randomep Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Kind of off-topic: I'm currently reading Damn Right! (biography about Charlie Munger) and at one point his partnership was 60% invested in Blue Chip Stamps--didn't realize he was THAT concentrated. The partnership's returns were great for the ~13 years he ran it but it wasn't a smooth ride. He had two years of 70% growth and two years of 30% losses. Anyway, I don't have much of a point, just thought of this thread while reading the chapter earlier. That isn't the half of it. When British Columbia Power was about to be bought by the government, Munger put his funds money, his own money and every penny he could borrow into a merger arbitrage. Warren Buffett held the same stock at the time, but he didn't go to the extremes that Munger did. Thanks for the book mention. I didn't know Munger had a biography. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matjone Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 That is who I had in mind when I was talking about Graham and Schloss. Schloss' record was incredible - he ran a fund almost 50 years, trounced the market and I think he only had a double digit loss one year. For those two years in the early 70's Munger had over a 50% loss and Schloss was down around 15%. IIRC Tweedy Browne who followed a similar style to Schloss also did relatively well during that period. If Munger had had those two bad years at the beginning of his investing career instead of the end his investors might have lost faith in him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rohitc99 Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 That is who I had in mind when I was talking about Graham and Schloss. Schloss' record was incredible - he ran a fund almost 50 years, trounced the market and I think he only had a double digit loss one year. For those two years in the early 70's Munger had over a 50% loss and Schloss was down around 15%. IIRC Tweedy Browne who followed a similar style to Schloss also did relatively well during that period. If Munger had had those two bad years at the beginning of his investing career instead of the end his investors might have lost faith in him. From what i recall from the book, munger felt quite bad about the losses. he did not mind losing his own money, but was upset that he was losing his investor's money although he rationally know that it was not a true loss and the value was still there. very few can lose 30% two years in a row and still operate rationally. a concentrated makes sense only if you are both smart and rational ...i am not and hence diversification makes sense for me - Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
merkhet Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Yea, there's a huge temperament component "hurdle" even above the high hit rate "hurdle." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
undervalued Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Note that doesn't mean it is reckless to invest 40% in a Brk. Why is BRK an exception? Now and then, I keep finding nugets in Charlie's Almanack and one of them was a quote from Buffett talking about how everyone else is taking his words as facts where Charlie wouldn't. I think it's hard to concentrate into one idea because no one knows all the risks including BRK. Who knows maybe one day, after Buffett left, they did an Exxon or something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidVY Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Because BRK is a diversified collection of business which is a diversification of itself Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theasiareport Posted October 9, 2015 Author Share Posted October 9, 2015 I think its pretty different situation if you have control (as majority owner), and hence power over the future of the company. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jurgis Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Note that doesn't mean it is reckless to invest 40% in a Brk. Why is BRK an exception? Now and then, I keep finding nugets in Charlie's Almanack and one of them was a quote from Buffett talking about how everyone else is taking his words as facts where Charlie wouldn't. I think it's hard to concentrate into one idea because no one knows all the risks including BRK. Who knows maybe one day, after Buffett left, they did an Exxon or something. Like others said, BRK is an exception right now because it is "a diversified collection of businesses" plus it has somewhat diversified portfolio as its investment holdings. Theoretically Jain and maybe GenRe could blow up the company by really bad underwriting on supercats. So I would not put 100% into BRK either. But if I was forced to concentrate, BRK would be natural choice for up to 20-50% of portfolio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
randomep Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Note that doesn't mean it is reckless to invest 40% in a Brk. Why is BRK an exception? Now and then, I keep finding nugets in Charlie's Almanack and one of them was a quote from Buffett talking about how everyone else is taking his words as facts where Charlie wouldn't. I think it's hard to concentrate into one idea because no one knows all the risks including BRK. Who knows maybe one day, after Buffett left, they did an Exxon or something. Because Brk is now a conglomerate, it is very diversified in a look-through basis (I think that is the term used on this board)... buying Brk is like buying a mutual fund. And the results would be similar to a good mutual fund (I'll get ripped apart for this but I can take it). If one of Brk's wholly owned subsidiaries like BNSF blew up a town, I don't think Brk itself is liable.... yes/ no? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Investor20 Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Why does it have to be concentration or indexing. I have substantial amounts in BRK & Indexes while putting money into good ideas I get every once in a while. Rarely do I exceed 10% in one stock (except BRK). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jurgis Posted October 9, 2015 Share Posted October 9, 2015 Why does it have to be concentration or indexing. I have substantial amounts in BRK & Indexes while putting money into good ideas I get every once in a while. Rarely do I exceed 10% in one stock (except BRK). It doesn't have to be. General opinion is that it's harder to outperform in non-concentrated portfolio, so you might as well give up and index. Also running non-concentrated portfolio takes more time, so that's another thing to consider vs. just indexing. But yeah, there are people here and elsewhere with non concentrated portfolios. I will claim again that by now BRK (including op cos) is not concentrated. MKL is not concentrated. Tweedy Browne. Harder to find hugely outperforming known small investors who are not concentrated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hershey Posted October 10, 2015 Share Posted October 10, 2015 I've always thought about 90% BRK for all the reasons stated herein, however after 9/11 Buffett said that if the attack had been nuclear it would have been brought down the company. So, there is always a chance that there is a hidden flaw, and therefore I can't go 100% into it or anything else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
netnet Posted October 10, 2015 Share Posted October 10, 2015 I've always thought about 90% BRK for all the reasons stated herein, however after 9/11 Buffett said that if the attack had been nuclear it would have been brought down the company. So, there is always a chance that there is a hidden flaw, and therefore I can't go 100% into it or anything else. Are you sure about that? I can not believe that that was the case. He did say that that the policies were not properly written and that ti would really have hurt, but bring down BRK!???!(The confusion may be that he did say that such an attack could wipe out the insurance industry, but he did not say that it would have wiped out BRK. Unless you can supply the quote indicating otherwise? The point about concentration still remains; honestly, I could not put 100% in BRK, (without perfect foresight). 20 to 30% maybe. A 35 year old Buffett, was young, brilliant and had long runway, but was neither bullet nor truck proof! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Packer16 Posted October 10, 2015 Share Posted October 10, 2015 I look on externally managed money as a form of leverage. As such you need to ask yourself if you would you put leverage on a concentrated portfolio. I would not. The only way to reasonably take these risks is with capital is with you own. Even at that most of us have a diversified portfolio of assets including human capital which can create income despite what the market is doing. This guy appears to have super levered his concentrated portfolio without knowing it. An interesting question to the asset manager is how much more leverage would he put on this portfolio. As a side note, leverage adds the most when it can also add diversity to a portfolio because the increased leverage risk is offset by the reduction due to diversification. Packer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RadMan24 Posted October 13, 2015 Share Posted October 13, 2015 Could it be fair to say this guy just wasn't good? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
augustabound Posted October 13, 2015 Share Posted October 13, 2015 Could it be fair to say this guy just wasn't good? Without knowing anything about him other than the article, that was my thought too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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