Mephistopheles

How many courts, cases, and judges now have access to discovery/depositions? I know there are multiple cases in the Court of Claims and the one in the D.C. Court of Appeals. Any other ones? We just need one of the judges in one of the courts to take our side, and that will be a huge boost for the shares.

I'm long and hopeful for the shares but I think that was just a diplomatic answer, not really signaling anything. They (Treasury) and Congress will take the money for as long as possible to help feed their chronic spending spree. What we need is a Congressman or woman who would like to be a hero and bring what's going on to light. While the sweep is great for everyone in Washington, it would be even better for one person to stand out and expose the wrongdoing.

Hi gamecock, would you mind pming me the database name as well? Thanks in advance!

Interesting, do we know what motion this is referring to?

This can't be good for municipalities that rely on parking tickets, moving violations, DUIs, and all other money making schemes involving vehicles. I guess property taxes will be going up in the future. =(

There's still probably a healthy gap from this sort of document to being certain a court will grant relief, I think. e.g. if you go back to the Lamberth decision, he pretty much concludes that the reasons for the FHFA's actions are not relevant, so depending on the claim it's not clear if these documents would matter much in a court's decision. That said this filing is obviously good news! Lamberth basically spelled out that HERA itself is unconstitutional; and because it says FHFA can't be challenged in court, he threw the case out. Which makes me think - there are so many cases here, some challenging FHFA, some challenging Treasury. Why not open a front against Congress/HERA?

here comes the cavalry. Government should prepare for a nuclear winter.

If the judge grants the motion to unseal, I think the government won't settle. At that point, the damaging information is already out there, and they might as well bet their bottom dollar and see if they can be redeemed through the legal process. Imagine borrowing money from a loan shark to go gambling and losing 80% of the money. Well, you might as well bet the remaining 20% because if you don't, you're going to get your legs broken anyway but if you win, you might come out even. I'm unclear on what happens to the New York Times filing if the government decides to do something to settle this stuff before the judge grants any of the motions to unseal. Oh I see what you mean now, I think. So you're saying that making the documents public will not remove the motivation to settle, but simply the judge granting the motion to unseal will. So it's in our best interest that Judge Sweeney rules in favor of the government??

It could be tomorrow or it could be a year from now. I don't know that I have a ton of insight into the timing of a possible settlement. The motions to unseal are a pretty big deal, so if they are a lynchpin, then a settlement could be close. Say the judge grants the motion to unseal, which makes the government want to settle, and they make a deal with Fairholme which keeps the material private in exchange for an end to the 3rd amendment. Would this mean that NYT and other 3rd parties can't unseal the motions? If the judge grants unsealing, can that mean that anyone can just release them, at which point the use of it as leverage to settle doesn't work anymore?

Yup, the discovery documents were filed in the Perry appeal. This request is incredibly weak. Again, I would love to see Sweeney deny their extension of time. (They don't even bother arguing why they should be granted an extension of time w/ the NY Times inquiry.) Lol wtf, that sounds like they are asking for sympathy. "Fairholme got something they want, so at least give us something we want"

A new angle I'm thinking of. How would a Jeb or Hillary administration help or hurt us? I think it's clear now that there is no reform for Fannie/Freddie and they are here to stay. In that case I imagine Clinton would just keep it status quo, but Bush may lean in favor of private ownership rights. Thoughts anyone?

But say the judge rules against a release because doing so would "destroy the world financial system". At that point the leverage is no longer there, correct?

If they don't come out, why does the government have an incentive to settle? I assume you mean the risk of them being released in the future would be the incentive. If the judge doesn't allow them to be made public, wouldn't that be the end of the story of them being released, at least for long enough that it wouldn't matter?

The Epstein always sounds confident. haven't heard this call, but I remember on one of the previous ones he mentioned how even though Plaintiffs might be morally or even legally correct, the government still has a fair shot simply because Courts tend to give it too much deference. Seemed not too confident imo. He also noted what you said...if you have a 100% seals case against the govt it's only 50% winnable Sorry I'm doing this from my phone H Yep that's what I was referring to..so I think him becoming more confident than that, is a great sign

Epstein always sounds confident. Haven't heard this call, but I remember on one of the previous ones he mentioned how even though Plaintiffs might be morally or even legally correct, the government still has a fair shot simply because Courts tend to give it too much deference. Seemed not too confident imo.

