moore_capital54

Yes, we started buying some but just so we track it, Doing the research as we speak. I view it as potentially an easy double or triple from here, with the only risk being greek currency devaluation.

Keep the cash. While BAC is still very cheap, the markets in general have gone up quite quickly, and the world's problems haven't suddenly disappeared. Things will get cheaper again, be it the entire market or an individual stock...just wait for the fat pitch. While we are digging for ideas as usual, we cannot find as much that interests us and cash is once again building up. We have plenty of exposure to areas that we thought were cheap, and don't want to go much over where we are. So we'll wait once again! Cheers! You see these posts prove exactly where the inflection point lies. I am going to go on a little rant here, but I think the board will appreciate it especially given all the macro/micro discussions and debates going on. I completely disagree with the logic of your post Parsad. We all went long BAC because we felt it was cheap over the very long-term, The fact that BAC is up and our portfolio of concentrated long positions is great, and you have heard it from me here. As of today we are up 25% ytd. But by saying the market has all of a sudden ran up and its time to raise cash, you are attempting to time the market. I have repeatedly said that I have taken nothing off the table, and we are still full throttle long, exactly the same allocation we had going into this year. Why? Because we are long-term investors. The way bull markets are born, are when the bottom feeders begin to sell which creates a consolidation followed by the next leg up. According to our assessment of the market, and intrinsic value for the securities we own, they are still extremely cheap. As such we aren't selling anything and we aren't smart enough to know that now is the time to raise cash. The market may decline by 20% but then subsequently rise by another 40%. It's impossible to know. If anything BAC's aggressive runup merely confirms how wrong the market was. The problem is most investors do not have the endurance to wait it out. Again, not directing this at your Parsad, I am just voicing my opinion here, I value your thoughts and think you are a great investor, but just have to disagree here. If you were long for the same reasons as I, there should be no reason you should be raising cash here, because if you are its merely a market timing exercise. Cheers!

This is for Bmichaud as there was no way to send an attachment via pm. OPAPANNUALREPORT_2010.pdf

Parsad that is a fantastic story! And while I agree with most of what you said relating to making the board an open forum for dialogue, I really do wish there was a way to at least "Bold" certain posters. For example, after seeing merkhet's last post, I really wanna know every time he posts and like some of the other posters I sometimes don't check in for a few weeks. Maybe just think about it? or put it up for a poll? It will only strengthen the board imo and make it more efficient. Cheers!

Hes not pompous hes just super confident because hes made $200mm personally doing exactly what he knows how to do. Some people think Munger is pompous too, in Damn Right there is a great part about Munger at a society party in Bel Air, California. Sometimes successful people who have actually made tons of money have little interest in time wasting exercises. Time is money and not everyone is interested in educating the world or proselytising. There is no rule that states that in order to be a successful value investor or investor, you have to be a super nice guy like Prem/Buffett. Has anyone ever heard of Jeffrey Gundlach? Hes a total a-hole but hes one of the best bond investors alive. Has anyone ever heard of Charles Brandes? He cheats on his wife and gets divorced every other year, hes a total arrogant a hole but hes one of the best out there too. The list goes on and on and on....

This post is hilarious, as all that matters in the end is the NAV. Ignoring the macro turned 100 dollars into 122 as of today even though it was worth 95 at the end of the year. If we chose to we could end the year right now and add another fantastic year to our track records.

Santayana this is the 10th post out of your last 40 which has been directed at me, in a negative fashion. The other 75% of your time was spent on worrying about the markets, not believing the job numbers, or BAC's Tier ratios, and asking the board "how a tender works". Simply put, If there was a way to block you I would have done so by now as you provide zero intellectual stimulation, contrary to posters such as Bmichaud and Munger, who I thoroughly enjoyed engaging with even when I disagree. Back to my last post. All I asked, or suggested was that a poster who says 50% of his portfolio is in XYZ just follow it up with (but I am in College etc.) which the poster then confirmed, exactly as I had suspected. Nobody has to do anything, these are just suggestions.

I wish I were half as crazy as you. Tell me what you see for IRE. Again, it is my humble opinion that it is important, in order to keep this forum as intellectually honest as possible, that posters who say half their portfolio is in IRE, add a small note such as, (But I am in College and have a $5k portfolio) just so we all know what were dealing with. Last time I mentioned this all hell broke loose, but it was really something I felt strongly about only because I see the level interaction on here, and how much time posters will spend responding to almost anyone.

