gfp

Every time I have sold some DAP.u, XPEL or even Generac, its ends up being a mistake so I stopped doing it. But those early sales still sting... Anyway - I hope you ended up with a lot more XPEL than I did!

Less and less is actually material to Berkshire parent company these days, but in the news yesterday is a large fire at an Illinois Chemtool plant. Chemtool is a subsidiary of Lubrizol (purchased in 2011). https://www.google.com/search?q=chemtool&client=safari&sxsrf=ALeKk014l-R38ukUgBp_ETy-qYpx__RDiA:1623773872280&source=lnms&tbm=nws&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi22uiGhZrxAhWXXc0KHWAvCtAQ_AUoBHoECAEQBg&biw=1341&bih=1287 In other news, TransRe (an Alleghany subsidiary) and GenRe are not renewing their 5 year underwriting partnership - https://www.reinsurancene.ws/transre-and-gen-re-break-off-underwriting-partnership/

Yeah that market reaction is pretty funny considering they had basically already pre-announced everything they said today. Maybe added some specifics but this “news” was out there

Nice timing on that one!

ProPublica has a not-that-enlightened article on Billionaires' tax bills, which may or may not be worth your time. But some might find Warren Buffett's detailed written response to the journalist of interest. It does come from the man himself after all. Another item of interest is a look into Michael Bloomberg's personal tax situation, since his company is a pass through LP. Orignal article: https://www.propublica.org/article/the-secret-irs-files-trove-of-never-before-seen-records-reveal-how-the-wealthiest-avoid-income-tax spoiler alert: extremely wealthy people pay a low "tax rate" on their annual increases in net worth if they don't realize gains or pay dividends. Buffett letter: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/20798866-buffett-statement-june-2-2021

Forgive me if you have already explained this, but what does it mean when your posts are in quotation marks? That you are quoting someone else? Or are you writing this?

I haven't followed this closely as you folks have, but it appears no opinion out of SCOTUS today. correct?

I think Prem would say the issue is that he is personally on the board of directors of BB. Which probably wasn't a great idea considering he would have been consulted on major decisions without being on the board as a very important investor.

Gates-backed Nuclear reactor company TerraPower and Berkshire's PacifiCorp plan to build one of the new Natrium reactors at the site of a retiring coal plant. 345 megawatt sodium-cooled fast reactor with molten salt-based energy storage for peaking. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/utility-small-nuclear-reactor-firm-select-wyoming-next-us-site-2021-06-02/

So I did find this as the last Form 4 from Sokol on this. Don't think he needs to file Form 4 any longer. He had over 3 million shares of SeaSpan and some dividends were automatically reinvesting https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0001097496/000122520817015852/xslF345X03/doc4.xml Edit: Sokol currently owns 2.425 million shares of ATCO and the Sokol Family Foundation owns 1.76 million of those shares. So he has been gifting shares or transferring / selling shares. He was given a grand of 1 million shares to become chairman and must have purchased some shares in the open market. I was under the impression previously that he had been given shares, the investment was not material to his net worth (it still isn't), and that he had never purchased any SSW/ATCO shares with his own capital. It does appear that he bought shares at some point unless I am missing a stock split.

Sanjeev, do we know what David Sokol's actual economic exposure to Atlas shares is? I haven't seen where he owns a substantial personal investment but maybe I am missing shares held by other entities like Teton or his family members. I assume his net worth is around a Billion dollars if not higher by now. He left Berkshire very wealthy and a lot of time has passed.

Thanks for posting the whole video. I had only caught dribs and drabs on CNBC. Love seeing a great interview with Malone and that shit eating grin he busts out from time to time. Hasn't lost a beat with age

I hadn't realized until this morning that Cryptocurrencies were not covered by the 'wash sale' rule. I wonder how long that lasts and what percentage of US-citizen Crypto trades is actually reported to the IRS. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/05/25/bitcoin-crash-opens-door-to-a-tax-loophole-for-investors.html

Judging by the rear window and bumper it is either a 1966 or a 1967 VW. Maybe it is included!

My friends who live directly on the Atlantic ocean in Florida have self-insured for decades. I believe they have a scheduled item policy for individual artworks and definitely umbrella/liability but nothing for the residence itself hazard / flood / hurricanes. But of course most people own real estate with mortgage financing because it is so attractive - which definitely rules out self insuring for hazard or flood (if required).

Thanks. Looks like Apple only owns equities that are non-marketable / private companies. Sorry for derailing the Berkshire content.

