Liberty

Smazz, do you have a link to the article that this graph is taken from? I can't seem to find it. Thanks!

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/05/the-double-dips-official-home-prices-fall-to-new-low/238423/ http://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/business/assets_c/2011/05/clear%20capital%20home%20prices%202011-04-thumb-500x348-50007.png Update: The title of this thread is the Atlantic's headline, not mine. I think they mean a double dip in the housing market, not whole economy...

More than evolution by natural selection, you mean? What more do you need?

This drop was pretty predictable, so someone was probably just waiting for it to back up the truck and load up.

Sometimes I wish we would focus more on discussing potential investments and less on how/why we disagree with each other. It's good for each side to state a position, but after a certain point, it just goes in circles and it's more productive to just agree to disagree and get back to more interesting things like 10Ks, PC market pricing levels, and combined ratios ;D Public debates are rarely resolved satisfactorily for simple evolutionary-psychology reasons. Productive discussions with divergent viewpoints are usually achieved in private, when there's no audience. My 2 cents.

As a relatively new investor, I'm constantly trying to learn, and I do appreciate it when you talk about your processes and criterias, Harry. Thanks for that.

That's indeed my main concern, that they haven't been around that long. From what I can tell, they have experienced people in management and they've had backing from savvy players (Chubb, Goldman Sachs) since their creation in 2002, but it's hard to know if that means much... But at a P/E under 5 and book around 0.8, there seems to be a decent margin of safety there... I dunno, that's why I asked the board, to get more opinions. I'm personally undecided. I'd probably invest if they had a longer history and if management held more shares..

Harry, what do you think of AWH? I'm a fan of RLI, but AWH seems pretty solid too, and sells below book, unlike RLI, and the combined ratios have been in the low to mid 80s recently. I made a thread about it here but so far it's only crickets and tumbleweeds... http://cornerofberkshireandfairfax.ca/forum/index.php?topic=4287.0

Thanks for this summary, Onyx!

Thanks for the summary, Parsad, and thanks for all your work in organizing this and creating this amazing online community. And of course, thanks to Fairfax and the other CEOs and investors who came. sounds like it was a blast. If any of the people who went and had a chance to chat with the FFH people could give us their summaries of what they learned, that'd be awesome for those of us who missed it. Thanks!

Have fun guys & gals and take photos for those of us who can't make it ;D

Great. Can't wait to get my hands on it (somehow)...

Thanks for another thought-provoking comment, Bonechip!

Looks like you had lots of fun. Kudos to the organizers and to Fairfax!

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/04/19/buffett-and-sokol-sued-over-trading-in-lubrizol-shares/

Working now. Not sure what the problem was..

Thanks for posting the transcript, Bathtime. Very interesting. "These assets we were able to acquire and secure for $1.2 million. A lot of people thought we were crazy and probably spent too much. However, their replaceable insurance cost is $851 million. These assets are more than 95 per cent ideally suited for our new product, dissolving pulp. As we turn this project around and convert to dissolving pulp, we are able to take these $1.2 million assets that were heavily underutilized by the previous owner, and, once we are fully converted to dissolving pulp, even at the initial stages, given the current or spot price of dissolving pulp, the mill will generate just over $200 million in profit."

I get an error page ???

Thanks Bonechip. Do you have info about labor relations at the various plants? That's one thing that concerns me and that I haven't really seen mentioned anywhere.

You've made me take a second look at FTP, Bonechip. What's your take on IV and stock valuation right now? Stock went down pretty significantly lately. Buying opp?

That's one of my picks. I also think Robin Raina of EBIX has been doing an impressive job.

Gannon posted a review of it: http://www.gurufocus.com/news/128995/book-review-the-big-secret-for-the-small-investor

The more I learn about China, the more I think it's going to end badly.. Problem is, how long can it last? Who knows...

How old are Cumming and Steinberg?

http://www.financialpost.com/personal-finance/mortgages/Pricey+property+surge+drives+average/4621592/story.html