LC

Hard using historical financials because the future is much more variable for these guys than the only grocery store in town.

What the heck did they spend 2b on? (Sorry I just follow Amzn for the entertainment)

15% ebitda growth rate? Curious on your justification for that.

I frankly don't think legal prostitution will increase healthcare expenses. I think it will increase visibility of safe sex. It reminds me of college drinking, it's a bigger problem in the states where it's illegal than Canada where the age is 18. Also if it's legal, women will be incentivized to maintain a a STD- free status and therefore take proper precaution.

Ooh cool company I've never heard of...wish I knew about it sooner. I personally think Uber built a better mousetrap, but I don't know this industry.

My two cents is for legalization. But some things in this country take centuries to change. See minority rights, gun control, etc. Progress is slow, and I think for the case of prostitution, probably the slowest...

And I believe his foray into renewable energy is to maximize the tax breaks associated with that investment. Which may imply that Brk's confidence in renewables is not 100% based on the underlying fundamentals. His recent investment into Exxon is telling in this regard.

Just back of the envelope, if FV is around 20/sh and they will achieve that in 2 years, you're looking at about a 16.66% return per year if you buy @ 15/sh.

Remember there's no reason to just buy one! :D

Momentum, to me, seems like it generates capital until it loses a bunch of capital. Value seems to preserve capital.

I am reading through the fifth book of the Night Watch series. Much fun! :)

I'm curious how forum members conduct research on management/family owners. There have been a few threads where I wonder, "how does he know that?" For example, some family-owned company go through..."family issues", and if I see a board member post about that it makes me curious how much information is gathered. I am sure talking to ownership or management provides most of this info but I am curious if there are any other methods people feel comfortable sharing.

All I have learned from this thread is that retail is so god damn hard. And anywhere else there are easier profits to be had.

You can't beat that as a customer. No question. But did Amazon make money on that? Two weeks ago we got my daughter a little sand box. I ordered 2 50lb bags of sand on Amazon. It cost less than $10 a bag and because I did it thru my wife's Prime account it was free shipping. When we got it we realized that we needed more (100lbs of sand isn't as much as you'd think!). So we repeated the process. We paid less than $40 for 200lbs of sand that was delivered for free. As a customer I'm thrilled. But there's no way Amazon made money on that sale. You're right. But do you order books on Amazon? Kitchen supplies? Etc. etc. etc.? Those orders they do make money on. Moreso than Walmart and others. So delivering you that sand (which Amazon assumues you order less frequently than books etc.) ensures that you remain a customer, and it ingrains you into the "Amazon ecosystem" (to steal a term from the Apple thesis). Also, do we know the specifics of their contracts with their delivery partners? We don't know how much they lost on the sale. Perhaps due to the massive volume of business they do with Fedex or UPS or whomever, they may have broken even on the sale.

thanks for sharing.

what does the asset base look like? is accrual accounting messing with the ROIC? is cash return > wacc? any opportunities for lowering the wacc which the market may be pricing in? are margins at normalized levels or is there opportunity to expand them? just random questions to think about!

Here's a question, well two questions and a comment: What will drive further ipad/iphone sales from current users (i.e. current iphone/ipad owners)? Is it important for an investment in Apple today that current users upgrade from their iphone 5/ipad 4 to the newest model, or is there a margin for error in this aspect due to opening up China/enterprise markets? The reason I ask is this: I own the latest iphone and ipad. I think they are great. And I treat them well, as I would guess a good majority of customers do. So as a consumer, I simply don't know what else Apple has to offer that will compel me to upgrade to the iphone 6 or 7. Will the iphone 7 cook me dinner? At what point do they make a device that is so good that it just doesn't need to be upgraded if you take care of it? Barring me crushing it, or the battery dying (perhaps Tim Cook will engage in some planned obsolescence?), I just don't see as long of a runway as I did a few years ago.

I agree. I think it will take years for the level of misery caused to failed distributors to outweigh their promotional schemes. But then again, maybe with enough publicity, the gov'ts where HLF does business will take notice. Not holding my breath, though.

I only heard the last 15 minutes of the presentation. But this part seemed the sketchiest to me, as well as the details of the buyback.

Because everything else has failed so far. And his ego can't take no for an answer, plus sunk cost fallacy. On the other hand, we're still fighting the war on drugs which is an obvious failure. Convincing the government to do...many things...can take a while.

Which "real problem"? I agree compared to things like the US's foreign policy feeding the military industrial complex the welfare system is a very tiny problem. But my original comment was in response to someone who mentioned single parent households. There are two major causes of single parent households, which are the primary reasons that there are a lot of them now and were not many of them say 80 years ago. 1) is the welfare system (you get more of what you subsidize) and 2) is the war on drugs. So when you are talking about single parent households as "the problem" then yes, the welfare system is a major cause of it. Sorry I was really unspecific...I was just speaking of poverty in general, not single parent households, or even poverty in the USA.

take it with a grain of salt! just one story and i definitely concede the real problem is not people 'gaming' the welfare system!

Heh. So, just an anecdotal story for you. My daily commute used to be the 4 train in Manhattan up thru harlem and the bronx. And it's rush hour one summer evening, and everyone is standing. The proximity to other warm bodies oppressive, everyone is exhausted and wants to get home, and there are these two spanish women, overweight, from the south bronx (based on where they got off to "go home"), and they are loudly having a conversation. The topic of which is LITERALLY how to (1) trick men into impregnating them so they can collect both welfare and child support (2) exactly how many children to have which is the optimal amount to collect the most from city/state/federal welfare programs and (3) how to use various monies given to them for the sake of their kids to buy, well, stuff (cable tv, cell phones etc). One girl was telling the other how she actually accomplished this. I mean, it was detailed and everything: the specific programs, filing processes, how long it takes to process, where to go buy things afterwards, etc. At some point I knew it wasn't just hot air. And I could not believe what I was hearing! I almost burst out laughing because it seemed so ridiculous once I knew they was completely serious. And the looks of the other passengers was equally incredulous. So maybe it's not everyone, maybe it's not a majority, maybe those were the only two people in the entire country who consciously made that choice. But to say something like "But to imply that poor people - particularly those born into poor circumstances - remain there because of conscious decisions is, in my humble opinion, either ignorant or self-serving." is in some cases factually wrong and (in my mind) frankly is a very middle/upper class thing to say! The reality is that you, and I, simply do not know the thought processes of some of these people, so we can opine all we want about why we think they are in their situation, but we really have absolutely no clue. Just my 2 cents.

hehehe maybe VW always things Fiat is undervalued? :D

animals do exhibit actions higher than murder theft cheating etc. compassion, teamwork, remorse & forgiveness, as well as exclusion from social structures for violating norms...it has been documented. i'm not exactly sure what separates "us" from "the animals" (other than human's egocentric perspective...), but i doubt it's religion.