gfp

perhaps ironically, the most likely thing to cause a downturn in the stock market would be a reduction of the deficit. Running a surplus would cause a depression.

BTW, I didn't know Fairfax owned 33% of the largest egg producer in Ukraine. https://interfax.com/newsroom/top-stories/104051/ https://open4business.com.ua/en/ovostar-owners-complete-squeeze-out-and-announce-delisting/

I found this in a Q3 Odyssey Re filing. Seems possible that Fairfax increased their ownership in AGT to 65.66%. AGT uses a lot of debt in their business and some of that debt does not show up on the consolidated financial statements because it is intercompany. Much like NICO at Berkshire. ("the Company" below is Odyssey. "Holdings" is Odyssey Group Holdings)

It would be consolidated, not equity method

https://www.eriksencapitalmgmt.com/investor-letters

How would that produce a profit on index inclusion?

No clue. The only news I could find today was the bond sale to finance part of the Sleep Country deal. https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/investing/2024/11/19/sleep-country-mulls-potential-bond-sale-in-rare-leveraged-buyout/

Trump is going to be our hero to slay Biden's inflation by deporting our labor force! Except he probably won't because reality But Immigrants are committing crimes! And Teslas are crashing! omg omg (edit: sorry, forgot to credit wabuffo on the more accurate CPI chart above)

If you came to this country legally and you are working on top of a roof, something went terribly wrong for you. There is nothing special about the last 4 years - the border has been porous forever. All of my roofing labor is illegal, and none of them are recent arrivals. They have kids in school, their wives clean houses or sometimes work on the roofing crews (!) They are busy making America great. And their food is better

impressive! jk jk

I think there are some investors doing the 50% annually on tiny companies currently. This guy comes to mind: https://dirtcheapstocks.substack.com (this is a paid sub stack but the picks I have seen have been very good) - he is also on twitter. Also Tim Eriksen, who runs Cedar Creek Partners, will probably get close with his expert market stuff.

Those are the figures I was referring to but just sort of rounded them because I didn’t have the exact numbers in front of me.

I forget who, but someone here reads these. This is the Q3 NAIC report for National Indemnity. Definitely sounds like GUARD was the problem child during the quarter, as was pretty clear from the 10Q and mention of "new management." Sounds like about $500 million of negative development that GUARD had ceded to NICO, plus NICO sent $517m of capital (unaffiliated stock holdings) to GUARD to boost their capital. GUARD had been growing quickly for a decade or more. 20087.2024.P.Q3.P.O.3.4841235.pdf

"There is no second best. But if there was, it would be Fairfax and Berkshire... "

General Re 3rd quarter NAIC filing came out. No equity purchases in the quarter, not much of a surprise. Kind of cool to see Gen Re get $235 per share for an Apple sale on 7/15 (basically top ticked the year so far) - and the basis on that stock was $29.94 / sh. 22039.2024.P.Q3.P.O.3.4836600.pdf

pre-13F look at the trading inside Odyssey Re in the quarter - no moves of any size this was from last night, but looks like the 13F came out today - https://www.dataroma.com/m/holdings.php?m=FFH 23680.2024.P.Q3.P.O.3.4833355.pdf

Tough to tell from that weird chart but is that Fair Isaac?

Perhaps ironically, Bitcoin, the economy and risk assets in general will probably do much better in a higher interest rate environment than in a low interest rate or ZIRP environment. It may be counterintuitive since people are taught that opportunity cost is such a big factor. Low interest rates -> bad things happening / stagnation / lots of demand for safety and liquidity / risk-off Higher interest rates -> reflation/inflation / growth / risk-on

It is usually so illiquid. Any new interest will move the price in the short term. The speculation here that it was Indian ex-pats buying on the perception of a great Modi-Trump relationship sounded plausible. But the Indian markets have been down lately. The airport is a hit so it doesn't matter to FIH.U but I'm selling these newcomers stock every time they bid it into the upper 16's

None shall pass!

Ha! I was sort of hesitant because the $1.2m one-day move in a private retirement account is pretty legendary and then not only does it not give it back there's another +5% day or whatever it was.

It's not a good idea to be 100% sure of anything. It helps to think in probabilities and keep an open mind. I started my "investment" career doing all kinds of non-Buffett-Munger things. I paid my bills for years with iron condor premiums on the cash settled SPX and OEX. I used to buy commodities! Little lumps of minerals that just sat there doing nothing! We are all big boys and girls here on this forum. We can think for ourselves and make our own decisions. We can roll our eyes or whatever. This isn't a widows and orphans forum. Should I nuke the thread? It says I can nuke the thread

One thing we can all agree on is that Bitcoin is a parking place for capital. Some might think it's a good parking place and some might think it's a dangerous parking place but it helps people understand what it is better if you drop the whole "currency" tag. It is not a security, it doesn't need to be a currency, it can just be property - a parking place for capital. There is a lot of capital out there. It all has to sit down in a chair every night when the music stops.

Well I don't think the dollar devalued by 30% yesterday and I'm not even sure James owns any bitcoin.

I heard it's super easy to exchange bitcoin for cash