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gfp

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Posts posted by gfp

    Capital Gains Taxes?

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    California taxes capital gains the same as ordinary income.  Some states don't have a capital gains tax.  The system in California is progressive and starts at 1% and goes all the way to 12.3%.  It might be the worst state for capital gains taxes but I don't know for sure.

    Berkshire Hathaway Meeting Notes

    in Berkshire Hathaway

    Posted

    I haven't seen any personal notes out there yet, but the WSJ notes cover pretty much everything.  Morningstar also did one, but it wasn't quite as good.

     

    http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat/2015/05/02/live-analysis-the-2015-berkshire-hathaway-annual-meeting/

     

    Here's one from a fool contributor - http://boards.fool.com/berkvilles-golden-year-31738454.aspx

     

    Here are M*'s - http://news.morningstar.com/articlenet/article.aspx?id=695453

    Buffett/Berkshire - general news

    in Berkshire Hathaway

    Posted

    "BV didn't budge. Haven't figured out why."

     

    Page 4 of the Q breaks down the changes in comprehensive income.  Unrealized investment losses and foreign currency translation are responsible for most of the difference between the income and the $1.3 Billion increase in net worth.

     

    "Other investments" was hit by a little over a billion dollars - remember that BAC was at 17.89 at year end and 15.39 at the end of the quarter...  warrants to purchase 700 million shares

    Fairfax 2015 Q1 Results are out...

    in Fairfax Financial

    Posted

    Different currencies

     

     

    Pretty much as expected for me: Book value unchanged...

     

    I am trying to understand the disconnect between recent stock performance of FFH.TO and FRFHF ( US OTC Market)? Trying to figure out if the under-performance of FRFHF is warranted ( currency? liquidity? etc.)

     

    Anyone already look into this?

     

    Thanks!

    What are you buying today?

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    This quote from a site below kind of sums up why US investors are just recently worrying about it.  There were changes in the last few years that alerted folks to the issue --

     

    "The FATCA legislation not only requires new self-reporting on PFICs and other foreign held financial assets, but also requires all “foreign financial institutions” to report on the assets held by U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents directly to the IRS by 2014.  While it may seem hard to believe that foreign financial institutions would willingly comply with such reporting requirements, the fact is that industry observers expect nearly universal compliance with the new rules by banks, brokerages, insurance companies, mutual funds (anything “financial”) around the world, because of the severe sanctions the FATCA law imposed on non-compliant financial institutions.  The point is that all U.S. citizens must assume that as of 2014, the IRS will have a direct and easily accessible window onto their holdings in foreign financial institutions. It will be easy to cross-reference direct reports by these institutions to the IRS with self-filed form 8938 and 8621 and determine whether or not your PFIC investments have been properly reported and the tax properly calculated and paid."

     

    http://thunfinancial.com/why-americans-should-never-ever-own-shares-in-a-non-us-incorporated-mutual-fund/

    Looking Up Old Annual Reports

    in General Discussion

    Mohnish Pabrai (Dalal Street) 13F HR

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    I realize it is way off topic here, but why is there a rather hard floor at 1.3x?

     

    This is possibly OT, but BRK is getting to be somewhat attractive. Stock has gone nowhere for over half year, while there was HNZ/KRFT deal and overall business growth.

     

    Unless BVPS has gone up significantly last quarter, it is still sporting one of the highest multiples it has had in recent memory. 

     

    Somewhere at 1.4X range, we'll see more precisely at Q1. I did not adjust for HNZ/KRFT. It's not very cheap, but considering a rather hard floor at 1.3, it's possibly unlikely that one can get BRK much cheaper.

     

    Whether it's worth paying 1.4X is something people have to decide for themselves. :)

    Dr. George meets Warren Buffett

    in Berkshire Hathaway

    Posted

    It's his standard comment that Burger King paid ~$12Billion for Tim Hortons.  "Why would you spend 12 billion to save 30 million"...

     

    The most federal income tax that Burger King has ever paid was approximately $30 million but their earnings are in the neighbourhood of $12 billion so the tax shelter benefits are negligible.

     

    I can't say anything about the exact US federal cash taxes that BKW has paid, but BKW doesn't have "earnings" anywhere close to $12 billion.  I suspect there was some kind of a typo here or misunderstanding. 

    Dr. George meets Warren Buffett

    in Berkshire Hathaway

    Posted

    He's talking about realized loss as a percentage of total net worth of the firm.

     

     

    With regards to risk, the Berkshire portfolio suffered a 2% loss once and had 1% losses twice in our

    history.

     

    I've seen him say this more than once, but is this really true?

    Looking at http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/2014ltr.pdf , 2008 shows 9.6% book value drop, 2001 shows 6.2% book value drop. Are these not related to portfolio drops? (I guess they might be operating business goodwill writedowns - 2001 could be GenRe, I'd have to look up...). Also didn't he have Washington Post drop over 50% as he was buying it and wasn't that a large part of his portfolio?

     

    It is still very surprising that he never suffered higher than 2% loss per year in his portfolio - if that's what he means. I don't think there's anyone else who has this kind of record...

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