Buffett/Berkshire - general news

[Eldad]

9 hours ago, Cigarbutt said:

Note: slippery slope for 'discussion' here but the angle is why BRK (this was likely a CEO decision) declined to 'participate' (for a potential profit) in the surety bond.

Above was mentioned that a surety bond of that nature is equivalent to a bond (lending agreement) where capital, capacity, collateral and character assessment play inter-dependent roles (one criteria could compensate for another but one criteria may be enough to decline). Character assessment is one of Mr. Buffett's strength but he's been recently disappointed (alluded to in last annual report) and likely increased the margin of safety required for that part. There are times when the risk-return profile is simply not adequate given the type of risk involved. As far as collateral, liquid assets are normally required for this kind of 'bond' and real estate does not fit the bill.

Now, as far as the outcome of the appeal, which is another consideration, a criminal offense of fraud does not require a victim. There is legal context for this and recognized criteria but common sense will tell you that, if you are caught crossing a red light with your car, a defense implying that there was no victim or harm may not be your best legal strategy to invalidate the infraction.

There is out there some discussion about the origin of the legal concept of Standing which involves a balance between community and individual autonomy as well as the efficient functioning of courts but the following is a balanced (opinion) view from a reasonable group (moderate-center, objective, high level of fact checking) which assesses the odds of success for appeal:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4690963

NY is claiming he hurt the integrity of NY business generally as the standing. 
 

Very abstract and far-fetched when the lender testifies on behalf of the defense. Combine that with the over the top fine and it’s just a complete joke. 
 

Anyway, sorry to derail the thread. As BRK shareholder I want no part of it for BRK. 

[omahafloat]

Pls move the Law/Trump discussion of the Berkshire thread.  Thank you!

[Parsad]

On 3/21/2024 at 2:41 PM, Eldad said:

Enron’s lenders and investors had no issue with AAs financial statements after the fact? 
 

Trump’s lenders have no issue presently. As in after the alleged fraud. The bankers basically say no fraud. The loans have already been paid off. They took his unaudited PFS and did their own DD as to the subjective values. Like all bankers should. They testified that they had no issue with his values in this trial and the state of NY still did what they did. 
 

Standing: a case cannot be brought by an unharmed party. 
 

Sorry but your point makes no sense and is in no way analogous. 

 

Sorry, but so far all levels of the legal system disagree with you.

 

23 hours ago, Eldad said:

Haha he is an ex-president of the US being actively hunted by the political opposition on every front. 
 

Not saying Trump hasn’t done his part, but all of this is definitely completely new for the US. 

 

There was Richard Nixon.  Also, how is it any different than the target on Biden or his son?  This is all nonsense.

 

If Trump defrauded the system...he goes to jail.  If Hunter Biden defrauded the system or is charged with contempt...he goes to jail.

 

Pretty easy to understand.  So let's not assume that BRK's actions were politically-related, and simply not based on risk.  Cheers!

[Eldad]

10 hours ago, Parsad said:

 

Sorry, but so far all levels of the legal system disagree with you.

 

 

There was Richard Nixon.  Also, how is it any different than the target on Biden or his son?  This is all nonsense.

 

If Trump defrauded the system...he goes to jail.  If Hunter Biden defrauded the system or is charged with contempt...he goes to jail.

 

Pretty easy to understand.  So let's not assume that BRK's actions were politically-related, and simply not based on risk.  Cheers!

It’s a little bit more complex than that. Stealing 450M for something that happened in an amicable business dealing in which neither party brought suit will hurt American financial markets and specifically New York as Cubfan originally said. 

[adesigar]

Hmmm. The only people that would stay away because of this from American financial markets and New York are going to be people who would like to be able to lie/cheat. I fail to see the downside to this.

 

I’m super happy that Berkshire decided not to take the risk financial and political. 

[omahafloat]

Why is this long discussion persisting on the Berkshire General News thread?  Pls move this to another thread? Cheers.  

[DooDiligence]

37 minutes ago, omahafloat said:

Why is this long discussion persisting on the Berkshire General News thread?  Pls move this to another thread? Cheers.  

