Parsad

Yeah, I think capex should be around 70-80m. They are spending nearly $200m on store improvements in the next 12 months according to their last filing. That is absurd with the stock trading where it is. Can management tell us that $50m or even $75m of those expenses are going to generate anything remotely close to a near 50% accretive benefit from share buybacks? Just plain silly, and this is a grocery/retail management making that explanation, rather than a shareholder-friendly view that a value investor would provide. This is unfortunately how most business people think. Their belief is that share buybacks should either not occur at all, or they should occur at any price, rather than viewing share buybacks as exploiting market ineffciencies on occasion, where it would benefit the corporation as a whole. Cheers!

Thanks very much for the notes James! I think that if they spent $30M a year in share buybacks when the stock is trading at half of book, it will make a significant dent over a few years...completely accretive. Especially when you compare that to the ROIC from building new stores or remodelling old ones. Cheers!

I wasn't saying this changes anything for Italy. It was just a play on words "PIIGS" and PIGS (in reference to Berlusconi). What I thought was pretty funny was when Sarkozy and Obama met for the first time at some G20 summit, Berlusconi went chasing after Obama like a star-struck fan and started yelling "Mr. Obama...Mr. Obama" as if he was going to ask for an autograph. Good riddance to buffoon-like politicians! Cheers!

Berlusconi to resign. No more bunga bunga! ;D Cheers! http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Berlusconi-to-resign-after-apf-3799031884.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=main&asset=&ccode=

Don't tell Bass that we are in the midst of Great Depression II. If he can't see the forest for the trees...well! ;D Cheers!

Frankly, forecasts are a waste of time as I've stated. We have no idea. Others have no idea. There are so many variables that are out of our hands. The only thing you can control is margin of safety, emotions and execution. Remember, the experts at one time thought the world was flat, Hitler was misunderstood and as recently as two years ago...markets were permanently broken! Cheers!

Robert DeNiro will play Bernie Madoff in an HBO movie. Cheers! http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/07/news/companies/deniro_madoff_hbo/index.htm?source=cnn_bin&hpt=hp_bn5

Vito's a very smart and patient (thus the name for his company) fellow. One of the best in Canada. Cheers!

Beer, The more and more you talk about it, the better you will be at expressing your ideas. I remember Mohnish when he first started...not so good. Today, he's probably one of the best you will hear at expressing investment ideas succintly and poignantly enough, so that both the experienced and novice investor understand completely. Even alot of what Buffett says is repetition of things he's thought about thousands of times over the last 60-70 years. I assure you that when Buffett was younger, he was not even remotely as eloquent as he is today...or even 30 years ago. Cheers!

Corzine has resigned from MF Global and hired an attorney. Don't people ever learn? Cheers! http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-04/jon-corzine-said-to-plan-resigning-from-mf-global-after-bankruptcy-filing.html

Since BH is likely to swing into a loss for this quarter, do you think Biglari will be returning his bonus compensation for the previous quarter, Parsad To put this as succinctly as possible with no misunderstanding...when monkeys fly out of my butt! Cheers!

The economies in North America are relatively good considering the trauma they've been through in the last three years. As I've stated for the last few months, North America is not going to see a double-dip...we are in recovery, albeit a modest one. The only risk is stupidity from Europe. If they do anything where they plunge into a severe recession, or worse depression, then that will drag everyone down a degree or more. But otherwise, as Buffett stated..."The natural juices of capitalism will do their magic!" Cheers!

Don't forget the Northface tent and sleeping bag, the Whole Foods organic granola, Kleen Ketal water bottle and Rice Dreams soy milk! And then we'll shut down the port authority or major bank in every city with a sit-in. That will change everything, since we are the 99%. Cheers!

Just great! Something else for the "Occupy" movement to gripe about. The SEC is investigating insider trading on MF Global bonds by private investors who may have been privy to non-public information. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-03/sec-said-to-review-possible-insider-trading-in-mf-bonds.html By the way, I'm just about "occupied" out, and these guys really need to find some other way to create change. This is more an annoyance than conducive to any sort of change. Once Sean Lennon shows up singing Madonna songs on an acoustic guitar, you know this movement has more than already jumped the shark! They should go camp out on Glen Beck or Barney Frank's lawn, and perhaps join forces with "The Tea Party". Mad-hatters the whole lot of them! Cheers!

I have to thank everyone for their responses! I was perfectly correct in my assessment of this board's base of knowledge. I'm quite surprised how quickly and expansive the responses were, both in reply posts to the thread, and private messages sent to me. I will forward all the information to her family. Cheers!