We will short FB, just as we shorted all these other hyped up social network companies. We are shorting them intraday as we speak as they have all popped on the "Facebook effect".

not everyone in the world aspires to run a hedge fund and bathe in a bathtub full of cash, or be a master of the universe. Hamilton took a break from his old life to life in North Dakota, and do what he loves which is watch the markets and write about them. No doubt he is personally worth 7-8 figures as well just by being so good. Longs are flat, shorts are up - do the math. Long portfolio is chock-full of good event stocks that won't necessarily participate in a month-long, low volume rally. Just recently swapped out of a multi-year holding that the market is getting a bit too excited about (including Mr. Cramer) into a name that is trading at less than 7 times FCF to equity, has a 12% total payout yield and is a potential takeout candidate at a market cap of $10 billion. All that said, the portfolio is in phenomenal shape for any environment going forward with good hedges in place, "events" set to transpire within the year, and a huge position in a severely undervalued business that has a balance sheet I can understand. Mr. Hamilton made a wonderful call on the market rocketing above its 200dma. What's curious to me however, is why someone that claims his stock picks have averaged over 50% annualized returns over the past ten years is writing free essays on the direction of the market as oppose to keeping his "secret sauce" to himself and making billions running a hedge fund. I remain skeptical - however, after giving his essays a "trial run" if you will, I will certainly take his opinion into stronger consideration when putting on hedges. His analysis has absolutely obliterated Hussman's outrageous weekly perma-bear musings.

I'll take this one. The reason is due to Zuckerberg's "comprehensive security program." The reason why you're even able to comment on it is because elsewhere in the S-1, FB has outlined the terms of its private aircraft use. They state explicitly that the CEO and COO are allowed to use the private aircraft for business purposes. Zuckerberg is allowed to use the private aircraft for any purpose because his security program requires that he doesn't fly commercial. If Zuckerberg travels with family and friends, the flight cost attributed to them is added to Zuckerberg's compensation so that everyone can see. So, not really bone chilling and it seems like an honest inclusion to me. From the S-1: You can't be this naive? Do you really believe that Zuckerberg is such a high profile human being that he needs to only fly private? While Senators and Congressman still fly first class? Moreover, if he is part of such a comprehensive security program why does he knock down pints at the local bars in Palo Alto, and where is his "security detail" I have never seen a photo of him surrounded by anybody. This is just a way to rationalize his usage of a private jet utilizing shareholder funds.

Another bone chilling tidbit: (3) The amount reported represent approximately $692,679 for costs related to personal use of aircraft chartered in connection with his comprehensive security program and on which family and friends flew during 2011. For purposes of reporting the value of such personal usage in this table, we use costs provided by the applicable charter company, which include passenger fees, fuel, crew and catering costs. The amount reported also represents approximately $90,850 for costs related to estate and financial planning during 2011. Why in the heck does a 27 year old need to fly in a private jet with his friends and family. And if that is the case, why does the company need to pay for it?

The following is a reconciliation of FCF to the most comparable GAAP measure, net cash provided by operating activities: Year Ended December 31, 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 (in millions) Net cash provided by operating activities $ 11 $ 8 $ 155 $ 698 $ 1,549 Purchases of property and equipment (55 ) (70 ) (33 ) (293 ) (606 ) Property and equipment acquired under capital leases (11 ) (26 ) (56 ) (217 ) (473 Free cash flow $ (55 ) $ (88 ) $ 66 $ 188 $ 470 So essentially investors are going to be payin 200x FCF for FB, I wonder how thats going to turn out :)

This post too falls under the conjecture bucket for me. Who's to say the day we posted the "What did everyone buy today" thread was not going to be the day stocks bottomed? The fact that stocks panicked further and we had to average down is only a testament to the fact that nobody really knows when the bottom is in. Our jobs are to buy securities when they fall below our assessment of intrinsic value, and historically, the best time to do so are during major down days. Macro should be disregarded, if enough margin of safety is presented by Mr. Market. Maybe there is more pain to come this year, but the fact that in 30 days most equities discussed on this board have risen by 30-50% indicates that they were severely undervalued.

-7% in value funds net of fees, -5% in resource funds.

I completely disagree with the logic of this response. Our job as value investors is to seek value irregardless of the macro environment. Some of us like myself, may or may not have an macro edge with our understanding of the monetary system. With that said, the purpose of this thread was to gauge which investors disregarded the macro drama to find some incredible bargains, as we did here in Toronto. To use hindsight and tell me why the market is up helps us learn little about your investing skills. Cheers!

Well its been nearly 2 months since the majority of this board felt the world was going to hell and a hand basket. We are printing money here at XXXX XXX Capital, LLC (Almost slipped and told ya :) up nearly 22% in the value funds and 7% in our resource funds. Some investors that are definitely doing well are probably Ericopoloy, and Parsad who were as bullish as I was all through the August-December period. I can't imagine Bmichaud or Munger are doing that great... Would love to hear and see how some have positioned themselves. Were still totally long, not taking a cent off the table.