 

I know, right? I made a thread specifically for this.

[charlieruane]

I enjoyed this Kingswell transcript of an interview Ajit Jain gave in 2011. Jain's closing comment re: his evolving views on philanthropy is particularly interesting, I haven't quite heard this POV before: 

 

AM: In terms of charity.

 

AJ: It’s a very difficult question. It’s a very personal question. My views have also sort of changed over time. Without getting into a lot of the details — which aren’t relevant to you and your audience — we have a son that has been diagnosed with a serious illness. Before he was diagnosed with the illness, I always sort of thought much like the Buffett philosophy. I always felt, “Gee, I’ve got this fame, I’ve got this wealth, I didn’t deserve it, and it doesn’t belong to me.”

 

But, after my son’s illness, things did change. I felt I didn’t deserve my son’s illness, either. He didn’t deserve what he’s getting.

 

So, in terms of my giving… Again, without getting into too much detail, two things have changed: One is that we focus on a foundation that is trying to find a cure for his illness. And, secondly, I feel guilty in as much as in the earliest days of his life, while he was healthy, I didn’t let him spend money and have a nice time. So I’ve done a u-turn on that and I spend a lot more money a lot more freely than what I used to.

Edited March 25, 2024 by charlieruane

[gfp]

2 minutes ago, charlieruane said:

I enjoyed this Kingswell transcript of an interview Ajit Jain gave in 2011. Jain's closing comment re: his evolving views on philanthropy is particularly interesting, I haven't quite heard this POV before: 

 

AM: In terms of charity.

 

AJ: It’s a very difficult question. It’s a very personal question. My views have also sort of changed over time. Without getting into a lot of the details — which aren’t relevant to you and your audience — we have a son that has been diagnosed with a serious illness. Before he was diagnosed with the illness, I always sort of thought much like the Buffett philosophy. I always felt, “Gee, I’ve got this fame, I’ve got this wealth, I didn’t deserve it, and it doesn’t belong to me.”

 

But, after my son’s illness, things did change. I felt I didn’t deserve my son’s illness, either. He didn’t deserve what he’s getting.

 

So, in terms of my giving… Again, without getting into too much detail, two things have changed: One is that we focus on a foundation that is trying to find a cure for his illness. And, secondly, I feel guilty in as much as in the earliest days of his life, while he was healthy, I didn’t let him spend money and have a nice time. So I’ve done a u-turn on that and I spend a lot more money a lot more freely than what I used to.

 

In case folks can't read the entire transcript or have interest in the original video of the interview, someone posted the link to the entire video over on shrewdm board -

 

https://www.ndtv.com/video/shows/ndtv-special-ndtv-profit/buffett-gives-full-freedom-to-work-ajit-jain-194567

[DooDiligence]

Live it up and give it up.

[charlieruane]

@gfp How is shrewdm, generally speaking? Quality material over there? 

[gfp]

33 minutes ago, charlieruane said:

@gfp How is shrewdm, generally speaking? Quality material over there? 

They have tried to recreate the old style of the motley fool boards.  I have mostly just looked at the Berkshire Hathaway board and there are a few great posters that are not on other message boards and some old-timers I remember from back in the day.  Even dealraker shows up occasionally.  I usually learn something and I know a few of them.  It's free, not much to lose checking it out.  The individual topics besides Berkshire are mostly dead as far as I know.  It is a new project so tough to get things going.    It certainly isn't as active and dynamic as CoBF and most Berkshire-related topics will be covered both places pretty well.

[gfp]

Here is an interesting case study on Philadelphia & Reading Corp, an early Ben Graham and Warren Buffett holding.  I found it interesting.

 

This is from Turtle Bay, who is on twitter and this website.  Good BRK content

Case study link:

https://www.turtlebay.io/_files/ugd/f2fd00_f9def6fca1f4401f9d12a071be30352e.pdf

 

Other interesting notes from the website above:

https://www.turtlebay.io/notes

 

Twitter -

https://twitter.com/turtlebay_io

 

 

 

[Hektor]

Thanks for the links, @gfp

[Gamecock-YT]

3 hours ago, charlieruane said:

Big earthquake in Taiwan. Remember when Buffett cited earthquake risk as a reason for backing out of his investment in TSMC?

