Parsad

You don't need them to have worker's comp unless they are on your payroll or employed by you...they break a leg and are out for a while, it's just like any other self-employed individual...they should have their own short-term/long-term disability. They just need insurance to protect you and them from any liability...your house insurance will protect you. But say they hurt somebody with a piece of equipment? They need insurance for that...otherwise your neighbour/victim can come after you. Cheers!

Congratulations! You'll definitely need help because you won't be sleeping much. :) I would recommend you make sure they have their own insurance. My gardener and handyman both have their own insurance. Cheers!

You're partly right! That's a very hard thing for people to accept...so you will get push back on this. You can have the right training and that's what Benjamin Graham, Buffett, et al are to investors, but: - You cannot teach or train the right temperament - Or how someone will react to a crisis - You cannot teach patience - You cannot teach someone to think independently if they aren't prone to that type of thinking...thus you get cloning practiced rampantly these days - You cannot teach someone to manage risk, especially if they are prone to a gambling mentality or an overly conservative mentality So alongside a firm, if not enlightened grasp, of how to apply an intelligent framework to evaluating securities, you need a number of other characteristics, including both emotional and intellectual traits. That's hard to find! The solace that all investors have though is that they can hone these skills and become better versions of themselves. So while everyone may not be great, most can be good! Cheers!

+1! Only a matter of time before someone creates a COBF algorithm. I'm going to start a post on "Fintech" stocks! Cheers!

Intel giant Andy Grove passed away at 79. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/intel-mastermind-silicon-valley-statesman-022547436.html

Yeah, there is some other funny business going on. How does the CFO blame the Controller for how the Philador accounting was booked? That's one of the most absurd things the CFO could have said. The Controller reports to the CFO, and the CFO ultimately signs off on the accounting, including treatment of how revenues are booked and any adjustments. There is obviously real cash flow underneath the hood, but what else in the accounting may need restatement? Anyone investing in Valeant is not making a binary bet...it's a speculative bet that the amount of fraud is limited. Cheers! Haven't they just reconfirmed that the only problem is still this rev recognition issue? Not sure what we learn in this release other than good news honestly. We have know the shifty Philidor structure for months now. We have also known about the few cents that more properly ought to have been booked in 14 instead of 15. And regarding the cfo I'm not surprised he doesn't want to be hung for this, assuming of course there is nothing else. The sin in Philidor was the weasely overall legal structure. Having gone there and used this structure, which I assume was not a Schiller creation, deciding whether to consolidate or not in q4 2014, with its trivial effects either y way, is almost totally economical irrelevant. And he didn't blame the comptroller. He said it was the compt's decision AND that he agreed with it. Personally I can understand the logic of what they did from an accounting point of view, too. Have no horse in this race but if I were long id be cautiously relieved that the release seems to reconfirm that all there is is this small Philidor Rev issue to restate. Quite amazing actually. Give me a hard working ad hoc committee, a terrified audit team and 6 months and I'd guess I'd find worse issues in many large international companies. Not surprised the stock rallied today. Just my two cents. I respectfully disagree with your view that he did not throw the Controller under the bus. Here is his quote: "The Philidor sales transactions in Q4 2014, and the subsequent accounting treatment, was the result of a careful and reasoned accounting decision made by the Company’s Corporate Controller based on what she considered to be complete and accurate facts, <b>and I was told by the Corporate Controller</b> that the outside auditors reviewed the transactions in question. The accounting decision was not my decision, but I was advised of the decision and the rationale behind the decision by the Corporate Controller, and I agreed with the decision. The now-former Corporate Controller was incredibly experienced, she was trusted and respected by the Audit and Risk Committee, and she consistently received among the highest employee rankings inside the Company and strong support from the Company’s outside auditors." According to his own statement, he simply accepted the word of the Controller that the auditors had signed off on the Philador revenue recognition. This indicates that he wasn't doing his job properly. This wasn't some immaterial $50K receivable! We're talking about one of their largest sources of revenue and how it was accounted. He doesn't have any backup from the auditors indicating that they were treating this correctly based on US GAAP? And if he does have backup, the blame certainly leads to the next party responsible...the auditors. This wasn't some new one-time transaction. They bear as much blame as the CFO if they approved the transaction! After that, the Audit and Risk Committee should be held responsible and the CEO. The last party I would blame would be the Controller. Cheers!

