Evolveus

That is a long list of stocks on the 13F but awesome to see over 85% of that $75 billion portfolio in the top 10 names, and 68% of that in the top 4! Practicing as they preach.

Watching clips like that gives me anxiety. Only got about 3mins deep.

http://www.dataroma.com/m/holdings.php?m=BAUPOST Buys into AIG. Does anyone remember what percentage of total AUM for Baupost is represented by equities?

Sunrider, My vote is for Finbond as well. And page 36 of that report does not show up properly on my iPhone but it came thru fine on my work PC. So yes, I could confirm the ceo's equity stake.

In the recent Khrom Cpaital letter, Eric Khrom laid out the case for a new position in the fund refered to as "Lender A", a micro lender that recieved the first mutual banking license in its country in 13 years with a CEO that owns 45% of the equity. There has been some speculation as to who is "Lender A", and I think 'Yours Truly' from the board here is correct in saying that it is Finbond. I did some digging with a friend and found intersting stuff on an Indian micro lender SKS. While SKS looked interesting on the surface of relative valuation, I confirmed that Finbond got the first license in South Africa since 1998 and that its CEO owns 46.4% of the equity. I will attached the micro finance report from JPM which shows SKS's valuation relative to peers (pg. 17) and I'll also attached the recent report and correspondance from Finbond showing executive equity stakes. SKS legwork (don't know if my hyper links carry thru with copy and paste) I've been googling and trying to connect some dots. I've found a few things that may be indicating it is an Indian lender, but not certain. Attached is a really cool JPM microfinance report from 2012. There is a a great chart on page 17 showing P/E, P/BV, & ROE. The obvious valuation outlier in that chart is SKS of India. On page 8 of the report, they briefly mention the Andhra Pradesh 'microfinance crisis.' I found a brief article that elaborates on that 2010 'crisis' HERE. from that article: "In particular, the dramatic expansion of microfinance in Andhra Pradesh, a state in southern India, ended in a crisis that caused significant ripples across the industry. The common response to this crisis has been to call for better regulated microfinance operations. The latter is undoubtedly important yet, in what follows, I suggest that the Andhra Pradesh crisis opens a window onto bigger issues of debt and distress within agrarian India." I haven't had a lot of luck with SKS financials though as far as determining equity positions of officers/CEO, as SKS appears the founder left the company in late 2011. A couple of dots • According to almighty Google, there are only three publicly traded microfinance companies: 1. Group Compartamos (Mexico) 2. Equity Bank (Kenya) 3. SKS (India) • Given that Khrom is a man of the Value Cloth, I am making the assumption that he is focusing on SKS due to low relative valuation presented in the JPM report following the microfinance crisis in India. • I also found that American venture capitalist Sequoia Capital have taken a stake in SKS in the last year or so. • Times of India newspaper reports RBI urged to ready new bank license norms - from November 2012 • SKS turns the corner and reports first profit in 7 quarters. • Quote from CFO in recent quarterly statement: "Fully providing for the Andhra Pradesh exposure, optimization of cost structure, delivering promises, coming out of the supply-side shock, portfolio protection and recapitalization are the building blocks of SKS Microfinance Limited's turnaround strategy,” said Mr S. Dilli Raj, Chief Financial Officer, SKS Microfinance Limited. “By returning to profitability, we have successfully emerged out of the Andhra Pradesh microfinance crisis. With a capital adequacy of 39% and sufficient liquidity, we are well equipped to reap the fruits of sector consolidation, advantageous change in the competitive landscape, a favourable regulatory climate and, of course, the enhanced business prospects." A couple of holes • I am having trouble finding management compensation, shares owned etc. Khrom's statement about the CEO's 45% interest is compelling and I'd really like to verify that. • There are loads of micro finance companies out there, but seemingly only a few public. I'd like further confirmation on Khrom's mention of LEA receiving the first domestic bank to be granted a banking license in thirteen years. At any rate, that's a start. Of course, I could be totally wrong, but I think I'm sniffing in the right direction. FINDBOND Correspondance Thanks for your enquiry about Finbond Mutual Bank. We obtained the first new banking license from the SA Reserve Bank since 1998. The bank that started off in South Africa just before us, is Capitec, who bought over the banking license from Regal Bank. As far as the shares question is concerned , the answer is on page 36 , point 5 of the attached 2012 report. Anton van Sittert Investment Manager Finbond Mutual Bank Tel: +27 (0)12 460-7288 Fax: 087 231 6127 Cell: 071 898 3843 anton@finbond.co.za www.finbondmutualbank.co.za Finbond_annual_report.pdf JPM_microfinance_report.pdf

Thanks for posting. Anyone know where I can find more information about Lender A (LEA) that is mentioned in Khrom Capital's letter. Autoinfo is another interesting stock owned by Khrom Capital: http://seekingalpha.com/article/1048651-autoinfo-a-growing-truck-freight-broker-not-priced-like-one Lender a = Finbond group in South Africa Yours Truly, Curious with how you came up with Finbond in South Africa. I was doing some research and my dots pointed towards SKS of India, but there are still a few holes in my story. If you'd like to exchange notes PM me since this was the SHOS thread. Thx

"Investing in a Low Growth World" - Grantham "We have met the Enemy and He is Us" - Inker GMO_QtlyLetter_4Q2012.pdf

http://www.moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2013/02/graham-and-doddsville-winter-newsletter.html Features Jana Partners (Agrium) and Frank Martin. Always a good read.

