIMPLY CANNOT BELIEVE!! ;D No, really, I have the utmost respect for the people I have partnered with trough the stock market and I strongly believe I have never overpaid for their company and leadership: I am sure a lot of value will be created in the years ahead. So, where is the rub? Very simple, like Mr. Watsa has so often told us: our results will always be lumpy. There will always be years like 2012, but then there will also be years when we will grow by leaps and bounds. Results overall will be satisfactory (to say the least!). So, here is why generalization is dangerous: what is right and works for moore capital might be right and work for you in your unique situation… or it might not! Furthermore, your situation will surely change in time, and what works for you today might not work tomorrow. Are you more comfortable accepting lumpy results, or following the new market-timing system you have so shrewdly devised? I don’t know, I cannot answer. What I know is that I am not a trader, and I am not a financial advisor, and I am not a money manager. I am a businessman. And astute businessmen hoard cash, or buy some protection, in prosperous times, while investing very aggressively when the game gets tough. Another example: both longterm and writser wrote about investments in special situations. Once again, it might be right for them, it surely is not right for me… I have two goals: a) to maximize my firm’s fcf, and 2) to invest it soundly in owner-operators. Those two goals keep me busy from 7 a.m. until 7 p.m., 7 days a week. Then, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., I go to the gym… So, what should you do, if you were me? 1) stop trying to maximize my firm’s fcf, to study special situations? 2) stop monitoring the owner-operators I am interested in for my firm to purchase an ever increasing partial ownership, to study special situations? 3) would you stop going to the gym? And risk losing my athletic prowess girls love so much?!?! Don’t even think about that!! ;D ;D ;D And, please, forget about that Macro “Musings” thread of mine: those are things I read just for fun and to relax! twacowfca is also a businessman, though much more versed in financial matters than I am. But, even among businessmen, situations can be vastly different. Once he wrote me that his firm’s portfolio is now worth 20 times his firm’s operating business. twacowfca, please correct me if I am too way off the mark: assigning a 10x multiple to the fcf generated by his operating business, that means the yearly fcf of twacowfca’s business is more or less 1/200 of the capital he has invested in the stock market right now. And, assuming the capital he has invested in the stock market is all equity, that translates into a 0.5% fcf yield from his operating business. Much different from my firm’s 16% fcf yield! He simply must have accumulated much equity year after year, with an operating business that almost didn’t grow. Also my operating businesses probably won’t grow, but I am still at the beginning and haven’t accumulated much equity yet. So, the fcf from operating businesses is now almost meaningless to twacowfca, while it is still very relevant to me! twacowfca might surely be more interested in dabbling in special situation investments than me. Alas! Probably, he now must manage too much equity for special situations to be a meaningful part of his portfolio… One last thought, an obvious one, but anyway… You said my firm resembles BRK… well, too kind of you! But surely you meant the BRK of the ’60… well, if you meant a mini-BRK of the ’60, I just can be flattered and fool myself into overlooking the absurdity of the comparison! ;D And just like the fcf of BRK during the ’60 was far from being assured, also my firm’s fcf is very much at risk. We manage two businesses: 1) engineering services in the civil and infrastructure sector, 2) a for profit education master school inside the Politecnico of Milan. 1) is incredibly under pressure in Italy nowadays. Until now we have fared better than average, but the future is uncertain and we cannot go on swimming against the tide much longer… 2) has proven until now to be a reliable business in a recession, and we have strong links to our main sponsor (Italcementi Group S.p.A.), but we must deal nonetheless with the bureaucracy of a large public University… unfortunately, anything could happen! So, the need to be prudent. Ok, this is already way too long! But you gave me a lot of food for thought, and I hope I have now provided you with some more. Thank you again and take care, giofranchi Gio,... It seems to me that you speak of the MIP- Politecnico di Milano School of Management, if I'm not mistaken. I'm just wondering if the MIP in Milan has a similar department like Prem's old Richard Ivey School of Business with it's Ben Graham Centre for Value Investing. MBA full time Scholarship http://www.mip.polimi.it/mip/en/globals/news/MBA-full-time-Scholarship-italcementi.html MIP Politecnico di Milano http://www.mip.polimi.it/ http://www.italcementigroup.com/ENG/Careers/Training/Training+courses/ MIP Politecnico di Milano The School of Management of the Politecnico di Milano @ Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIP_Politecnico_di_Milano ---- Welcome to MIP, Business School of Politecnico di Milano. Gianluca Spina, President - MIPPolimi YouTube.com - Video http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nkKydzMWyOk&feature=m-ch-fea

Thanks for posting,... I'm just stuck reading the research pages about GM inside Grant's.

