Parsad

Yes, but they have only commited to buying it at $300m if there is not a better offer. They would get $9m if a better offer is accepted. $9 million dollar bills don't grow on trees, but for Fairfax, this is pocket change, unless they really buy the asset (which I doubt). I think they would buy it...over $1B in revenue for $300M with all creditors settled and a clean balance sheet. This has Bill Gregson running it written all over it. If somebody outbids them, then they walk away with $9M. The toy industry is one ripe for consolidation...retail brick and mortar stores will struggle against Amazon unless they can get scale and continue to move a lot of their business online. Order online and get delivery or pick up at the nearest store...that's the way everyone is going. Cheers!

They have a ton of retail experience...I'm guessing this is going to be another Bill Gregson turnaround project. My nephew and niece are going to love the fact that I know the owner of Toys R Us now! Cheers!

I do Sudoku every night in the bathroom during my bed-time evacuation. I do enough so that I start to get tired, rather than stimulated mentally. So usually the legs start to get numb! ;D Cheers!

Hi All, Fairfax has put together a special package through Thomas Cook India for Fairfax or Fairfax India investors that incorporates an 8-day/7-night India visit with daily guided excursions to see Fairfax-related companies and historical/cultural sites of India. The dates of the itinerary are January 12th to 19th, 2019. I've seen the itinerary, which is quite expansive, and you would be basically staying at 5-star hotels in various cities, including Delhi, Mumbai, Agra, Jaipur and Bengaluru. Breakfast, lunch and dinner is also included each day...with visits to dine at historical hotels, sites, etc. All transfers are also included. The package has a set price for single or double occupancy. You would also have to pay for your flight to and from India, but Fairfax is working with Air Canada to get some deals on flights as well. If I don't win the silent auction prize for the trip to India, then I will be going on this one. It would be a very good way to see some of India, while being able to learn about Fairfax's India investments...all in a great deal of comfort...especially for the first-time visitor like myself! If you would like more information on this, please email me at cornerofberkshireandfairfax@gmail.com and I can forward you the itinerary. Cheers! Sanjeev

Online and dinner ($200) ticket sales end Thursday (19th) folks! If you plan on joining us for the our last annual dinner...you've got a couple of days left to get your tickets. Thanks to all of you who are attending and to those that have attended in the past! Cheers!

Online and dinner ($200) ticket sales end Thursday (19th) folks! If you plan on joining us for the our last annual dinner...you've got a couple of days left to get your tickets. Cheers!

Online and dinner ($200) ticket sales end Thursday (19th) folks! If you plan on joining us for the our last annual dinner...you've got a couple of days left to get your tickets. Cheers!

The incentive fee is based solely on performance. So if I don't perform, and our partners can argue I haven't over the last 2-3 years...then I don't get paid and it costs them nothing other than lost opportunity. They may not be happy, but at least my interests and their interests are aligned. Let me ask you a question now: If I had been correct on Sequant Re, and that investment had worked out perfectly and now PDH was making $1-1.5M a year in fees from Sequant Re (let's not even include the 17% annualized return on Russell Breweries, 13% annualized return on Kingswood's 1st real estate project, increase in PDC's revenue from essentiallly zero (but we'll call it $900K in 2015) to $1.5M in 2018, and the 19% annualized return I did in 2016/2017 on the investment portfolio)...all these things came to fruition except the biggest investment...Sequant Re. If I had been right, and PDH stock was now at 25 cents...would my partners have minded my interest and time spent on PDH? No, of course not. In this business, you are only as good as your last game. Value investors, while they think they are different, are as equally short-term focused as the average investor. How many value investors have held Fairfax shares steadily from when they bought them and not wavered? Of those that bought at the lows in 2003, and there were hundreds, I would say you could probably count those still holding those shares on one hand. That percentage might be a bit better for Berkshire shareholders, but I would bet that it isn't statistically much different for those that bought Berkshire shares back in 1999/2000. Managers don't get into the business to be wrong...every decision, good or bad, we try and make the best evaluated decision we can with the information we have on hand at the time. The lesson is that managers may not always make the best/correct decision, and their partners may not always be happy about that, but the goal is to make sure incentives and behaviors are in line with partner/shareholder interests. That is the only thing anyone can guarantee...whether they are a hedge fund manager or the CEO of a corporation. If you have the working fundamentals right, at least incentives are fully aligned...since performance is never guaranteed on any investment. We live for and absolutely try to do that! As mentioned previously on another thread, we recently closed our Canadian Fund. Our performance was underwhelming, and operating costs in Canada for such a small fund was part of the reason...so we felt that the fund was not adding value to investors and made the decision to close. The vast majority (about 80%) of our partners did ok or well while in the fund, but there were four more recent partners who had lost some of their capital...from 1% to about 10%. Alnesh and I felt compelled to make them whole from our own money and we did. While we underperformed, and of course the partners would have preferred us to have killed the indices, there are no guarantees on investment return. But our incentives, behavior and culture was 100% aligned with partner interests...that's the only thing we can 100% guarantee. Name me a fund manager who has made their partners whole without it being in the LP agreement? Cheers!