Hi Folks, We are getting closer to the dinner date! I'm taking online ticket purchases up until Friday, April 8th. All sales and refunds will end on that day, other than presentation-only tickets which will be sold at the door. I have to give the Fairmont Royal York the final dinner number on the 8th, thus the cut-off. Also, if anyone wants to donate something for the silent auction, including any sort of Berkshire/Fairfax/Value Investor memorabilia, please contact me at cornerofberkshireandfairfax@gmail.com. Thanks very much for your support! Sanjeev

Hi Folks, We are getting closer to the dinner date! I'm taking online ticket purchases up until Friday, April 8th. All sales and refunds will end on that day, other than presentation-only tickets which will be sold at the door. I have to give the Fairmont Royal York the final dinner number on the 8th, thus the cut-off. Also, if anyone wants to donate something for the silent auction, including any sort of Berkshire/Fairfax/Value Investor memorabilia, please contact me at cornerofberkshireandfairfax@gmail.com. Thanks very much for your support! Sanjeev

Yeah, there is some other funny business going on. How does the CFO blame the Controller for how the Philador accounting was booked? That's one of the most absurd things the CFO could have said. The Controller reports to the CFO, and the CFO ultimately signs off on the accounting, including treatment of how revenues are booked and any adjustments. There is obviously real cash flow underneath the hood, but what else in the accounting may need restatement? Anyone investing in Valeant is not making a binary bet...it's a speculative bet that the amount of fraud is limited. Cheers!

Few people are truly good or bad...we're all shades of both. They're saying that Sandridge is the alledged co-conspirator to the price fixing. I voted against Tom Ward a couple of years back when there was a proxy there due to the exorbitant spending and compensation, but every time I met Tom in Toronto, he was very gracious and shared his knowledge with us. I'm sure Aubrey was similar, as he and Tom were very good friends. Sad to see someone take their life like that...for him and all of those he left behind!

Holy smokes! Wow. Just crazy.

I would guess that they are among the shares Frank claimed to own. Actually, I think they mean that 3,318,000 shares issued or claimed to be owned by the company has no back-up documentation to prove they should exist. Question is: - who owns these shares? - were these shares sold by whoever they were issued to? - were they fraudulently issued if there is no documentation or director's resolutions indicating they should have been issued? Cheers!

Does anyone have it? Hunting through all the "other"s on Sedar is pretty awful. Here you go Thanks, I didn't realize it was just the MD&A section. This time, he had a separate letter. It was the first official letter as "Premier Diversified Holdings Inc.", whereas the previous letter was still under the "Premier Diagnostics Health Services" banner. I felt shareholders deserved a more extensive letter beginning this year with the company headed in a new direction. Cheers!

I feel like telling some of you Burry hasn’t crushed the S&P is like telling a kid there’s no Santa. WHAT DO YOU MEAN THERE'S NO SANTA! F**K YOU! :)

Hi Everyone, Over 50% sold...get your ticket order in! Just under two months before the dinner. Cheers!

Hi Everyone, Over 50% sold, so please get your ticket orders in. Just under two months from the dinner! Cheers!

I can confirm that it is the real Guy Spiers and he's trying to secure a seat at the bankruptcy hearing table for all the equity holders. There is no guarantee of success. He may or may not choose to answer your questions. Cheers!

