Jurgis

This misses my question. Right now I have over 1000 books on the to-read list (yes, some of them are probably crap where I won't get through first 20 pages and over 70% are fiction so they only partially relate to this topic). So I don't need a reason to read. But I do need a reason to read particular book or a set of books. Cause otherwise, they will just go into 1001 through 1100 positions into the queue. 8) And in general most history books for me personally go to the bottom of the pile, not to the top. Was just looking at some Napoleon's biography recommended by Economist. Probably good book, decided not to even add to my pile. 8) Anyway, if you enjoy history books, that's fine. I was just looking for some extra motivation. :)

If we are going into physicists, then definitely read everything about and by Richard Feynman. 8) http://smile.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Richard+Feynman I'd like to see a parallel universe where Feynman went into investing. ;D

From the problem: 2 numbers a and b, a >=b, Good luck

OT? (Perhaps I should split this into another thread if discussion develops) I wonder if the question should be "how to read" instead of "what to read". I have no issue with the books recommended. Most of them are good, some are great. I wonder though what exactly people expect from reading these books. Sure, reading in itself is good, it expands world view, you might get some insights, etc. But I also wonder how many people read e.g. Steve Jobs' biography and expect to find another Steve Jobs and/or become Steve Jobs. Or read history books and expect to become macro economic/political experts or something. :) I wonder if that ever works and if it works does it work because some people read differently than others. In particular, I don't think reading history has helped me to become better investor at all. Though I have to admit that I don't particularly like history books (I don't hate them, but if I have a choice, I don't read them either) and I am also not a good investor either. ;) In many aspects the present is unique and trying to shoehorn it into historical precedents is as bad as trying to say "this time is different". :)

They raise a valid question: when do you fire a portfolio manager, when do you sell the company? It's easy to say with 20/20 Monday-morning-quarterbacking vision that we would not have fired Munger or Buffett (yeah, when BRK shares fell over 50%, when it was investigated by SEC with potential of Buffett being barred from investing business, when WPO almost went BK, when GEICO almost went BK, etc.). But with all honesty how many people would not have fired Munger and Buffett? Even on this forum, I doubt that many people have held a position in BRK/FFH/MKL for 10 years plus. And even the ones who held them for 10 years plus, how many had much larger positions in stocks that they sold/bought/etc. in effect maybe not "firing" Buffett/Watsa/etc, but at least not hiring them either. ;) So it is a very valid and very hard question: when do you hire and when do you fire your investment? How long underperformance would you suffer? On the other hand, I agree with Picasso. They are whining a bit too much for my taste. And page 4 is IMHO worthless. Should an investor care that they zig on the days when SP500 zags? It seems that they are marketing themselves to investors who care - and that's not really my crowd. ;) If I could pick them outperforming SP500 or zigging-while-zagging or active share, I'd pick outperformance. Especially since zigging is such a short term measure... I could raise some issues with their kudos for Texas Pacific and Royal Gold, but I believe these have been discussed on this forum in the past, so I won't repeat. :) Also, they might be right and these might be great investments. I think their presentation of them is questionable though. Why would they show tables that have irrelevant info pretty much in all lines? Who cares how many ETFs hold the stock or past appreciation or sales / employee? Do any of these really affect your investment in a company? (I guess past appreciation does affect investments into "investment" companies such as BRK or FFH in some sense... but in general past appreciation is rather worthless number). I guess they are trying to do something different. And I still kind of like it. But I wonder if "different" at some point is also not an irrelevant measure.

Thanks Dustin.

Have no clue, sorry. I don't believe it is actual Mensa test. I think this was presented in the press as a "what Mensa test looks like but much shorter". I'd be interested to hear from Mensa members (or whoever took Mensa test) if this is similar to actual test. :)

LOL. Talk about cheap entertainment! This is cheaper than movie tickets. Not even talking about rock concerts.

I don't know if it's really Mensa. I posted it completely for fun as a brain teaser. Obviously, doing the test won't improve you investment returns or sex life. ;D Actually, one of the questions provides a secret Illuminati way to get rich in real estate. So, yeah, if you solve all the problems, and you figure out the answer, you could become rich!!!!!

;D

No signups, no interest, so this is cancelled.

I agree that Canadian treatment of divvies as you described make them more attractive than in US. Regarding divvies vs cap gains vs downturns: so you have to pick companies that pay divvies and won't stop paying them during the 50% market downturns. This limits the investable universe quite a lot. Are you sure you are not sacrificing long term returns if you do that? Cause if you do, you might win the battle but lose the war: you get divvies now, but have problems 10-20 years down the road when your portfolio has not grown enough. E.g. if I had to buy KO or JNJ for divvies and divvie payout security, I'm not sure I'd be happy with their future return (although I might be wrong and the return might be fine). While on the other hand JPM might satisfy divvie payout and possible future growth but probably has lesser divvie payout security. Anyway, it does depend on a personal situation and personal portfolio. Your solution might work perfectly fine for you. I don't think there is a single right answer. Take care

are we supposed to be able to do this in our head? when p said "i know you don't know" I am guessing that meant he knew q didn't know it before q said anything, right? If you can do it in your head, you're pretty genius level. I'd suggest pen and paper at least, programming makes this easier though. I got almost to the end with pen and paper, but programming script makes last step easier to verify and doublecheck. The answer to your second question is "yes".

What price drop? ;D

OK, I think that makes sense. Thanks

Edit: yes, there is a single solution that follows from the inferences of conversation between P & Q. I wrote a Python script and got the answer. It would be somewhat hard, but possible to do it by hand. If anyone wants spoilers the answer is also at http://www.mathpropress.com/archive/iams/vol14.ascii Now back to wasting my workday on other non-productive endeavors like value investing 8)

+1 to what Petec said.

I am reserving judgement, but I can see why market does not like this: "Hey, we are buying this great company!" "Hey, we have to do share dilution for this great company!" "Hey, we did the share dilution and we will still only get 70% of this great (?) company" ... ::)

Great talk transcript. Edit: great interview too. I mostly agree with him. :)

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/graphics/2015/04/mensa6.html I don't know if this relates closely to real MENSA test. :) I did 6. Coulda done 7 if I was not lazy. ;) Couldn't do 2, 4, 8 - tough with English as second language and/or my thinking setup. With 4 even after I looked up the answer, I still did not know these names. 2 and 8 were possibly doable if I spent tons of time. :)

I know that you know that I know the answer. But that does not help anyone else solving the riddle. :P Yeah, it kinda similar to "what color hat is on your head" problems.

Or they are bulking up on cash expecting a crash... which may be good ... or not. ;)

This is still really weird. If they bought a good company, why would they sell 30% of it immediately??? It's not as if they don't have money for the whole thing. I just don't see why they need a partner. Another explanation would be that they don't want more than X amount of business/exposure to what Brit is doing. But this also makes little sense: they can run it as conservatively as they want (unless there are some Lloyd's rules that I don't know), so why is bigger exposure an issue. And why would they need cash now? It's not as if they have tons of bargains to buy... (Is BRK for sale? ;D Just kidding... :-X ) Edit: Also IMHO they have other things that they could dump for cash.

OT: I agree, this forum needs a non-Facebook-connected like button. It seems that either nobody uses the Facebook-like-button that is there or it does not work or both.

Yes, this is rather WTF... :o