You too,... ho, ho, ho,... ;D and may Santa hopefully bring you a big bag of presents,... specially a bunch of shares in long lasting companies. I think Sqnjeev's abstinence from the board signaled that he might working hard to play Santa for all board members. Maybe he is the real Santa ;D

A two part interview with Ryan J. Morris: Interview: Ryan Morris (Meson Capital Partners) Part 1 Published: September 11, 2012 http://sumzero.com/headlines/financials_and_insurance/33-ryan-morris-meson-interview-part-1 Interview: Ryan Morris (Meson Capital Partners) Part 2 Published: September 11, 2012 http://sumzero.com/headlines/financials_and_insurance/34-ryan-morris-meson-interview-part-1 Ryan Morris: I feel like all the risk people are talking about today is overall market risk. Every tail insurance type policy seems overpriced to me – every bird in the sky is a black swan with a fat tail! With respect to risks that come up with all individual investments – particularly in the small cap universe where I focus - I’d say that the biggest risk that I don’t hear talked about is the governance side. The quality of corporate governance for smaller companies is just such a mixed bag and I don’t think people pay enough attention to it. Almost all of my investment mistakes have been related to that and it’s a fairly subtle thing until you have some experience with it. I know a lot of people who buy stocks based on profit guidance but they really need to take a closer look at the accounting and keeping track of how closely CEOs do what they say and how intellectually honest they are about their mistakes.

I would rather encourage you all to read Ryan's outstanding partnership letters. ;) ...They should be in everyone's file cabinet, because he's definitely a value investor to keep in eye on. http://www.mesoncapital.com/ http://www.mesoncapital.com/letters/2009_H1_MCP_Letter.pdf http://www.mesoncapital.com/letters/2009_Q4_MCP_Annual_Letter.pdf http://www.mesoncapital.com/letters/2010_Q4_MCP_Annual_Letter.pdf http://www.mesoncapital.com/letters/2011_Q4_MCP_Annual_Letter.pdf

Here's an interesting article on the buyback Buffett's Leading The Corporate Buyback Surge 2912-12-18 http://www.forbes.com/sites/investor/2012/12/18/buffetts-leading-the-corporate-buyback-surge/?partner=yahootix

America's Billionaire: Warren Buffett Boosts Worth Bloomberg VIDEO 2012-12-18 http://www.bloomberg.com/video/america-s-billionaire-warren-buffett-boosts-worth-vqIhkGrARKa93_L4lsZuJQ.html?cmpid=yhoo

Happy Holidays everyone,... http://thomasatkins.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/santa_coca_cola_2006-7008212.jpg

Liberty,... You are truly right. The board developed slowly over the years through a devoted crowd of knowledgable readers and contributors. Each single member alone would be weak, but through the collaborative contributions of opinions, discussions and reseach,... the board grew out of itself,... a sort of swarm intelligence or wisdom of crowds to a truly unique treasure trove. Comparable with Wikipedia's collaborative platform. The inputs and outputs of the discussions of its members lead to feedback loops of opinion forming. It's the perfect agent-based system of collaboration and a form of artificial intelligence or super-brain. Even the U.S. Intelligence Community (i.e. CIA, NSA, FBI...etc) switched after 9/11 to this form of data base and file keeping. There system is called "Intellipedia" based on the wiki software code. Intellipedia @ Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellipedia CIA Intellipedia - 3rd anniversary https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/intellipedia-celebrates-third-anniversary.html Artificial intelligence @ Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_intelligence AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents"[1] where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its chances of success

Quest Management, Inc. -> Thai Focused Equity Fund http://www.questthai.com/ Also some good video interview with Doug Barnett http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=HOnjRPI8zkw&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DHOnjRPI8zkw Brkmystery ,thanks for the link. Actually, I used to visit his website a few year ago. He used to invest in some companies that I interested in. Do you have a link to the old thread on MSN board about Doug Barnett ? The old MSN BRK board was the predecessor board to this one here. Sanjeev was forced to close the old board, because Microsoft ceased this member feature some years ago. There is only some smaller back up version made by Sanjeev at: http://msnbrkboardarchive.multiply.com/ But I personally doubt that you find there all the old message threads. He probably kept only the most important threads about FFH & BRK.