Let me offer my two cents, as someone in a very similar position to Steve: In terms of compensation - Our fund owns 42% of PDH...I receive a salary from PDH as CEO and I receive only incentive fees I earn from our fund. PDH makes up about 15% of the fund. Now some people would argue I'm double-dipping, since I receive my fees from the fund and I receive a salary as CEO of PDH. That would be true if PDH was a passive investment like Bank of America, Macy's or some other stock we own in the fund...where I have no direction over, nor any day to day responsibilities. And believe me, the day to day duties are extensive...especially in the beginning when we got involved and I was working 14 hour days six days a week for the first 2 years trying to turn it around. Or it could be perceived as double-dipping if we received a management fee from the fund...but we don't...totally incentive-based. Also, my CEO salary is on par or less than what anyone else would have gotten for that position...depending on the fluctuating market cap and book value over the years...you could argue either way, and because of that I won't try and debate it. It will either look cheap or look expensive 5-10 years out. But I capped it from day one...I will never get a raise! How many CEO's would do that? Whether we should or should not have gotten involved with PDH can be debated either way. But it is what it is, and we are intent on growing it over time and making it into something special. I have a very direct influence over the success or failure of PDH...not like passive investments in our fund. It consumes an enormous amount of time, work, energy and even costs you mentally (stress). So while I'm sure some would like to continue arguing that it is double-dipping, it certainly isn't in our case. And from what I've seen, Steve's circumstance is very similar. Cheers!

Hi Folks, This is our 13th dinner and probably last one in its current format...as support is clearly waning from year to year. We've raised $160,000 in memory of JoAnn Butler, Prem's executive assistant and our friend who passed away from colon cancer in 2009. Everything has its time, and we are very happy we were able to do this for as long as we have. I don't know exactly what next year's event will look like, as the week is so full of other wonderful events, it has relegated ours to one where attendance is decreasing year to year. The most likely conversion will be from a dinner to a simple networking event, with Fairfax coming in around 9pm with their panel. We will probably retain the silent auction, and continue to raise money for Crohn's & Colitis Canada, but we will get rid of the dinner and reduce the price to attend to something nominal to cover the rental of the room and space. So, I'm encouraging all of our supporters, old and new, to join us for our last such dinner. We have some great speakers lined up, including our usual Fairfax panel moderated by Jeff Stacey...and of course, Francis Chou answering questions till 11pm or later! Truly looking forward to seeing you there...one last hurrah! Get your tickets below and check out our event PDF that is attached. https://www.pdh-inc.com/2018-premier-fairfax-conference.html Sanjeev 2018_PDH_FFH_Dinner.pdf

Hi Folks, This is our 13th dinner and probably last one in its current format. I'm encouraging all of our supporters, older and newer, to join us for our last such dinner. Please get your tickets before April 18th, as we have to finalize numbers after that. We have some great speakers lined up, including our usual Fairfax panel moderated by Jeff Stacey...and of course, Francis Chou answering questions till 11pm or later! Truly looking forward to seeing you there...and remember, we are raising funds for Crohn's & Colitis Canada in memory of JoAnn Butler! Get your tickets below and check out our event PDF that is attached! https://www.pdh-inc.com/2018-premier-fairfax-conference.html Sanjeev 2018_PDH_FFH_Dinner.pdf

Hi Folks, This is our 13th dinner and probably last one in its current format. I'm encouraging all of our supporters, older and newer, to join us for our last such dinner. Please get your tickets before April 18th, as we have to finalize numbers after that. We have some great speakers lined up, including our usual Fairfax panel moderated by Jeff Stacey...and of course, Francis Chou answering questions till 11pm or later! Truly looking forward to seeing you there...and remember, we are raising funds for Crohn's & Colitis Canada in memory of JoAnn Butler! Get your tickets below and check out our event PDF that is attached! https://www.pdh-inc.com/2018-premier-fairfax-conference.html Sanjeev 2018_PDH_FFH_Dinner.pdf

2018 AGM Presentation: https://www.pdh-inc.com/2018-agm.html I apologize for not being there this year, but there was a medical issue in the family...everything is good...thanks! Cheers!

In most professions, you still create value for your employees, even if you underperform. An underperforming waitress will still serve customers, an underperforming engineer will still do some engineering work for the company etc. An underperforming money manager however will be measured against the easily obtainable index standard and if he doesn’t beat that or worse underperforms by a wide margin, he does not create any value of hits customers, in fact he costs his customers money. His customers would have been better off, if they had never heard or met this persons, that’s the harsh truth. Wasn't this the harsh reality from 1996 to February 2000? And again, from 2003 to 2008? And now you have one of the most prolonged bull markets, with unimaginable manipulation of monetary and fiscal policy, from 2009 to 2018. Value investors looked stupid until February 2000, and then again until October 2008. Unwinding of bonds, increasing interest rates, huge expansion and growth related to a massive tax cut stimulus, and don't forget that sovereign debt relative to GDP hasn't decreased for almost any developed nation over this expansion period. Bubble, bubble toil and trouble! On the positive side, money mangement is one of the few professions where you can underperform and still become filthy rich. Alnesh and I just closed our Canadian Fund after a decade of relative underperformance. The fund was just too small, and operating expenses far too high...we had no fixed fee, only an incentive fee above a 6% hurdle. We didn't become filthy rich, and we made sure all of our partners left the fund with at least the capital they put in or more...four partners who came in during the last couple of years were made 100% whole from our own funds. The Chou Funds might not work quite like that, but at least Francis is one of the few managers in the world who tries hard to be accountable. Cheers!

