Buffett/Berkshire - general news

[Dynamic]

Very interesting how chocolate tastes differ around the world, and how climate influences the types sold too, which is probably why Cadbury's made in the USA has to have a different recipe to the mostly cooler UK where it can melt in the mouth almost instantly (I've just shared a few squares of Dairy Milk in the UK with my wife. We like Hershey's too, when we're in the US or Mexico, but there's something about Cadbury's we miss.

 

On a different note, tastes for fine chocolates differ too. Lindor does very well in the UK. Leonidas is a favourite brand of ours (especially the white chocolate with yuzu dark chocolate ganache filling), but there seem to be fewer places to buy it in the UK over the last 5 years and we were glad to get some on a recent trip to London. We often stock up when visiting France or its native Belgium and need just one chocolate at a time and really savour it, so the box can last many months. We have family near Pau in France who raved over a particular chocolatier, but we enjoyed it and loved the store but wouldn't rave over it like them, so it's very much a matter of taste.

[gfp]

Meanwhile, Berkshire just keeps bidding on these distorted T-bill auctions!

 

[Gamecock-YT]

Think that's the treasury direct/retail rate that you have circled

[gfp]

6 minutes ago, Gamecock-YT said:

Think that's the treasury direct/retail rate that you have circled

 

That is the coupon-equivalent yield on a $35 Billion bill auction for 21-day bills.

 

[Paarslaars]

16 hours ago, Dynamic said:

Very interesting how chocolate tastes differ around the world, and how climate influences the types sold too, which is probably why Cadbury's made in the USA has to have a different recipe to the mostly cooler UK where it can melt in the mouth almost instantly (I've just shared a few squares of Dairy Milk in the UK with my wife. We like Hershey's too, when we're in the US or Mexico, but there's something about Cadbury's we miss.

 

On a different note, tastes for fine chocolates differ too. Lindor does very well in the UK. Leonidas is a favourite brand of ours (especially the white chocolate with yuzu dark chocolate ganache filling), but there seem to be fewer places to buy it in the UK over the last 5 years and we were glad to get some on a recent trip to London. We often stock up when visiting France or its native Belgium and need just one chocolate at a time and really savour it, so the box can last many months. We have family near Pau in France who raved over a particular chocolatier, but we enjoyed it and loved the store but wouldn't rave over it like them, so it's very much a matter of taste.

 

Yes Leonidas is the best, I prefer the manon:

 

[Spekulatius]

My bought some of TJ 85% Uganda chocolate that @rkbabangand it's indeed very good. I rate it 8-9/10, about even with Ghiradelli. The TJ chocolate is incredible smooth tasting for the 85% cocoa content while Ghiradelli is slightly bitter.

Both are better than the Lindt 85% or 92% bars imo.

 

Both are great Chocolates and the TJ for $2 is an absolute bargain. After all we are value investors here.

Edited May 26, 2023 by Spekulatius

[rkbabang]

2 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

My bought some of TJ 85% Uganda chocolate that @rkbabangand it's indeed very good. I rate it 8-9/10, about even with Ghiradelli. The TJ chocolate is incredible smooth tasting for the 85% cocoa content while Ghiradelli is slightly bitter.

Both are better than the Lindt 85% or 92% bars imo.

 

Both are great Chocolates and the TJ for $2 is an absolute bargain. After all we are value investors here.

 

Yep,  maybe there is better chocolate in the world somewhere, but it is the best I have access to in my area in any grocery store, and I seriously doubt there is a better value on any dark chocolate in the US.  If there is something available that is as good and cheaper I'd love to know.

 

[NnnnotSoSmart]

Speaking of chocolate. More nibbling of OXY by Buffett.

 

BRK bought another 4,660,809 OXY shares for $272,996,222.  Average price paid: $58.57/share.

 

https://dataroma.com/m/rt.php

 

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1067983/00...

 

He's apparently not interested in "buying control" but he sure keeps buying.

[jks327]

On 5/24/2023 at 9:25 PM, adesigar said:

 

Its something about the ingredients or manufacturing process. US chocolates are more grainy (maybe that's how they are preferred in the US I don't know, its just not to my liking) and often have cheaper ingredients. Even Sees uses Corn Syrup instead of sugar, vanillin instead of vanilla, etc. in some of their chocolates. For the prices they charge you would hope for better ingredients. They claim "We only use the highest quality ingredients - see for yourself!"   https://www.sees.com/ingredients/

 

The best chocolates I have eaten was in Paris.  It was a store called Patrick Roger.

 

From what I've read you have to use vanillin when making hard candy, it gets hot enough that regular vanilla will burn and lose its flavor.  Supposedly vanillin is made from tree bark, sounds like there could be worse but then again I haven't eaten anything with added sugar since 2018.

[gfp]

Jury decision against PacifiCorp - Oregon fires

 

https://apnews.com/article/wildfires-utility-company-berkshire-hathaway-warren-buffett-ff26bcf69a111e7343e7f806c6c7c937

[crs223]

going forward, i hope they shut off the power whenever the wind speeds exceed 20 mph.