Hi Winjitsu, No problem. Please email me. Thanks! Sanjeev

Hi Folks, If any of you are investment bankers in Hong Kong, please contact me at cornermarketcapital@gmail.com. Thanks very much! Sanjeev

Munger nearly lost everything in the 1973-74 correction...he was down some 70%+. He learned from his own mistakes as well! Berkshire was lucky things turned out like they did after the whole Solomon's debacle...otherwise Berkshire would not be here today. Prem is lucky he is still standing after buying C&F and TIG and then being hit with 9/11 and Hurricane Hugo! We all make mistakes...don't be so hard on yourself. Cheers!

Agreed. What a wonderful archive of videos it would be if they had started in the early Youtube days.. Probably no choice at this point...crowds are just too big. There is no other venue big enough if the crowd gets significantly larger. People are renting cars after flying into Lincoln, Nebraska or Iowa, because you can't get rental cars in Omaha. Hotels in Omaha and Council Bluffs are fully booked...many a year ahead of time. Also, a lot of the old-time BRK shareholders are approaching their 70's, 80's and 90's, so many might prefer to just watch it online now instead of dealing with the crowds...and only going to get worse. Cheers!

Nothing I'm aware of, but it could be that our service provider does upgrades around midnight EST. Cheers!

That's what has always been a red flag to me. He manages $500mil and he can't hire one single analyst? In an average year he should keep 1% which is $5mil, an analyst salary is chump change. Ok if he is buried in paper all day reading fine, but I see him well dressed making speeches and even teaching courses at university......... he can't be devoting as much attention as his partners expect and deserve. And an analyst won't mess up? I've read a lot of dumb things from a lot of analysts. The best is when lousy portfolio managers decide to become analysts, or when bad analysts decide to become portfolio managers. Pabrai had more time and no analyst when he bought Delta Financial in 2007...the idea was wrong, not anything else. Einhorn has a ton of analysts and he still bought and sat on the board of New Century. Concentrated positions in good ideas is what made these fund managers, and that is part of the risk of investing in a concentrated portfolio...there will be volatility. People screw up and adding an analyst is like adding a sixth toe, because you think the other five toes are too busy! We have one brain and one penis...adding more of either doesn't necessarily equate to being smarter or a better lover! :) Cheers!

In some ways I feel like DTEJD1997 completely trolled this forum. The guy is a coin dealer and I believe owns a coin store. There was a thread on this a year or two back. He's talking his book like anyone else here talking some stock. I think it'd be interesting to know how many people on here could really pull together $4-5k in a day or two (probably most, but this is also a board filled with rich people). I worked at a place with stock options that needed to be exercised with cash and in talking to co-workers the common response was "who has $3k in cash laying around?" The idea that anyone even had that sort of money available was absurd. Stock options paid for in cash? Really, that's crazy. I would agree, that most people on here could pull together that type of cash no problem. I could do that in ten minutes. But most people on here are smart enough, and as you said probably well off enough, to keep a certain amount of cash and liquidity. Average Canadian debt/income ratio hit 170% yesterday...highest since 1990. Not sure the average Canadian/American could wrangle that type of cash up right away. Cheers!

Personally, I think there is some need to hold some cash outside of an institutional account, simply because you could have a major catastrophe (Earthquake, solar flare, terrorist attack, etc) that forces you to do without the banks, internet and ATM's for a few days. As well in any financial crisis, there would be a run on banks for a few days or weeks, until the government could find another institution to step in or nationalize the bankrupt bank(s). You might not qualify for a loan also if banks suddenly tighten lending requirements like they did in 2009 and after. So a good chunk of cash sitting in a safety deposit box/safe/filing cabinet might be a good idea. I don't think you need gold or silver...unless you think the country is going to collapse into chaos. You would be better off spending that time and energy growing your own food in your backyard, paying off any debts/mortgage, than wasting it buying gold and silver. At least you could live off your own land...thus why Buffett would rather own all of the agricultural land in the United States plus 25 Exxon Mobils, than all of the gold ever produced. Fear drives people to do stupid things! Including very smart people. How many were buying gold at $1,800 US oz instead of Wells Fargo at $12 and Starbucks at $6 in 2008? Cheers!