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Excerpt from 2014 annual letter

MarioP

By MarioP
in Berkshire Hathaway

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thepupil Mentor

thepupil

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"My advice to the trustee could not be more simple: Put 10% of the cash in short-term government bonds and 90% in a very low-cost S&P 500 index fund. (I suggest Vanguard's. (VFINX)) I believe the trust's long-term results from this policy will be superior to those attained by most investors -- whether pension funds, institutions, or individuals -- who employ high-fee managers."

 

Why not Berkshire?

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txlaw Newbie

txlaw

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Simply the best article to present «How to invest like Buffett!»

 

Easy to understand for every Joe Sixpack, funny but so true. A condensed version of «The intelligent investor».

 

http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2014/02/24/warren-buffett-berkshire-letter/

 

I will send hit to my non investors friend to see if it is as clear as it seems to me.

 

This is great -- will be forwarding it on as well.  Thanks for posting.

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Straddle Newbie

Straddle

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Nice, thanks for the link.

 

You don't need to be an expert in order to achieve satisfactory investment returns. But if you aren't, you must recognize your limitations and follow a course certain to work reasonably well. Keep things simple and don't swing for the fences.

 

Games are won by players who focus on the playing field -- not by those whose eyes are glued to the scoreboard. If you can enjoy Saturdays and Sundays without looking at stock prices, give it a try on weekdays.

 

 

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Palantir Newbie

Palantir

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Forming macro opinions or listening to the macro or market predictions of others is a waste of time. Indeed, it is dangerous because it may blur your vision of the facts that are truly important. (When I hear TV commentators glibly opine on what the market will do next, I am reminded of Mickey Mantle's scathing comment: "You don't know how easy this game is until you get into that broadcasting booth.")

 

+1

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treasurehunt Enthusiast

treasurehunt

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I find it interesting that he's cash in the estate - 90% will go buy SPY and 10% short term bonds -  so he has no faith in buying BRK? Is Warren suggesting SPY will do better than BRK over the long term?    Gary

 

Buffett wouldn't be the one doing the buying; his wife would be, after his death. Presumably Buffett thinks she shouldn't invest in Berkshire unless she is willing and able to make a rough estimate of Berkshire's future earnings. After all, this is what he recommends for valuing any asset in the article. Buffett suggests that investors buy an S&P index fund if they cannot value assets; he's just putting this advice into practice for this wife, I think.

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Kiltacular Newbie

Kiltacular

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I find it interesting that he's cash in the estate - 90% will go buy SPY and 10% short term bonds -  so he has no faith in buying BRK? Is Warren suggesting SPY will do better than BRK over the long term?    Gary

 

Buffett wouldn't be the one doing the buying; his wife would be, after his death. Presumably Buffett thinks she shouldn't invest in Berkshire unless she is willing and able to make a rough estimate of Berkshire's future earnings. After all, this is what he recommends for valuing any asset in the article. Buffett suggests that investors buy an S&P index fund if they cannot value assets; he's just putting this advice into practice for this wife, I think.

 

Good question...good answer

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Rabbitisrich Newbie

Rabbitisrich

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Forming macro opinions or listening to the macro or market predictions of others is a waste of time. Indeed, it is dangerous because it may blur your vision of the facts that are truly important. (When I hear TV commentators glibly opine on what the market will do next, I am reminded of Mickey Mantle's scathing comment: "You don't know how easy this game is until you get into that broadcasting booth.")

 

+1

 

The way he phrases it can lead new investors into believing that macro views are distinct from company fundamentals. But if you listen to Buffett talk about his companies, and how he acted during the demand fall off post-Lehman, he clearly understands that every company-specific expectation implies macro environments that permit those expectations.

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jay21 Newbie

jay21

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Pretty sure the 90-10 was specific to the estate and the bonds were short term.  Also, his graph might be misleading because if you rebalance every so often, you might be deploying cash in down markets and harvesting in up markets, which might make the returns look smoother and better (I am not 100% b/c I didn't do the math).

 

Also, while the author may be technically right that indexing (or I guess any type of asset allocation by his logic)  involves macro forecasting, I think that it does not contradict Buffett saying he does not discuss macro when making stock individual purchases.

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Libs Community Regular

Libs

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Buffett takes his own advice so seriously that he exited the market entirely in 1969 and 1970. Market valuation and analysis is bad :)

 

He didn't exit because he saw a collapse coming, he exited because everything was overpriced. As I understand it. So it wasn't a market call.

 

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