Parsad

They would have to buy up a hell of a lot more shares than they currently own. I think you will now see other people come out to vote against the compensation package. The class-action risk is also pretty significant now with Sardar buying back shares at a lower price than when Biglari Capital was sold to BH. Cheers!

Greg Taylor, CFO at Fairfax, is rotating after five years to Hamblin-Watsa. John Varnell is rotating back to CFO of Fairfax. I thought Greg did an absolutely fantastic job of communicating information to shareholders during the conference calls! Good luck to him at Hamblin-Watsa, and it's great to see another terrific Fairfax executive back in the CFO role he inhabited previously! That's one superb team there! Cheers! http://www.fairfax.ca/Assets/Downloads/Press/fpr2010-06-04.pdf

We're finding some good stuff. It's not dirt cheap like March 2008, but we are starting to see some bargains here and there. We were 50% cash about three weeks ago, and now we are down to about 30%. Cheers!

If some of you have ever wondered why Fairfax's combined ratios seem a bit more elevated than their competitors, now you know why. There is no fudging of the reserves at Berkshire, Fairfax or Markel. The set their reserves higher than most of the competition. Cheers!

Welcome Opihiman2! Enjoy the board. We also have another Opihiman registered, as well as other boardmembers from the Hawaiian Islands. Cheers!

Hi Viking, I think the defining characteristic is that investors were willing to pay obscene amounts for businesses in the past, thus you have many companies where the valuation tread sideways for years. In the meantime, these businesses have doubled, tripled or quadrupled their earnings, maintained or grown their market share, and continue to exist as dominant players in their industry. I think if you are looking at a broad spectrum of the market, then you have better valuations within many of the premium players, when compared to some of the valuations you see in the small to mid-cap spectrum. That being said, buy what you think is cheap and then sell it when it is dear. Most investors weren't willing to do that over the last ten years. Cheers!

I think it's like his comments about alot of other things such as derivatives...do as I say, not as I do! The stuff he buys or writes is based on his assessment, thus he thinks there is enough safety in the premiums. But the stuff alot of other people buy or insure...well that's another subject all together, and often there isn't enough due diligence. Cheers!

I wouldn't worry about the FFH muni-bonds. They're insured by Berkshire! ;D Cheers!

Use this free JPM screening service: http://www.adr.com/Home/Home.aspx Cheers!

Short, but good article, on Buffett's views on municipal debt. Cheers! http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=airOwCWviFuU&pos=2

I'm not sure why it gets so complicated. I'll tell you actually which one I like right now. Goodwood Funds management fee for running the investments of Westaim. They get 0.1667% plus 15% above a 10% hurdle! So on $350M in equity, they would get about $580K plus 15% above a 10% hurdle. Simple, high hurdle and lower incentive fee...their MER is very low. They own 19% of the company too! Sardar should have done something very similar...he could have gone for 0.25% plus 15% above a 10% hurdle. I think most shareholders would have agreed to that. Cheers!

It's run by Garry Schwartz. His wife is Heather Riesman who owns Indigo Books. Onex would be comparable to Blackstone or some other large private equity firm. They've done well over the years and Schwartz has a huge committee that helps him run all the businesses. They've expanded their investment fund business heavily over the last few years. Cheers!

Hey I agree with you...cheaper is always better! ;D Cheers!

I think the measured basket approach you are thinking of is appropriate. Of the larger players, several have lucrative patents that are expiring and will impact their future revenues. Alot of the future potential lies within the smaller bio-tech players, but this field is a landmine, not unlike the dot-com era. This will definitely be the area of growth and innovation, and the cash-rich large players will be snapping them up over the next decade. On another front, I would not discount the future success of JNJ. Alot of people seem to be doing that right now. They are the #1 or #2 player in many fields of pharmaceuticals and retail pharmaceuticals. Powerful brands that are not that different than Coke or Wrigleys...think Band-aid, Johnson & Johnson Baby Products, Acuvue, Neutrogena, Tylenol, Splenda, Listerine and...ahem...KY Lubricants! Cheers!