Nope,... I only remember now his name as it came up in the YouTube video,... Haven't researched him for years. But I definitely must have somewhere older URL links in my digital folder cabinet.

Great that you mention Doug Barnett (Quest Management) again. I once posted about him some intensive message thread at the old MSN BRK board years ago. He runs an outstanding asian hedge fund called "Thai Focused Equity Fund". Julian Robertson and George Soros were among his early investors, and currently, about 40% of his assets are actually the private accounts of other hedge fund managers. Quest Management, Inc. -> Thai Focused Equity Fund http://www.questthai.com/ Also some good video interview with Doug Barnett http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=HOnjRPI8zkw&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DHOnjRPI8zkw

Warren Buffett continues media tour to tout book Investor Warren Buffett to appear on Daily Show, CNBC to promote new book about his career OMAHA, Neb. (AP) -- Billionaire Warren Buffett is continuing to promote a new book about his career with a series of interviews. Buffett is the focus of Carol Loomis' new book "Tap Dancing to Work: Warren Buffett on Practically Everything, 1966-2012." The book is a collection of Fortune magazine articles on Buffett, who is chairman and CEO of the Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate. A couple of the articles were written by Buffett himself. Buffett and Loomis have already given a number of interviews this week. The pair is set to appear on Comedy Central's "Daily Show" Tuesday night and on CNBC's "Squawk Box" Wednesday morning. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/warren-buffett-continues-media-tour-211701844.html ----- Warren Buffett & Carol Loomis @ Charlie Rose Show - Nov. 26, 2012 http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/12672

Many Moons Later, the I.R.S. Questions a Tax Deal By GRETCHEN MORGENSON I only find the NY Times headline very peculiar. "Many Moons later,..."

It must have been a nice gala. Sadly my first Vancouver experience was about over 3 weeks ago running a marathon with my suitcase in 45 minutes through Vancouver Int't Airport to catch my connecting flight to L.A.,.. but people from Air Canada had been very friendly to hold the plane for me and other late-comers that were stuck in U.S. customs. It was somehow a surprise for me to find U.S. border patrol officers on Canadian territory. At least I happily boarded the plane, otherwise I already thought I would have to ask Sanjeev for shelter ;D, - aha just kidding. But I only had to fly accidentally through Vancouver, because hurricane Sandy didn't let me fly over the U.S. east cost, so I had in last minute to reschedule all my flights. Anyway, I would have enjoyed to stay at least 24 hours,... Vancouver from the air looks neat in fine rain, my kind of weather,... in L.A., I had to wear on my last day, my winter jacket :o

I viewed a couple of days ago their presentation of the new BB 10 os. It didn't look that bad,...and I felt watching the presentation, that it's quiet promising. http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=tzxQ2YUjk50&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DtzxQ2YUjk50

Happy Turkey Day... & Happy Black Friday,... ... Now I just wonder what day is more wacko ;D

berkshiremystery, I sincerely hope all the best to your friend and I applaud your willingness to give him support, in his time of need. You are a caring person. God bless you, giofranchi Yes, may God bless you. I had a dear friend in our local running club who was dying of an incurable illness several years ago. There was someone with him every day, friends or family. It must be awful to die alone. Well,... I hope that the doctors can do something, otherwise there might be bigger implications, because she has young 10 year old boy, which it's own complicated health problems. He is currently staying with his grandmother, so she must watch him and can't fly. I would be the only one currently to bring her to hospital. And we fly both in, from different parts,... long distance... my Indiana Jones odyssey will start soon,... I'm on the run,... my last post currently, I might check here in some spare minute from L.A., if I find time. Take care all.

Hello folks,... you also must be wondering where I am. I'm currently only in read mode for this board here since days,... and I almost don't have much time to spend here. I guess that I have the same problems as our Liberty,... going on some trip for almost 12 days in the middle of next week to the L.A. area. But,... my trip is rather unexpected, and it won't be some holiday. I have to fly over on long distance to support some dear friend with severe health problems,... so my trip probably will land me in Cedars Sinai's waiting room sitting there for hours and hoping everything right can be done. I'm currently the only friend that can be at hospital to give support,... there is nobody else available,... thus,... sad situation. So, I'm currently away for some time, and probably not even time to read here. Currently say bye for over two weeks.