The conservatorship by law suspends dividends except for the senior preferred, with or without the sweep. So imo, it's not a valid legal argument. And no problem, I actually asked this question last year. :) I have a related question regarding the junior preferred dividends. The 8.25% prefs are obviously selling for a premium to the variable rate ones. I know holders of these are banking on them selling above par if we win. So my question is, have you thought about the chances of them being called in this case? This would make the variable ones a better deal. I assume that they'd want to call the high rate ones asap. Or do you think because of capitalization concerns, they may hold off on calling, which would make the fixed rated ones a better deal?

Thanks merkhet. So you're saying that the limited relief was granted for the other case? Or that this is your best guess? What other situations can it be granted for? I was under the impression that limited relief meant selective parts of the depositions are going to be unsealed to the public.

Document #162 was the motion for unsealing the DeMarco & Ugoletti depositions. Please forgive my ignorance but what is the significance of this, if any? +1 From Merkhet's post, it sounds like it could be really bad or really good :P

The write-up of $15 billion would be reduced by a tax liability equal to the percentage tax rate multiplied by $15 billion. So call that around a $12 billion increase in book value (rather than $15 billion). Oh yes of course, thanks for the correction! :)

So doing some back of the envelope math here: Berkshire owns 55.36% of Heinz for $4.25 billion + $5.536 billion for the special dividend. Now it's 55.36% of 51% of the new company, so 28.23% of 1.217 billion KHC shares, or 343,559,100 shares. At $72.40 that's roughly $25 billion, or a $15 billion write up from the original investment. Add $15 billion to $241 billion book value to get $256 billion. At $335 billion market cap that's 1.3x book value. So, BRK is a buy right now.

"I turned my computer into an ATM"

As a former research analyst, I'd like to reinforce that research reports should be ignored except to learn cold facts such as numbers in a financial statement. Analysts are very smart, hard working, decent people. But there is a major restraint to the quality of their work and that is the short term bias that is pervasive in the industry for a multitude of reasons. I'm sure everyone is aware of this, but just wanted it to be heard from someone who's been in the industry.

Look at page 21 of the URL you supplied: http://assuredguaranty.com/uploads/PDFs/AGM_1Q15_Supplement.pdf The table at the bottom of page 21 says the net par exposure of $4.0 Gross is only $2.2B. Unfortunately, the table at the top gives a calculation of "Gross Debt Service Outstanding". They do NOT define this term in their glossary. Nor do they supply a calculation based on net exposure. Really very frustrating. What is AGO's Net Exposure (who cares about gross?) including costs to service interest payments? There has to be a present value calculation for that 20 year stream of interest rate payments, otherwise how do you estimate an impairment of book value? I agree there are reasons to believe that there will not be a 60% wipeout of par value. But even if there is, AGO appears to be able to survive that. I just want to know where a safe number would be to draw a line in the sand, and I want that number to absorb a 60% wipeout for par, and added to that the present value of the net interest payment exposure. Pg. 23 of that same url provides an amortization schedule showing $3.7 billion total net debt service. However, that link is only for Assured Guaranty Municipal. $4.94 billion is the consolidated net par of all the subs & parent. The total net debt service exposure is $8.3 billion. This is presented on pg 127-128 of the 10q. http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1273813/000127381315000019/gaapago-03x31x2015x10q.htm#s70292AA5063AA576264DCBEE3D8605D3

I see double posted questions and links from time to time. I can see why it could be annoying, but why not just ignore it? That's what I do. It takes a microsecond to scroll past a repeat question/link. And imo it doesn't happen that often. Same with starting topics expecting to have others do the work. Just ignore them and move on. Ignoring is much easier and a lot less stressful than getting worked up and trying to change behavior. Especially since a vast majority of the posts on this forum are unlike the type we don't like.

Merkhet, I read that. Thanks for sharing. By the way, GSELinks.com will be posting the Lampert shareholder letter to their site tonight. I read it too, thanks Merkhet.