I am not disagreeing that these things aren't used appropriately in many situations, but the same can be said for many things in life. One of the things we used to say was don't blame the lion for killing it's prey. It's the lion's nature. It doesn't make it right, but it is what it is. Regulators and such are great at regulating and preventing the last crisis. Get rid of one thing and something else will take it's place. Wall Street really isn't a den of thieves, it's a misnomer. There have been dens of thieves of course, but Wall Street itself is simply a bunch of people who are made up of about 99% greed and 1% water. Greed is as greed does (to adapt Forest Gump's famous line). Most of these things serve a purpose, not all, but most. Wall Street would serve itself better if it simply took things to the line instead of always going over the line and causing the rubber band to snap back. But again, the lion and all that. Again, as disciples of Graham & Dodd and Buffett, I believe we are all held to a different standard around here. Kraven can it be argued that was Paulson did was on the right side of the law, probably, maybe. Does it pass the front page of the newspaper test no, not at all. Relating to synthetics I stick to my position that they serve no purpose. An analog would be, say you wanted to buy 50,000,000 shares of BAC right now at 7.39, and yet you can only buy around 1,000,000 on the ask. Well you call up your prime broker, in my case Scotia, and I ask them to find me some german fund who is willing to take the other side, at 7.39 right this instance, and to sell me 50,000,000. Well they don't own that 50,000,000 so instead they will create a new security that now tracks the price of BAC and take the other side. Well lets see what happened here, instead of buying those 50,000,000 shares in the market, and getting filled based on the laws of supply and demand, I coerced, or through my fees, convinced my prime broker to convince their clients to take the other side of this "gamble". That is what Abacus was, Paulson could not get filled on enough mortgage securities, so he decided to create a tracking security, and paid his brokers to coerce idiots into taking the other side. For this reason it does not pass the front page of the newspaper test, and it should be outlawed. You can argue otherwise, but I stand firm on this point.

Well not to nit-pick but it's because Paulson never made claims as to the quality of the securities. Goldman didn't get in trouble for creating Abacus (it's not illegal to create crappy investments); they got in trouble because internally they were laughing about how crappy the security was while simultaneously withholding the fact that Paulson designed it to be crappy from their investors. And then Goldman claimed that their incentives were aligned with investors when they were actually shorting it. Why does Paulson get in trouble for claims Goldman was making? But I agree with your sentiment. It also seems like the Wolfsons are getting off easy; I think the most severe punishment the government is going for is being banned from the securities markets. I don't believe incarceration is on the table from what I can tell. There will always be fraud all over Wall Street until prosecutors start throwing the major players in federal PYITA prison. And not just the Indian ones (yea, I don't think it's a coincidence personally.) I agree with your logic to an extent, but the SEC should have simply "followed the money" and essentially this security was a tool that stole money from the germans and handed it to Paulson. Paulson was the architect, Paulson knew just as did Goldman what he was doing, and he did not deserve those gains. I have much respect for paulson, and especially with this CDS Trade, but he does not deserve to get filled more than the market allows just because hes paulson. Synthetic securities should be outlawed.

I suggest that you all read the actual SEC compliant. In it a special section has Mr. Wolfson visiting a large fund which the SEC refused to name, that was short FFH Shares. Mr. Wolfson offered to "reset" the hedge fund's short position in FFH in exchange for a 20% borrow fee as opposed to the 30% that was being charged by the funds prime broker. This complaint feels very similar to the one brought against goldman, instead of Paulson for creating the abacus series of CDS's. Why were Paulsons people allowed to sit and choose what piece of crap mortgages to throw into Abacus and then hire Goldman to sell them to the Germans, and goldman only gets in trouble? The architect was Paulson. Once again, the wolfsons were just the grease in the machine, they were the enablers that allowed the funds to short synthetic shares, electronically of real businesses. Why aren't the funds being sued?

Thanks bmichaud, this is turning out to be a monster year here for us up nearly 20% YTD in the value funds and more than making up for the slight loss in 2011. Remember, in a fiat money system the government will always resort to printing money, some way somehow. The LTRO is just a transmission mechanism for the ECB. Word on the street here is that RISK IS BACK ON. Fundamentals still look great to me, especially in the resource space.

Congrats BAC longs, the thesis is starting to play out quite well, we are now earning a return on our position.

Agreed.. Starting out as a very good year for net long value investors.

Anyone else think this would be a great time for OSTK and SHLD to merge :)

http://zealllc.com/2011/reccraze.htm This weeks Adam Hamilton. The difference between Zeal and ZH is that Zeal was very bearish towards the late nineties and I have seen him turn bearish throughout this decade as well. Actually, I am quite surprised at how bullish he has become these past few months. Cheers!