A more in depth view of East Coast's view of transformation companies. UNP, CFX, WBC http://moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2013/01/east-coast-asset-management-q4-letter.html

http://moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2012/12/grants-interest-rate-observer-winter.html h/t Above Average Odds Investing

Gundlach shares his thoughts on cash, the homebuilders, a re-pricing, and Japan. http://moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2012/12/jeff-gundlach-on-bloomberg-tv.html

You're welcome. I think he is one of the sharpest minds out there. If nothing else, he is a realist.

Kyle Bass's most recent keynote, given Oct 1st. US, Japan, China, and debt related issues, and a touch on shadow inventory in the Q&A http://moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2012/12/kyle-bass-keynote-engtanglement.html h/t Frank Voisin

It seems that alot of others agree that folks like Ackman are a good thing. Ackman named CEO of the Year: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-magazine/rob-magazines-ceo-of-the-year-bill-ackman/article5795408/?page=all I like the fact that certain activists hold boards accountable. Boards can get away with murder, with other peoples money and then golden parachute from the burning plane. I would love to see less of that. CHK's previous board comes to mind as far as incompetent, self-dealing, and no skin in the game. However, as someone who had to fight the job market of 2010, to see 4500 lost jobs does make me wince. As people and machines become more productive and automated, coupled with stagnant growth, it will be interesting to see how it impacts jobs.

WEB speaks with Matt Lauer about Cyber Monday sales, consumer confidence, and some thoughts on the future of the American economy. http://video.today.msnbc.msn.com/today/49976804#49977035

Warren Buffett out with another NY Times op-ed on taxes: http://t.co/kaCMGTmw

The American Home is a real estate partnership run by a value oriented hedge fund manager Aaron Edelhiet. He ran Sabre Value then around 2009-2010ish, he went all in on residential real estate beginning in the Atlanta area and then expanding. They currently have around 1000 SFH's that are owned and available for rent. As far as specifics of the partnership's returns or leverage, I do not know, but it fits your criteria of passive RE investing. Not too many have been able to successfully scale SFH to this degree. http://theamericanhome.com/

That's a fair question. Anything that I read and think is worthwhile or worth revisiting goes on my blog first. My blog is a collection of things that I'm in to - not just investment articles. I have the blog as an outlet for myself bc not a lot of folks where I live want to talk about value investing, or vinyl or proper cocktails or hard to find craft brew. It's another online storage place for those things for me and possibly a point of interesting interaction. I'm not living in the town from the movie Deliverance or anything, but I've gone from a major metro, to a significantly smaller place, but I still have my big city tastes. I post to the blog first for myself and then ill tweet it and if its relevant, post a link here on the board.

Howard Marks: A Fresh Start (Hopefully) http://moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2012/11/howard-marks-latest-memo-fresh-start.html

I couldn't find them on SEC.Gov either. I spoke with the blogger over at 'Chasing Bruce Greenwald' and he said he didn't think they were above 100m yet either, bc once again no SEC trail that he could find.

The latest from Jeremy Grantham of GMO, with additional commentary from Ben Inker. This is the first time I have read anything from Inker. "On the Road to Zero Growth" - Grantham pgs. 1-17 "Help, Help, I'm Being Repressed" - Inker pgs. 18-20 http://moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2012/11/gmos-jeremy-grantham-on-road-to-zero.html

An advantage to a Roth is that there are no required minimum distributions for the account owner unlike a traditional Ira at age 70.5. Below i pasted text from an article on Boston.com that explai a that in a little more depth. Required Minimum Distributions for Roth IRAs "Roth IRA owners are not required to take Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs) but the beneficiaries of their Roth IRA may. Unlike traditional IRAs, owners of Roth IRAs are not required to take RMDs during their lifetime. However, after a Roth IRA account owner dies, non-spouse beneficiaries of the owner's Roth IRA do need to take RMDs. Spousal beneficiaries have the option to take RMDs or have the Roth IRA treated as their own, thus avoiding the need to take RMDs on the Roth IRA. In other words, for a Roth IRA, RMD rules do not apply before the owner's death. However, when the Roth IRA owner dies, RMDs must begin unless the beneficiary of the Roth IRA is the owner's surviving spouse. Generally, non-spouse beneficiaries of a Roth IRA must begin taking RMDs after the account owner dies and must be fully distribute the IRA within five years. In cases where all of the non-spouse beneficiaries are 'designated beneficiaries', the Roth IRA can be distributed over the life expectancy of the oldest beneficiary if the distributions begin by December 31 of the year after the account owner dies."

This may be old news as its dated October 22nd, but it looks like SHLD holders will be receiving shares of Sears Canada with SHLD lowering its ownership to 51%. It's nice to see some tangible evindence by Lampert to start unlocking the value embedded in the Holding Co. http://www.benzinga.com/news/12/10/3015494/sears-holdings-approves-partial-spin-off-of-its-interest-in-sears-canada

Well, I just made up one and got in ;) Well played, sir!

here is a link to a recent interview with Hugh Hendry with his macro thoughts and then at the 55 minute mark David Einhorn who talks about why he believes fed policy is not and will not work. FYI: Last night I watched the video fine and when I went back today it was asking for my email to continue watching. I'm not a fan of that at all, and I can understand why others are not as well. Other than that, its a good discussion http://moneyinstereo.blogspot.com/2012/10/hugh-hendry-and-david-einhorn.html