LC

Hey ditto on chess. First things I learned to play with the old man were chess and stratego. Great way to teach critical thinking, anticipation, etc

learning more programming code (C ) than i would ever wish on my worst enemy :D

I'm not sure about psychopaths, maybe John can chime in with his experience. I suppose it takes a certain type to deceive so many people for so long. You would have to be very smart, very motivated, and amoral. We had a case (and i'm being purposely vague here to avoid any confidentiality issues), where one aspect of a long, regulated process was anonymously reported to be fraudulent. After a pretty lengthy investigation the conclusion was essentially the following: either (1) nothing is wrong, or (2) the person/people engaging in this fraud are extremely intelligent to successfully cover their tracks on a daily basis over at least 2 years, despite it providing no gain to themselves (in fact any cover-up would probably cause more work), and with the potential to be discovered by other processes down the road and ruin their careers. This is usually how these cases end.

Roles and responsibilities % of NW invested as racemize mentioned Decision making process I'd ask for records of the last 5 years to see each position and how profitable it was Also I'd ask yourself what you are looking to gain from this? What do you get out of it?

Thank you!

One thing to note is fraud is VERY difficult to uncover (and even more difficult to prove) without a tip-off or help from inside the organization. Your odds increase over long periods of time (i.e. will the cash flows emerge or were they illusory?) but even this is not a given. My experience has put most fraudulent activities in one of two camps: -Institutional: This is a combination of wrong incentives, lax regulation, and multiple layers of disassociated responsibility. Easier to spot because nobody is really trying to "hide it", they are just at a mature point of pushing the envelope (i.e. finally crossing the line). When I do forensic work, it is mostly in this this area. And it is better work: Nobody is actively hiding anything, you have institutional support, and at the end of the day you are improving whatever area you are looking into. -Individual: More of a true "fraud", this is the SAC Capital, interest rate collusion, Bernie Madoff, etc. of the world. Very difficult to spot but easier to get a gut feeling. Most people are good at sensing if something is too good to be true or if someone rubs you the wrong way. But much more difficult to prove because these guys are actively hiding something, AND they are experts in the field (probably moreso then you) AND have insulated themselves as much as possible from any hard evidence if they are smart (which they usually are). You will be stifled at every turn, they will play dirty, etc. Most of my work has been on the first case. Very rarely does the second come up and I do not really like working on those cases. In the public markets? Forget trying to find fraud unless you are a big investor and can get real information. Otherwise, only the big televised cases will be available (the Enrons, Valeants, Ocwens, etc.) and you're still making an educated guess. Most fraud in public markets comes from one division of a huge company which outside minority investors have little or zero visibility into. The only way (again in my experience) to find this out is to become a customer or become a supplier (or both) and try to figure out what goes into the sausage factory vs. what comes out. IMHO your time is better spent looking for good businesses and avoiding the ones which appear too good to be true.

I would take a look at the asset lifecycle specifically any modifications if u can find the info. Lend car-->buyer goes into default-->repo car-->loan terms modified (outstanding balance is added to loan amount)-->buyer gets car back-->modified terms can't even then cover interest. My guess is the above flow is how many of these loans will evolve. Regulators should be providing guidance or enforcing limits to this behavior.

For myself it is related to financial model development/validation/implementation/ongoing usage. Happy to answer any q's you may have.

Yes it is a sizeable part of my job, but I would say it is not as psychological as it seems. Evidence must lead the way, but understanding the emotions/psychology of the people involved can help direct you where to look. Definitely an interesting activity!

I disagree. Plenty of sociopaths have created immense value without breaking laws. Plenty of non-sociopaths have created immense value, also without breaking laws.

But he was totally free to raise the price of Daraprim without committing securities fraud. I agree with you that laws are sometimes selectively enforced. But that's not a good excuse for breaking them.

I never liked this part of the quote. Can't we both be right? Maybe you sell your BRK to buy BAM and I buy your BRK and we both make great returns. The whole zero-sum thing bothers me because I think of investing as a value-adding activity which grows the pie over time

Just FYI these guys changed their name to Tapestry Inc. I was in a Coach store today and one of the salespeople told me Coach replaced their head of design and went back to their previous standard of craftsmanship (all leather etc.). Time will tell if it is true and works, but she did say that the new head of design won the designer of the year last year.

This brings up a question. Does narrative matter more in highly technical startups in terms of attracting funding. What percent of investors are capable of doing the DD necessary to determine if what the narrative claims is the goal is actually possible Great point. If you can't form an informed opinion, then move on. The only people who should have thought about investing are those with the resources to perform the scientific analysis necessary to come to such an opinion.

Still working for me (US)

If you use net worth as a proxy, it's not even close.

I'm not sure people blindly believed...didn't they fabricate test results which showed the product worked?

If I had to pick I'd say Warren

Financials perhaps? I was looking at ENB a month or so ago but they seem poorly managed and also the share issuance as you mentioned both turned me off.

Open source network traffic algorithms exist. Google hosts the platform a la google maps. Cheap and easy.

They could just hail it down with a sharp whistle like in the good ole days :-X

Autonomous cars will kill Uber/Lyft. Why wouldn't I take out a loan, have the car drive itself for the 22 hrs/day when I don't use it myself, and capture that $ myself?

Transition from more volatile assets (financial assets) to less volatile assets. Homes, land, etc.

Bought a house and am knee deep in renovations.

Small cap value classic. Has key man risk written all over it.