No I don't know their holdings but I assume the portfolio is almost entirely government bonds, corporate bonds and mortgage backed securities.

There is no reason to suspect the increased volume was from a single buyer/seller. It turned out it wasn't Berkshire, but Berkshire being in the market for A shares generally increases trading volume. Other factors are new all-time highs and the age of many A-share holders. Charities receiving A shares need to sell them to build the hospitals, etc... It also appears that Renaissance Technologies is trading in A-shares, which may account for some increase in volume as their models will trade automatically. By the way - does anybody know if there are 13-F style reports available for the equity holdings of Braeburn Capital (the entity in Reno that manages hundreds of Billions for Apple Inc) ? I don't know what entity name an institutional holding report would be under (if any). There is nothing under Braeburn Capital. This guy appears to run it: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffery-power-cfa-frm-4915306

The green dot means that builder is publicly traded. Last year’s rank is the number next to this year’s rank. Clayton was 11th last year and 9th this year. I saw a lot of billboards for Clayton Properties Group traveling across the country a couple days ago - all of the billboards are seeking workers, not advertising homes. The US is blanketed in help wanted signs right now. Basically every business.

I get a trade magazine called "Builder." Today's issue ranks the largest Homebuilders by 2020 closings. Was happy to see Berkshire's Clayton Properties Group (site-built only, does not include Clayton's manufactured homes) rising to number 9 on the list with 9,475 closings in 2020. More than well known names like Toll Brothers, MDC, Hovnanian, Beazer, etc.

WSJ article on new Mitek venture: https://www.wsj.com/articles/warren-buffett-to-offer-a-new-spin-on-modular-construction-11621339201?mod=mhp

https://www.ft.com/content/2438b16f-c4ca-4a5e-b1c2-07b3fbc0bc35 It's been rare to have David Sokol comment publicly on Berkshire since his resignation, but here he speaks to the FT about Abel. Worth a read. I believe you can skip the paywall a few different ways. Answer some survey questions or something like that

Digging a little further, I see that Sokol converted his MEHC shares to Berkshire common shares. MEHC did not repurchase shares during the relevant period where Sokol disposed of his ownership stake. Interestingly, the deal is way better for Sokol/Abel when Berkshire Hathaway common shares are undervalued, as the Energy shares are valued subject to a formula for "fair value" but the Berkshire Hathaway shares are valued at the market price. "On January 24, 2008, Mr. Sokol exchanged 629,931 shares of our [MEHC] common stock for 955 Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares and three Berkshire Hathaway Class B shares." Sokol still had outstanding options to acquire 549,277 MEHC shares for $35.05 / share, which he apparently exercised and ultimately ended up owning 1418 A-shares and 4250 B-shares in 2011 when he left Berkshire in 2011. Presumably he had also sold some Berkshire shares along the way. Berkshire still pays Sokol $1 million per year for the rest of his and/or his wife's life incidentally - the maximum benefit under his plan.

For the critics complaining that Abel and Jain are paid too much in their current Vice Chair roles, here are the last three years of compensation Greg earned as a lowly subsidiary manager: (spoiler alert: $79 million over 3 years)

At the time I posted that, I believed that Berkshire facilitated the transfer of Sokol's stock to Abel but that is not how it went. I now believe that Sokol's shares were repurchased by MEHC (BHE predecessor) under the shareholder agreement "put" option that Walter Scott's family often uses to sell BHE shares back to the company. With Dave Sokol still at MidAmerican, Sokol owned 1.6% on a fully diluted basis, and Greg Abel already owned 1% on a fully diluted basis. Greg didn't technically own all 1% yet, but would eventually vest that amount (I believe he currently owns 740,961 BHE shares out of a total of 76,368,874 BHE shares). The mechanism where Abel's (and Scott family's) BHE shares can be converted to Berkshire Hathaway Class A or B shares is the Shareholder's agreement, as amended on December 7, 2005 (originally from 3/14/2000). Back in 2016, according to this blurb from a BHE filing, Abel's BHE shares would have converted to 1,906 A-shares (A-shares were about $194,360 apiece at the time), giving his BHE shares approximately the same valuation in Berkshire shares as the cash-put price that the Scott family was using. (an approximate $37 Billion equity valuation for all of BHE in 2015-2016. The most recent BHE price / share "print" that I know of is from Q1 2020, which was $698.61 / share, implying a Q1 2020 equity value for BHE of $53.35 Billion. That figure would be higher today, but it appears that a year ago Greg owned BHE stock convertible into $517.64 million worth of Berkshire Hathaway common shares (his choice of A or B).