Fairfax Financial 2010 Annual General Meeting

[Parsad]

The 2010 Fairfax Financial AGM will be held at Roy Thomson Hall, 60 Simcoe Street, Toronto Canada.  It's about a block north of the Metro-Toronto Convention Centre where the 2009 AGM was held.  The date has also been switched to a Thursday (April 22, 2010), as there is a large convention being held in the city around the same time.  You would be wise to book your hotels and flights early this year.  You can find more information at www.fairfax.ca.  

 

We will also be holding our annual Fairfax Financial Shareholder's Dinner at Joe Badali's again, and that will be at 6:30pm on Wednesday April 21, 2010.  Directions to Joe Badali's can be found here:  http://www.joebadalis.com .  Last year's was fantastic with Sam Mitchell, Brian Bradstreet, Wayne Cadwallader and Francis Chou all attending and answering our questions.  Cheers!

 

 

[oec2000]

Sanjeev, thanks for the heads up. I look forward to being there again. I have some suggestions for the dinner for your consideration.

 

The venue. Joe Badali's is conveniently located but the room was poorly insulated from outside noise making it difficult to hear. (As unassuming as they are good, the HWIC folk are very low-key people who understand that the power of one's ideas is unrelated to how loudly you expound them - something the talking heads on CNBC need to learn.) Maybe arranging a mike will solve the problem. Or someone else can think of an alternative venue.

 

Voluntary donations for attending dinner. If my memory serves me well, you had previoulsy mentioned something about Joanne Butler's favourite charity. Since many of us have benefited greatly (both financially and knowledge-wise) from FFH management, I thought it would be nice for us to give something back in return for the courtesy that FFH management so selflessly extends to us every year.

 

Timing. It occurred to me that there are some advantages to having the dinner after the AGM rather than before it. Firstly, it would enable to us to ask follow up questions to points raised at the AGM itself. Secondly, I'm just thinking that FFH mgmt might be busy the day before the AGM and may find it difficult to attend or stay long at the dinner. (Brian, Francis and Sam did stay till very late this year and I felt bad especially after hearing how early they normally start their day.

 

Cheers,

oec

 

[Parsad]

Hi Oec,

 

Thanks for the suggestions.  Regarding the ideas:

 

- We originally started the dinners at Joe Badali's, so there is a sense of nostalgia there for those that attended the first one with only 9 people and Francis as our guest.  They can handle up to several hundred people, so we can continue to hold it there for years to come.  They've always been very accomodating, and the place is disarming and easy going.

- Joe Badali's can provide the mic and speaker, but for $175.  I'm looking at cheaper places in the area where I could rent them.  Tentatively we have the attendance price at $5/head with all proceeds going to the "Crohn's & Colitis Foundation" in Joann's name.  I may increase it to $10, with $5-6 going to charity and $4-5 to cover the cost of the mic and speaker.  Corner Market Capital will also match the donations from the attendance.

- Regarding holding it the next evening, unfortunately alot of shareholders come in the night before and then fly out after the AGM.  We would probably have less attendance holding it the next day. 

- In regards to the managers, I believe Sam and Francis usually get together the night before to chat about investing and life, so they started coming to our dinners together.  For the most part, the dinner now fits into Fairfax's agenda for those days.  If we move it, there's a chance we may be making it more difficult for Fairfax, since they have their manager meetings ongoing for the next day or two.  Cheers!   

[oec2000]

Hi Sanjeev,

 

Thanks for the clarifications. Sounds good!

 

Btw, did you ever get round to arranging a gathering for Board members in the Vancouver area. I remember it was discussed but don't know whether I missed it. Just thought it would be a good idea to do one if it hasn't already been done.

 

oec

[SharperDingaan]

 

Might we suggest that CMC cap their match at $X/contribution ... so that we can do some larger contributions without bankrupting you. It would also be usefull to have a tax number so that we can deduct the contribution. (ie: instead of getting $1, you get $1.30 .. with the extra $.30 being the tax mans contribution  ;)).

 

Assuming the market doesn't crash between now & April, there is a strong possibility that this will also generate some significant change.

 

A contingency plan could be very usefull.

 

SD

 

[Parsad]

Hi Sharper,

 

Thanks very much!  We'll only be matching the $5/head attendance, so if 50 people show up, we'll donate another $250.  We'll also have some other stuff that will be drawn for in a raffle, and the proceeds will also be donated. 

 

What I'll do is contact the "Crohn's & Colitis Foundation" over the next month or so, and inform them of what we are doing.  I'll get a direct contact and mailing number for those that knew Joann and want to make additional donations.  That way they can issue a tax receipt to you guys directly who decide to make a larger contribution.  Cheers!