 

Sounds like TSMC at the very least had to evacuate a bunch of staff, remains to be seen whether this will cause a material delay in production.

 

wasn't it geopolitical risks? 

[charlieruane]

Geopolitical risk seemed to be Buffett's primary concern, but he did cite "seismic action" once—though now I realize that was in the following CNBC interview, not at an annual meeting: 

 

There’s actually a danger of seismic action, I mean, and where they’re located. But that’s a low probability and they, you know, they’re smart people but would I rather have it, there was a U.S. domicile company than be a subject of who knows what, depending on conditions outside their control?

 

Transcript link.

[zippy1]

1 hour ago, charlieruane said:

Geopolitical risk seemed to be Buffett's primary concern, but he did cite "seismic action" once—though now I realize that was in the following CNBC interview, not at an annual meeting: 

 

There’s actually a danger of seismic action, I mean, and where they’re located. But that’s a low probability and they, you know, they’re smart people but would I rather have it, there was a U.S. domicile company than be a subject of who knows what, depending on conditions outside their control?

 

Transcript link.

He did say that. Although the whole Silicon Valley is in …

[Munger_Disciple]

Fellow Berkshire Groupies,

 

Andy Kilpatrick, who became famous for his massive books on Buffett, apparently became quite rich with Berkshire stock over many decades despite getting a few margin calls along the way. 

Does anyone know more about Andy's Berkshire stock investing? 

[OracleofCarolina]

I have never seen any stories on that, is he still making those books? 

[gfp]

43 minutes ago, OracleofCarolina said:

I have never seen any stories on that, is he still making those books? 

 

I don't think he still makes the books.  He tells some stories about the margin and first BRK share purchase in '83 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6bPl1IXlhs

 

[Munger_Disciple]

4 hours ago, gfp said:

 

I don't think he still makes the books.  He tells some stories about the margin and first BRK share purchase in '83 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6bPl1IXlhs

 

 

Thanks @gfp! I saw this video before; just wondering if there were any additional details. He referred to this in the video as you pointed out:

 

"I've had my setbacks yeah I've done some margin, my wife spends money you know but I still have that original share."

 

Good for Andy, it appears that he was able to survive that margin call & do well. 

Edited April 5, 2024 by Munger_Disciple

[John Hjorth]

10 hours ago, OracleofCarolina said:

I have never seen any stories on that, is he still making those books? 

 

10 hours ago, gfp said:

 

I don't think he still makes the books.  He tells some stories about the margin and first BRK share purchase in '83 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6bPl1IXlhs

 

 

I agree with @gfp on this assessment.

 

The time span between each edition was on average a couple of years, give or take, and with some exemptions.

 

The so far last edition of the book was the 2020 Elephant Edition :

 

 

Topic about the book in the CoBF Books forum : Of Permanent Value - Andrew Kilpatrick.

[KPO]

https://www.dataroma.com/m/holdings.php?m=DJCO
 

Looks like the DJC board decided to sell down a portion of all four positions. 

[Hektor]

https://www.barrons.com/articles/berkshire-hathaway-geico-progressive-stocks-c03bcdf4

 

A 20% Job Cut at Berkshire’s Geico Highlights Challenge for Car Insurer

The company, formerly one of the fastest-growing big car insurers, has been shrinking in the past two years.

 

Geico reduced its staffing by 20% during 2023, giving up more than a percentage point of market share, as the auto insurer moved to retrench and regain profitability. It is the latest twist in a rivalry among some of the top companies in the car-insurance industry. Geico, formerly one of the fastest-growing big players and the jewel of Berkshire Hathaway ’s vast insurance operations, has been shrinking in the past two years. Its archrival, Progressive, has been expanding profitably and seeing its stock price surge.

 

[schin]

On 4/5/2024 at 4:56 PM, KPO said:

https://www.dataroma.com/m/holdings.php?m=DJCO
 

Looks like the DJC board decided to sell down a portion of all four positions. 

 

When Warren passes, I would expect there will be selling of his prized holdings too.