FFHWatcher

There lies a problem with me. You have a CEO now that is a non-O&G operator. Not sure you want him sticking around for six months.. Management teams almost always have the incentive to put a company into bankruptcy. They often come out on the other side owning a significant chunk of the new equity, at zero out of pocket cost; equity mind you, that is in much better shape than the equity they wiped out. Everyone else is just going to let this comment go? "Management teams almost always have the incentive to put a company into bankruptcy". This is simply mind-boggling to read. I'm not sure where this poster works or what companies he follows but I hopefully have nothing to do with the same companies he follows.

Fairfax can further monetize the UK runoff, or they can buy it all back. The current mgmt of Fairfax has been public that they are in the 'further monetize' camp at this point in time. I assume they will use this capital to help buy back those minority interests (Brit & Allied) from OMERS that they have alluded to. It sounds like Fairfax is simply rebalancing their ownership into their Primary Insurers by selling off pieces of their non-primary insurers/run-off. I wonder how this type of deal would come about? Who pitched who the idea? Did OMERS see it and want it or did Fairfax see the asset and pitch it to OMERS? I would assume it was Fairfax's idea to sell it.

All Good! (this week). The previous 99 weeks, not so much >:(

If it's not a dead cat bounce then why aren't insiders buying?

It's from Seeking Alpha. SA has quite a few SSW followers. J Mintzmyer is a contributor at SA and he seems to spend all or most of his time analyzing the shipping sector. He seems to be a good resource and knows his stuff.

And I felt so smart (briefly) for lightening up at $11.50! Thankfully I still have most of my position. Seaspan is the next Brookfield*. You heard it here first. *This is a joke. Sort of. I heard it here 2nd... ieb4 Comments288 | + Follow i am not in disbelief, management has been saying for some time that they will be diversifying the business while at the same time maintaining dominance in container space and expanding there as well. was the Swiber deal not a hint that this was a path forward? also, it is not as if they are abandoning shipping (witness their two deals in last few months to expand fleet). but it is clear they want a higher multiple for the stock, going the asset manager route is certainly one way if they execute and make smart, accretive acquisitions. i again point to brookfield asset management and brookfield infrastructure as entities for comparison (although brookfields are not maritime, more railroads, toll roads, data-center, communications etc) definite fork in the road here...i'm choosing to stay the course and go with management's vision of future, not selling any shares and reinvesting all dividends. good luck to all who sell.

^^^^^ This. Not sure about the double down but the Dorian damage was massive in the Bahamas. Not sure of the exposure there. Maybe not statistically significant. In the past, they have pre-announced significant hurricane losses but no announcement here. On the plus side, SSW investment is looking up. It is a bit depressing to see some of the 'value' industries they have been involved in over the years. Many of these industries have been slowly killed and FFH has been in many. Steel, Paper/forestry, Coal, Newspaper, choosing RIM/Blackberry instead of Apple, Retail Clothing, Retail - Toys (too early?). It is hard to understand their investment decision-making process. It's almost as if they don't want to put any money into anything if it isn't $100M or more and they don't seem interested in businesses over $1-2B.

I own a cleaning company. We clean many vacation rentals in SW Florida. It is very seasonal here. One thing that an owner of a vacation rental needs to consider more today than 5 years ago, is regulatory risk. Many communities or towns are passing by-laws that restrict or control short term rentals. Who wants to buy their dream home next-door to a rental that has new guests every 3 days, 5 days, 7 days, etc.? Those tenants tend to really 'enjoy' their vacation and it also puts a lot of stress on the house. Some by-laws will create short term rental 'zones' that may not permit short term rentals, or none less than 7 days or none less than 30 days, etc. Just something to consider before you buy and something that could affect the value of your investment after you purchase it. Local permanent residents will put pressure on the local gov't to implement and enforce short term rental by-laws. Not many people want their next-door neighbor's house to that will basically become a hotel. For my business, the short term rental market is amazing and the owner always has a spread between what they collect for a cleaning fee and what they payout to the cleaning company/person.

Yes, the operating cash flow that occurs at the operating companies gets pushed up/dividended(?) up to the Holdco and used for buybacks. (ie. Crum or Northbridge are not buying back FFH shares but they do pay dividends to holdco who then buyback shares with the excess cash flow)

As far as I understand FFH and the insurance industry (I could be wrong); Buybacks can't/won't occur at the subsidiary/operating company level. Buybacks can't/won't occur with float, as float is at the operating companies. I assume that with FFH that it is no coincidence that their float is in the low to mid $20B range which matches their cash + short-term bonds. Surplus at the operating companies are much more long-term in nature and is more available and more suited for long-term equity and investments in associates type investments. Buybacks have to be done at the Holdco level and then cancel the shares to reduce the s/o. (That would be cool using the float to buyback shares and then cancel them) Their daily limit of share buybacks is 10,453 or about $6.5M/day

I can't see that many share purchases on Sedi.ca. How else can FFH repurchase without reporting them on Sedi.ca ? Or am I not seeing them for a different reason?

August 2011 post by another Fortress shareholder.... IMHO, a 370m market cap seems crazy for all the assets that they have and all the juicy catalysts on the horizon (even without any acquisitions..). Jump ahead 7 years and it is a $45M company. A couple thousand bucks of this stock trades per day. 7 years ago, Chad's $13M bonus compensation was being discussed, he was a genius, etc. Everyone was impressed because he was issuing stock at $50, buying it back at $30... and now it is $3. In 2011 Apple was something like $35 and Microsoft was $20. Why do we all, including me, waste so much time on crap businesses in crap sectors?

I assume money/cash in bank accounts is fleeing the country hand or fist. Don't governments put restrictions or halts on money leaving the Country in some cases to firm up their financial institutions? In one investment I had, I think it was in Venezuela, they restricted all uses of cash from the company where the cash left the country. Dividends couldn't be paid, share repurchases couldn't be made, etc. Cash was frozen. All required millions of dollars to leave the Country which was not permitted.

Oil business in Venezuela. Coal company in China. Do not expect property laws in other countries to work like the US, Canada, Europe, etc. I have learned my lesson.

Personally, I have always lost when investing in, what looks like good companies at good valuations but in bad countries. I have lost because the laws in those countries have not supported the wrongs that the governments and/or insiders have inflicted on the companies I invested in. The governments expropriated or insiders 'expropriated' the businesses away from rightful shareholders and the shareholders had virtually no recourse. I believe if something occurred in this country, as a shareholder, you would get a very small % of your investment returned to you, but most likely you would get $0. The downside just isn't worth the potential upside and there are a lot of other good businesses at reasonable valuations to invest in that are in countries where the legal system and shareholders have reasonable rights. What would your upside in your share price at Polaris have to be, to justify a total loss? How do you justify allocating a reasonable % of your capital in a country where expropriation without reasonable compensation is a possibility? Just my 2 cents.