I thought one of the reasons why the stock fell yesterday was because the head of their Entertainment division, the guy who created the X-box, was retiring. Cheers!

Hey Viking, you are correct. I was just giving Eric an excuse. ;D Cheers!

Hi Eric, It was because the European Union fined them $1.35B. http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9880256-7.html We were close to starting a position, but just not quite cheap enough yesterday. You guys are correct, about it becoming a cheap, boring stock. Alot of premium companies are cheap, boring stocks right now...especially compared to many of the small and mid-cap stocks. Many have been in a bear market for a decade now, as their earnings and cash flows have finally caught up with their valuations. They may continue to be discounted a little longer. Cheers!

Also this guy seems to be always out-and-about, when would you ever have the time to sit down and read the 10K/Qs investors need to read before making an intelligent investment choice? Well, he has a huge entourage, so I would guess he's got at least 14 MBA's on his staff to do that for him. Plus, he's so busy designing the tallest office building in the world. ;D Cheers!

A few months back, we were surprised on this board by Jones Soda being sold to Reed's for $10M, which some of us felt was cheap. Shortly after negotiating that deal with Reed's, Jones asked for permission to entertain another unsolicited offer it had received and Reed's obliged. Too bad for Reed's! Jones Soda has signed a deal to be distributed through Walmart, and the market valuation today soared to almost $30M! Why Reed's agreed to this, I don't know, but they did. Cheers! http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Jones-Soda-soars-after-apf-3891261427.html?x=0&.v=1

Sanjeev, he's done better than what your source is stating - by a large margin. Can't say unless there was some disclosure, but I have an extremely hard time believing those results were not a matter of either luck, or pushing up prices of microcap stocks. In the meantime, the manager builds up a huge incentive allocation, while the fund tanks in a year when you can't keep the prices moving up. Have you actually seen any audited financials? If you have, then I stand corrected, but unless I could see a fund's behavior and what they were up to year after year, I don't believe the hype. It is extremely difficult to do just 3% a year better, and even harder to do 10% better than the indices over a period of time. Twenty six fold in six years is incomprehensible with a basket of stocks...even if you only held 3-5 stocks. Cheers!

Interesting article about Prince Alwaleed. I don't think he has anything in common with Buffett except being a billionaire and reading Berkshire's letters, but it is interesting to see how he fashions himself as an equal counterpart. Cheers! http://preview.bloomberg.com/news/2010-05-17/buffett-and-the-prince.html

It's funny, for someone milking the hell out of this, she sure is doing her best to pretend to be distant from it. I think Buffett's biggest mistake in his career, was that he trusted Schroeder to write what was to be the most informed book about him and Berkshire. In the process, it made him look bad, while making Schroeder look downright bitter and spiteful. Cheers!

What do you think is the break for the top 0.1% of managers during '02-'10? I think greater than 10% annually above the S&P500 TR would put you pretty close...but over a reasonable time frame...10-15 years. You grow one dollar to $26 over six years, but lose 80% of that in the seventh year, you compounded at 23% annually and that's pretty amazing. Not sure exactly how I would view the results though if you were any of the people who put in money from 2006-2008. I think the truly great managers are the ones that can balance risk and reward over very long, long periods of time. Buffett losing money in only 2 years out of fifty is the gold standard. Seth Klarman managing a 17% return over 25 years with only two down years, while holding large amounts of cash is the silver. And none of those losses were catastrophic in any manner. Cheers!

From what I've seen elsewhere, the comments seem to say he lost over 80% in 2008? Does anyone know if that is correct? Cheers!

Here's an article about him when he was 18. He was making 50 trades a day! I think he suffered a gigantic loss in 2008 from what I see. Jordan, do you know exactly what the percentage loss was? Cheers! http://www.observer.com/node/41848