That area is the most exquisite biomechanical machine in the body. The pain described may be related to trauma to the tendons and fascia in the arch rather than neuropathy per se, but it's not wise to second guess her physicians. A second opinion by another physician who specializes in treating musculoskeletal pain in a different way might be helpful. There are two philosophies of treatment that could be considered. One is to relieve the pain through treatments affecting the nerves in the area or through surgery. This isn't always completely successful. The other is to assist the body to restore normal function. There is a simple treatment called prolotherapy that is often highly successful in similar situations. A group at The University of British Columbia in Vancouver has had an amazing track record using this therapy for Achilles Tendonitis. Perhaps your friend might contact them and see if they think prolotherapy might help his daughter. There is also a physician in Chicago, Ross Hauser, MD who specializes in prolotherapy. He's the best there is. See caringmedical.com :) Frank (Tim's out today) Hi Frank! They originally saw a specialist at UBC, but now are with supposedly the top specialist in Vancouver at St. Paul's Hospital. I will pass along the information, as I don't know exactly what treatment they tried at UBC. Thanks very much!

Hi Tim! Left foot around the instep. She fell on an icy sidewalk last winter, hurt her foot, and slowly the pain and sensitivity progressed over the next six months. Cheers!

Cracker Barrel put together a pretty comprehensive response to BH's proxy fight. Not much left to argue about! Cheers! http://sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1067294/000119312511290764/d249469ddefa14a.htm

Now apparently there won't be a referendum after France and Germany said that the bailout package was a single offer, one-time deal, and his own party will institute a no-confidence vote if he pursues it. Papendrou now says that the referendum was to be on the bailout package, not on being part of the EU. Talk about a squirmy, weasely, ungrateful little man looking for a better deal! Cheers!

Thanks for the information guys! Much appreciated. Mloub, they finally have one of the best specialists in Vancouver looking after her, so he is taking things one step at a time, progressing to different treatments when one fails to work sufficiently. Surgery is an option, but one he suggests should be examined after all of the non-invasive treatments have been tested. Will pass on the information regarding the spinal stimulators. Currently they are trying localized pain medications and physical therapy. Cheers!

I have little interest in this discussion but the argument above is of especially little value imo. How many copies have been sold of The Intelligent Investor? How many true contrarian value investors are there? I wouldn't be suprised to see a 1000:1 ratio. Surely there must be one who has read it and is willing to step up and buy rimm at 3 times earnings? first one to post a link to the form 4 gets a cookie! How many shares was Brian Moynihan buying in the last six months at BAC, even though Buffett was investing? Insider buying or selling can mean something, or it can mean nothing at all. I've never owned RIMM, but frankly I'm more intrigued now than before. Although I would like to see it come down more as their revenues, cash flows and earnings are dropping. It's really trading closer to 7-8 times earnings, rather than 3 times earnings. And I would suggest that if people cannot add something to the dialogue here, then resist the temptation to say anything at all! Cheers!

Play nice boys! Cheers!

Kennedy Wilson has closed the purchase of an office building in Los Angeles, across the street from the Grove. Interestingly enough, the address of the office building is "145 Fairfax!" ;D Cheers! http://www.marketwatch.com/story/kennedy-wilson-completes-purchase-of-miracle-mile-office-building-2011-11-02

Those debt covenants will be breached on a 4 quarter rolling basis. But they will probably be back within that range after the 4th quarter of 2011, once those receivables come in during the 1st quarter 2012. Antar will take anything he can and try to blow it up into a huge mess. Overstock has enough cash to just pay the debt off entirely after the 4th quarter when they get their biggest inflows of operating cash flow. Overstock needs to do better...no doubt about that...but to blow it up into what Antar's saying is silly. They are currently in negotiations with U.S. bank regarding the covenants, and I suspect that some adjustment will occur where U.S. bank will give them some leeway, with them returning to within the credit covenants in the next six months. The whole Google penalty and then Overstock's decision to switch to the O.co brand is what really hurt them this year. They lost about 5% of their revenue in the 1st quarter because of the penalty, and their visibility naturally went down in the 2nd because of that as well. The stupid idea of ramping up the O.co brand was poorly executed, and Byrne stated that himself in the latest conference call. Customers were confused and probably put off by the push. Overstock's own brand is pretty darn good, and there was no reason to switch. They could have just used the O.co url as an alternative. Cheers!

Yes, because barely anyone has heard of them and virtually no one follows them. ;D I think I'll put this message board on twitter, so you guys will only have 140 characters for responses. There will be several million 140 character LVLT tweets! Cheers!