Sardar Biglari Is Not the Next Warren Buffett Oct. 19, 2012 http://www.thestreet.com/story/11742355/1/sardar-biglari-is-not-the-next-warren-buffett.html?puc=yahoo&cm_ven=YAHOO

On a side note,... after reading the article, and the author name Neesha Bapat. I was struck by surprise by her university name, a so called "Singularity University". I was thinking immediately about Ray Kurzweil and his book "The Singularity Is Near". And after searching the university name on Wiki,... Bingo! I find it very interesting to have a university that's researching exponentially advancing technologies and Moore's law. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singularity_University http://www.singularityu.org/

At least the MSFT advertisement video for the surface is promising. http://macdailynews.com/2012/10/15/microsoft-airs-first-tv-ad-for-surface-tablet-with-video/ “With the first Surface spot, Microsoft focused on the “clicking” noise made when a user attaches the tablet’s magnetic keyboard-cum-cover, as well as the soft snapping sound heard when the unit’s kickstand is opened and closed,” Mikey Campbell reports for AppleInsider. “Taking more than a little inspiration from successful iPod commercials, the ad features a troupe of dancers who manipulate the device to create a drum break-like beat that slowly builds to a crescendo of feverish clicking and snapping.” http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f9/Microsoft_Surface_with_Touch_Cover.png ----- Microsoft Surface @ Wikipedia.org http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface

Otherwise I should also encourage people to stay until Friday. Because on this day of the week,... the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM), of which Prem is a trustee,... has a worldwide very unique museum evening. The so called, "Friday Night Live @ ROM", expect the unexpected, eat sushi and drink wine amongst the Dino's, at Toronto's Bloor Street with live music. Just wonder why Prem himself doesn't encourage us shareholders to see this special ROM evening.

Thanks for the details, Sanjeev. Is the Corner Capital AGM only for investors in Corner Capital, or is it open to everybody? Actually Sanjeev's meeting was some neat icing on the cake to finish the day. While Fairfax AGM had some 950 people in attendance, the Corner Market meeting had a more college classroom atmosphere,... the partners were sitting in the middle of the room around a big table, while visitors could sit around at the sidelines. I personally encouraged people to go to Sanjeev's AGM,... since I believed he wouldn't throw out maybe his future new partners. Of course Norman was also very active asking questions.

elltel,... actually it's very easy,... you just show up, on Thursday morning, April 11, 2013 at 9:30 a.m., Toronto time at Roy Thomson Hall, 60 Simcoe Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. There is NO need for a ticket. But it's better to come 1 hour earlier. In the lobby of the Roy Thomson Hall are for the Fairfax AGM some registration desks where you show them some ID card or passport,... nothing more. Or you might want to show them your proxy letter,... but that isn't necessary. You get at the desk some badge for your shirt with the name "Fairfax Financial AGM for shareholders" and that's it. How long does the official AGM the next day usually last and what is it like? Does all the fun stuff happen at the dinner the day before and the AGM is more of the 'dry procedural business' stuff, or is the official AGM also full of goodness with presentations, Q&As, and guests making speeches and such? Well,... probably both events were special in their individual ways. The shareholder dinner had a more a cozy atmosphere,... almost like some big, very big family Christmas dinner,... running almost until midnight,... until the last one would leave the Imperial Room. We came as strangers and left with many newly made friends, which we can't await to see next time. I personally felt like Sanjeev played nice Santa Claus, introducing us to all the folks at Fairfax and Hamblin Watsa. The actual Fairfax AGM on the next day was of course at first filled with some terrific introduction by Prem, a presentation with slides and a Q&A. Afterwards there was some standing reception downstairs at Roy Thomson Hall's pavillion with some free light snacks and drinks. Francis, and Prem with his wife and family walked through the shareholders, talking with them personally, greeting friends, standing for photos and making autographs at "The Templeton Plan" book. Then in the afternoon,... Sanjeev had his own AGM for Corner Market Capital (CMC),... which of course was some excellent event by itself. I would everybody just encourage to also visit this AGM as well. Sanjeev wrote some neat essay from this years meeting. http://www.cornerofberkshireandfairfax.ca/forum/fairfax-financial/two-days-in-toronto-fairfax-dinner-fairfax-agm/msg75606/#msg75606