[gfp]

Little update on BRK's Japanese investments:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[jbwent63]

I track the shares, and since March 31 as a group they are up over 29% vs. the Nikkei being up 17.75%. In terms of yen, the gain is about 558.5 billion yen (about $4 billion USD), and the total value of the shares held as of today is 2.465 trillion yen ($17.7 billion USD). Amazing performance.

 

Edited June 13, 2023 by jbwent63
error

[Charlie]

I like the Apple chart :

 

 

Buffett began buying in Q1 2016.

Edited June 13, 2023 by Charlie

[Munger_Disciple]

Buffett the 

[Xerxes]

These charts of Japanese investments have very good technicals (half-pretending I know what that is). Unlike charts of rice futures from Osaka exchange. 
 

good job Omaha !!

 

Just wished it was a tad larger. And not just “keeping-yourself-out-of-the-bar” right-sized.  

[gfp]

9 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

These charts of Japanese investments have very good technicals

 good technicals = up and to the right

[Ulti]

https://beyondbengraham.com/6-sharing-memories-of-ben-graham-with-warren-buffett-in-omaha-2023/

[BiggieCheese]

 

Has anyone investigated the recent surge in Class A share trading volume? Could this be attributed to the rise in fractional share trading?

 

User @aws figured out a year ago that the increase beginning in 2021 was due to Robinhood fractional shares a month before the WSJ reported on it (Robinhood Was Behind Phantom Surge in Berkshire Hathaway Trade Volume, Study Finds - WSJ). It doesn't seem like retail fractional share trading would be more than triple the activity during 2021. 

 

Additionally, trading volume has been 36% higher on Mondays than the rest of the week so far in 2023. This trend seems to have been around since 2020, albeit to a lesser extent. I doubt the items are correlated but it seems like another odd trend.

 

[Munger_Disciple]

3 hours ago, BiggieCheese said:

 

Has anyone investigated the recent surge in Class A share trading volume? Could this be attributed to the rise in fractional share trading?

 

User @aws figured out a year ago that the increase beginning in 2021 was due to Robinhood fractional shares a month before the WSJ reported on it (Robinhood Was Behind Phantom Surge in Berkshire Hathaway Trade Volume, Study Finds - WSJ). It doesn't seem like retail fractional share trading would be more than triple the activity during 2021. 

 

Additionally, trading volume has been 36% higher on Mondays than the rest of the week so far in 2023. This trend seems to have been around since 2020, albeit to a lesser extent. I doubt the items are correlated but it seems like another odd trend.

 

 

I think it is still related to fractional share trading which pretty much all brokerages offer these days (I know Schwab offers it). It is hard to believe that there was more dollar volume in A shares than B shares. 7,000 A shares are roughly equal to 10.5 million B shares. 

[BiggieCheese]

The SEC restricts repurchases to a maximum of 25% of the trailing four-week average daily trading volume (rule 10b-18). I wonder how this is calculated and if it accounts for fractional shares

[Spekulatius]

With a little bit of inflation, Japanese stocks will go gangbusters.

[MCR]

The Rational Walk has an open call for questions about the Annual Meeting and Q1 results. He's taking questions through the end of today (6/18). He says he plans to respond to questions he receives this week: https://rationalwalk.substack.com/p/ama-1-call-for-questions-on-berkshire

[John Hjorth]

12 minutes ago, MCR said:

The Rational Walk has an open call for questions about the Annual Meeting and Q1 results. He's taking questions through the end of today (6/18). He says he plans to respond to questions he receives this week: https://rationalwalk.substack.com/p/ama-1-call-for-questions-on-berkshire

 

Ravi is obviously severely hit at the moment by the syndrome that haunts many long term Berkshire shareholders. The urge to do something. Sit on your a$$ investing doing nothing is actually very hard. Pretty good initiative here Berkshire related, if someone asks me, as alternative to start trading.

[nwoodman]

Good news

June 19, 2023 02:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

 

OMAHA, Neb.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--(BRK.A; BRK.B) – Following the close of the markets in Japan today, Berkshire Hathaway’s wholly-owned subsidiary, National Indemnity Company, will notify Japan’s Kanto Local Finance Bureau that it has increased its ownership interest in five of the leading Japanese trading companies.

The companies, listed alphabetically, are Itochu, Marubeni, Mitsubishi, Mitsui and Sumitomo. Presently these are the only publicly traded investments that Berkshire owns in Japan. Their aggregate value considerably exceeds that of Berkshire-held public stocks in any other country outside of the United States.

Excluding shares of treasury stock, Berkshire Hathaway’s ownership interest in each of the five companies now averages more than 8½%. This reporting of ownership interest is consistent with how Berkshire Hathaway reports its ownership interest in U.S. based publicly traded companies.

 

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230618253567/en/

 

Edited June 19, 2023 by nwoodman