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eclecticvalue

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Posts posted by eclecticvalue

  1.  

     

    What are people thoughts on Hank Greenberg? He's seems like tough guy to work with/for but he seems like he knows his insurance.

     

    Cv Starr was duped into CCME a couple of years ago

    http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-05-25/greenberg-s-starr-to-seek-outside-money-for-buyout-deals

     

    what is CCME ?

     

    It was China Media Express. It was a fraudulent reverse merger company based in China. There were value investors who thought it was undervalued but they were off the mark.

  2. Has anyone thought of creating a portfolio tracking software for the individual investor where it is better than the free options( good but flawed) and the current options (not user friendly, design not great) out there?

  3. I thought 'Looper' was the best film I've seen so far. Batman was pretty good but kind of drawn out. I haven't seen Argo, or Les Miserables yet. Also if you are looking for something to watch with your significant other I thought 'Safety Not Guaranteed' was a really good light hearted film.

     

    +1 for Safety Not Guaranteed. Also check out Ruby Sparks, another indie film with a unique plot.

  4. I have been a regular listener of Marketplace for well over a decade. I think I started listening it it  more than 15 yrs ago. Great show. Nowadays I turn on the webcast as I begin my afternoon nap (I have in-ceiling speakers in the nap room that bring in the sound). Usually I am fast asleep well before the show ends.

     

    Ah, the ole' osmosis method!  :D

     

    Nice the real pabrai has spoken.

  5. I recently started reading Daniel Kahneman's Thinking Fast and Slow, which I'm enjoying so far, and this strikes me as a System 1 (fast, emotional, "gut feeling") vs System 2 (slow, logical, calculating).  Maybe someone should buy copies for the people who were slagging Silver.

     

    Or read Nate Silver's recently released book. I am planning on reading it soon.

  6. The auction for the Charlie Munger bust Mohnish had commissioned is on!  Rumor has it that one of these busts sits in Charlie's office, along with one at Berkshire HQ and another in Mohnish's home office.  Anyone can bid and own it!  Cheers!

     

    Mohnish has one in his home office if you check this video and look closely in the background it is there hidden in plain sight.

  7. It's both printing and an asset swap.

     

    First they print the money, then they swap it for an asset (bonds).

     

    It is inflationary of course (but right now it's like spitting into a deflationary headwind).

     

     

    The fed create a reserve on the balance sheet for those securities but it is mostly out of thin air. I know it hard to understand that and it may look like printing at first. That is what the fed is doing though. Also fed controls monetary policy they do not print money. Congress prints money with fiscal policy.

     

    Also QE could help with the recovery if banks lend their reserves they have received from the fed. But banks do not want to. So we are seeing signs of deflation instead of inflation. Read this for more information on QE http://pragcap.com/understanding-quantitative-easing

  8. Is anyone seeing what is going on in California. That is merely a preview of HyperInflation. The world's resources are not as elastic as the PHD Standard would have you believe. Keep printing keep subsidizing unproductive classes, in the end they will suffer the most.

     

     

    The reason they are printing money is to head off deflation and keep interest rates low.  It will only cause inflation if and when those excess bank reserves enter into circulation.  Do a search on debt deflation cycle.  Ask the Japanese if they have had hyperinflation. 

     

    Anyway, here is what Bernanke recently said in response to this:

     

    With monetary policy being so accommodative now, though, it is not unreasonable to ask whether we are sowing the seeds of future inflation. A related question I sometimes hear--which bears also on the relationship between monetary and fiscal policy, is this: By buying securities, are you "monetizing the debt"--printing money for the government to use--and will that inevitably lead to higher inflation? No, that's not what is happening, and that will not happen. Monetizing the debt means using money creation as a permanent source of financing for government spending. In contrast, we are acquiring Treasury securities on the open market and only on a temporary basis, with the goal of supporting the economic recovery through lower interest rates. At the appropriate time, the Federal Reserve will gradually sell these securities or let them mature, as needed, to return its balance sheet to a more normal size. Moreover, the way the Fed finances its securities purchases is by creating reserves in the banking system. Increased bank reserves held at the Fed don't necessarily translate into more money or cash in circulation, and, indeed, broad measures of the supply of money have not grown especially quickly, on balance, over the past few years.

     

    Actually QE is an asset swap, Good job on posting that passage from bernanke's speech. He even says QE is not money printing if you read closely. Even though you said the fed was money printing.

  9. Saw this on Reddit shortly after reading this board, and thought some here might like it:

     

    Good read, people need to see the NBC show Rock the Center. They did a segment on the extremism of news on television. It was eye opening to watch Bill O Reilly come forth and talk about how vitriol sells. The segment was on 3 hours ago.

  10. I want in on that!!!!

     

    anyone want to stake me (I'll even look after their hours on the jet - albeit not the cost :D )  ;D

     

    Maybe we can stake you in WSOP instead.

     

    There is another poker player on this message board who seems really good. I was going to suggest in that thread that we stake him for WSOP. I might as well admit it here.

  11. Investors today cannot benefit from past financial performance of any investment. I am sure we cannot evaluate business/security by the past numbers alone. The future development counts in a big way!

     

          Exactly, I first liked the idea and have participated in Distressed Debt Investor's contest but it is hard tell what the future holds from just looking at past numbers. When attempting a valuation, most of the time you will be off. Also you do need to know the industry.

  12. At least the academics know the leverage comes from the insurance float. I just looked into the paper and it is confirmed. I should have done it in the first place.

     

    Now your seeing people like Einhorn and Steven Cohen are trying to copycat Buffett. Too bad Sardar hasn't been able to get one yet.

     

     

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