TedKord

I owned shares for a few years and did very well, I sold a couple of months ago around $200, but have kept my eye on it. In my experience they have done very well acquiring run off portfolios. What made me more cautious, is that they were growing their traditional P&C business. I assumed that was because they were seeing fewer opportunities in run offs. That said, I have nothing but respect for management and will go back in if the price falls to something crazy like 1.1-1.2x BV or I get comfortable with their ownership of an underwriting business.

Since November 8 the Peso has fallen from MXN18.32:$US1 to MXN20.84:$US1 or 13.75%. Since 2013 it has almost been cut in half. I'm not much of a top down economist, but wouldn't this greatly ameliorate a potential 20% border tax?

On October 20, GST announced a transformative transaction with an unnamed investor, which I went over briefly in the initial post. It has generally been moving up since then. The prf goes ex- tomorrow, which is worth $1.80. There is a limit as to how much you should pay. If it gets north of 23.75 (95% of par) after it goes ex- you're better off in the bond as Deepsouth suggested.

The discounted $ price is the reason I prefer the preferred. The total value of the combined prf is 154m and the total LTD is 418m. They will refi the bond next year once the properties are proven. I think it is likely they do a larger refi and take out the prf at the same time. If so you get the 10% carry + 20% capital gain. The bond is the safer play. If oil prices collapse, you will be much better off in the bond. I guess I think that risk is limited due to the relatively short term until they try and refi. I may be wearing rose colored glasses. If they don't take out the prf, they will trade where they are or perhaps a little better on the back of better funding and you can just trade out. I think the main reason to buy the bond over the prf is greater liquidity. If you think there is a reasonable chance oil revisits the 30s this year, you probably shouldn't buy either.

I like the preferred stock of Gastar (GST). They trade on the NYSE for with almost a year of dividends in arrears. The 8.625% trade at 20.5 and the 10.75% trade a little north of 22. Both are $25 par preferred. I’ll limit my discussion to the 8.625% for simplicity, but the story is basically the same for both. On Jan 10, GST announced that they will make up the arreage on the preferred on Jan 31 for holders of record on Jan 20, so these will go ex- on Jan 18. On the 8.625% GST will pay $1.80. GST will pay the dividend of .18 per month going forward. It will reduce their borrowing base but for the intermediate term, that doesn’t mean anything. GST has plenty of liquidity. GST is a pure play located in the STACK in Oklahoma. The STACK has become one of the most popular plays in the US after the Permian Basin. Last October, GST sold some non-core acreage for 70m and, more importantly, cut a development deal with a “large, private, global investment fund”. The agreement covers 60 wells in which the investor will pay 90% of the costs and only get 80% of the returns. This, by itself, is good news, but what this does is revalues a lot of GST’s 100% owned drilling sites. Think of it this way: once they drill a well subject to the agreement, engineers will make estimates of what the well will eventually produce and move the asset into Proved Developed Producing reserves (PDP), which can then be borrowed against. The engineers will also look at the wells to the right and to the left of the well and say that those wells should have roughly the same characteristics as the drilled well, so then GST can move those reserves from inferred reserves to Proved Undeveloped (PUD). These actions allow for more liquidity and will have a higher NAV which is how energy investors will look at it. After paying down the arrears the preferred will have about a 10% current return. GST has an 8.625% bond due in May, 2018 which trades near par. Assuming their drilling is successful, they will need to refinance that note next year. I see no reason why they wouldn’t try and refi the entire capital structure at the same time.

There's a lot I like about the stock: low P/E, good capital allocation, decent margins. It is a strip club. There's only so much money you can invest in a company like this.

10k, sold 2k yesterday

For all the noise generated today on coal, steel, pharma or hospitals, I think RICK could be one of the real losers. Any short term actions to stem the flow of immigrants will negatively affect RICK. I don't know what percent of RICK's independent contractors are here on various visas, but I'll bet it's pretty high. I think I'm going to trim my position.

RICK will be holding a 4Q & FY16 conf call on 10/13 instead of waiting for their regularly scheduled 12/14 call. They claim that they want to share exciting developments now rather than wait and they are appearing at a couple conferences and want to be able to speak freely. RICK doesn't trade with the kind of volume that magnifies short term news, but this sounds like a positive development.

Not sure what you consider an "outsider type manager" but I'd put Randy Smallwood, CEO of SLW, on your list. I don't know if they invented streaming, but they certainly were instrumental in institutionalizing it. I think SLW was the first firm to understand that a neither a gold mine nor a base metal mine was ever going to be valued on their silver by-product. SLW could buy that stream and be revalued as a pure play silver company. They have grown too big to use that strategy exclusively nowadays, but I've always thought of these guys as leaders in the space. I'm a huge fan of Robert Friedland, and a shareholder of IVN, but I don't know how much you can learn from him. I guess the takeaway would be get involved in large scale assets and be an excellent salesman.

Buffet's advice itself has changed over the years. I suggest partially from greater experience and partially from the sheer size of the company he has to run. The Buffet Partnership didn't make incredible returns investing in the S&P 500. Nor did the Partnership only buy stocks to hold forever. For every American Express there was a Kaiser Aluminum. A private investor, who runs a few million bucks in a private portfolio andwho can afford to put in serious elbow grease, doesn't need to run his portfolio like CALPERS. Not that CALPERS and investors without extra time wouldn't benefit from Buffet's advice. For most of us on the board, their has been plenty of excess returns in FELP and SCX (thank you Picasso), that truly are too small for BRK nowadays, but would have easily fit into the Buffet Partnership.

Financials: VRSK, BRK/B,Y, ESGR Metals: NGD, TAHO, IVN CN, U CN, BCN LN, PE CN, ATC CN, RPM, CN, GZZ CN, NUS CN Oil Related: WPZ, MMLP, GST prf Russia: LUKOY, OGZPY Tankers: OSG, DHT, HPHT SP (ports) Other: CBI, RICK, FIT, CDK Odds and sods: BWEL, HRCR, MNPP By size with in sector. I didn't list fixed income investments, or shares of the company I work for.

Whoever is elected, I don't will make a large long term difference. For all the strum und drang of the campaign, both candidates want to roll back trade and borrow heavily. Rightly or wrongly however, I do think markets will react much more violently in the short term in the event of a Trump election. I would use that opportunity to sell coal stocks and gold both of which I think will pop on the news.

Steak 'n Shake bringing a 400m new deal. UOP proceeds to pay off all other debt and pay a 230m dividend to BH.

Oh no, I get it. And I've heard the calls. I will feel more comfortable when I see it.