Value Investor Conference is holding a couple of events Berkshire weekend: Morningstar CEO - Kunal Kapoor on May 3rd Brookfield CEO - Bruce Flatt on May 4th See details below: http://www.valueinvestorconference.com/valueinvestorregister.html#OVD2

Value Investor Conference is holding a couple of events Berkshire weekend: Morningstar CEO - Kunal Kapoor on May 3rd Brookfield CEO - Bruce Flatt on May 4th See details below: http://www.valueinvestorconference.com/valueinvestorregister.html#OVD2

I can give you some idea of the options questions, but not the exact name of the individual, as that would be against company confidentiality. #1 was granted to an employee before I joined. #2 was granted to an employee after I joined. You can see how I feel about the issuance of options...at the same time, we have to provide some incentive to employees. I will always make sure our issuances are well within reason. On the question of donations...that is more of an accounting and presentation issue than anything else. We did not donate that amount. I had a non-profit sublease alot of the excess space we were occupying on the corporate side after I took over. Because they signed on for a 5-year lease, and they are a non-profit, they pay a little less than market rates. They do something goofy at the end of the year called a "check exchange". They issue us a check above the normal sublease amount by "x" for discounted services, space, etc. We issue a check back to them as a donation for "x". I have no idea why they do it, and I think CRA should frown on it. But we record it as a donation, receive a tax receipt, yet no real difference in cash exchanged hands. Go figure! Cheers!

Post only if 100% ok with Ben and Allan...otherwise it will be removed and the poster banned. Cheers!

Hi All, We are getting closer to the event date. Please get your tickets at the link above. If you need anything, please contact my assistant Nicole Chin. We have some great presentations again this year...including one from our own Keith Smith and his Bonhoeffer Fund! And of course, our guests from Fairfax Financial who will be running their usual Q&A! Important note: The event is at the Sheraton Toronto Centre this year, as there was some construction at the Royal York...and all of the events were moved there. We will be back at the Royal York next year if things continue. Speaking of next year and continuing...that will be dependent on ticket sales and we will decide how things progress going forward. We may downsize or possibly eliminate the event altogether. It's been a great run, and hopefully we can continue it, but it will come down to participation. Thanks for your support over the years and we look forward to seeing you all at least once more this year! Sanjeev

This seems like a silly gratuitous question to answer, since we weren't millionaires when we started and still had good results...but if it makes you feel better: Alnesh is definitely a multi-millionaire. I on the other hand had to live on my investments for 7 years while building Corner Market Capital...so I'm definitely a millionaire, and close to a multi-milliionaire...but not there yet. Now I'm sure the relevance of this response will change everyone's minds. The people on this board can be so retarded for such intelligent human beings! Any of you wondering if Mohnish is a multi-millionaire? I can ask for a copy of his bank account statement. Cheers!

During 2017 (after that letter), the Hedge fund also purchased a further 14.8m PDH common shares for $1.52m CAD (~10.25 CAD cents per share) during 2017 (per SEDI). wabuffo The fund was down 1.17% for the entire 2017 year. PDH made up less than 20% of the fund at year-end. Of the remaining 80%+, 40% was cash before the recent downturn in stocks. Make of it what you will. Cheers! You are also assuming that the other 40% of non-PDH assets is not doing anything, and that none of the 40% cash was deployed in the recent drop and rebound. You know the phrase about "assume"...makes an ass out of you and me! Cheers!

During 2017 (after that letter), the Hedge fund also purchased a further 14.8m PDH common shares for $1.52m CAD (~10.25 CAD cents per share) during 2017 (per SEDI). wabuffo The fund was down 1.17% for the entire 2017 year. PDH made up less than 20% of the fund at year-end. Of the remaining 80%+, 40% was cash before the recent downturn in stocks. Make of it what you will. Cheers!

Who knows what will happen, but I have a feeling Joe Average hasn't even started selling yet. Buying and ultimately selling bitcoin, isn't as easy as the advocates would have you believe. So there is a lag between when the larger players sell, and the small average investor's get to sell. The smaller players, especially the ones buying last at the higher valuations, will be left holding the bag. Cheers!

I received in IB account. Depending on the brokerage and how their back office operates, it may be up to 2-3 business days from the ex-dividend date before it shows up in your account. It just depends on how their system internally handles dividends from Computershare, and how they process the ex-dividend stock transaction. I know ScotiaMcLeod will show the cash in the account tomorrow...3 days from the ex-dividend date. If it's not there tomorrow, have your brokerage investigate internally what is going on. Cheers!