Gregmal

The guy has numerous times stated he missed GOOG and AMZN, MSFT, etc. There would have been zero reason not to be able to deploy at least some capital during the sell off into those. Personally, I think he probably did. If he didn’t, there’s no excuse about scars from the past or limitations on size...even novice investors saw pretty quickly those businesses would be ok. And many of the pros like Tepper nailed the bottom, almost to the day. Or maybe the greatest investor of all time was just sleeping?

I mean this is exactly what you'd expect to happen when you give too much weight to a bunch of dorks from academia. These guys arent used to their 15 minutes of fame, but then enjoy it. They get egged on about their "models" and then get carried away, no different than when you ask a 14 year old about what video games they like just to make conversation. Then academics need to stay in the classrooms. Not always the case, but some of the absolute worst investors Ive ever met in my life are teachers, doctors, and scientists. They get way too hung up on ideas and "possibilities" and often lose grip on reality. The type that invest in clean energy stuff because climate change is a certainty even though that has zero correlation to the fact that the business they are investing in are an unmitigated disaster. I had a investor once talking to me about his side portfolio. Keep in mind this is a US Navy Seal with a Degree from Yale that works at the same company Edward Snowden used to; smarter on his dumbest day than most of us are on our best days.... Owned CLNE and WPRT in 2013 because it was inevitable natural gas was the solution to the fossil fuel problem...

Eh, Ackman can be a clown, but the email to Munger is just an example of the guy really giving a shit and doing whatever is possibly in his power to make his investments work; something I think is admirable. The downside, which we've seen with many, probably most notably, Herbalife, is he goes too far and doesnt know when to stop. But Ackman is definitely a guy who works his ass off for his investors and puts everything he has into making things work for them.

Well orthopa, we already know Dalals deal... as for many of the others, the data and facts are only useful when they support a certain political narrative. That is all.

I'd also point out that a long sung tune of failure and caught with your pants down syndrome involves preaching caution and conservatism AFTER THE FACT. When things go down, if you played it right, you should be on offense. When things get wild, defense. Investors probably have a somewhat better excuse because its often subjective where the turning points are. But boy does it piss me off when I hear CEO's and business managers, who several months ago were loading the boat on buybacks, AT THE HIGHS, now preaching "cautiousness" and "taking measured approaches" when their shares are down 30-50%+...Its IMO immediate grounds to fire the asshole.

So I agree, we hear a lot of folks talking about "worst recession since".... but how is nobody able to differentiate what is extremely obvious? Most recessions, or even depression, happen on their own and are largely unavoidable. This is entirely different than temporarily FORCING everything to stop, and companies to layoff/furlough for the time being. To summarize the sensationalism, I ll point to an example. I saw a headline last week, "biggest wave of unemployment in history!"...and my first thought was, what idiot wrote that headline? The second, not f*** shit, we chose to shut everything down. I guarantee the first day or weeks following things opening back up, we may see the single largest hiring sprees EVA!! Will we get back to normal right away? No, but the sensationalism is just bullshit and a huge distraction.

Not directed at you, but the general question you raise: Well, then what is a good buy? A month ago the entire market tanked. OK - let's say BRK has totally sour views on banking, energy, and anything travel-related. What about the rest of the economy? Surely there were some bargains in unrelated industries? I think if they are holding their breath for desperate business owners to call them up, begging to sell out, then they will go blue in the face before that phone rings. If they can't find bargains as investors in public markets during a viral market rout, then go run a PE shop. Indeed I think you hit two major points. 1) Any idiot could find SOMETHING to buy a month ago. I just posted on FRP. They sold a PORTION of their business, the warehouses, for $350M+ a couple years ago and sat on the proceeds specifically because they thought the market was overvalued. They still have other business segments easily worth a few hundred mil. Last month, it briefly traded below the value of just the warehouse proceeds... idiot, no-brainer territory. There were plenty others. 2) Cash back in 08 was expensive. Judging by Buffetts refusal to make investments, I'd also imagine he's waiting for deals to fall into his lap that simply won't happen because Berkshire simply is not the lender of last resorts anymore; too many folks have money. Banks have tons of liquidity right now, not so in 08. PE is loaded and ready to go, something heard plenty about as BX and BAM even boasted this a few times. Those guys are getting Buffetts deals.

This has held up better than probably any real estate company I follow, but what else is interesting is the volume. Been huge for FRP recently, and in a good way. Perhaps this one has earned its stripes with a few more folks than just us schmucks here.

IDK but to me that makes perfect sense. With 0 as your interest marker on the bond side, what multiples should people be paying for earnings? 10x? If you have 1% 10 yr, a 4-5% mid cycle earnings yield seems pretty reasonable to me. Not that Im buying into it yet, but in theory I dont see how it doesnt make sense. This is part of the reason I just shake my head when people mistakenly take short cuts and just conclude "we cant be trading here, it's where we were in 2019!"... No, its not where we were trading in 2019, when you account for some very important variables....Coronavirus will just make the companies you should be buying in the first place, better and stronger going forward.

I've been thinking the same thing. There's basically a miss-pricing here. If the S&P is worth 2800 then no way the banks show be this low. If banks are this low, no fucking way should the S&P be worth 2800. Seems like a long-short banks vs s&p might be a good trade at this point. Given their low yields, government bonds are a likely to be a poor investment right now (long term). Especially with all the spending by governments and the potential for this to stoke inflation down the road. Coronovirus will be with us until a vaccine is ready so many industries are uninevstable: airlines, airline makers, hotels, restaurants, travel, tourism, movie industry, theatres, conventions, arenas. Other segments like retail (think mall/store shopping) are going to really struggle moving forward as sales will remain low. What happens to sellers of seasonal goods (like clothing) and all that worthless inventory that cant be sold. Oil is in a severe bear market so energy stocks are going to continue to struggle. Everyone is expecting the global recession to be the worst since the great depression. This will hurt banks and other cyclical stocks. There is a small subset of companies that will get through the virus/oil/severe recession: cash rich (minimum strong balance sheet) and able to grow top line. Think of companies people need to use to work at home, as an example. Microsoft, google, adobe, amazon, facebook, etc. Select utilities too? Telcos? A ton on money will be looking to buy these very few companies; hello new bubble? Agreed, but "new bubble"? Some of these were already there. If I had a buck for every person who now sees that "hmmm Amazon is probably a pretty good investment..." derp, derp, derp... well, I'd have a lot of dollars. Personally, I dont own any banks yet, but banks and real estate, companies with robust and stable cash flows and ability to return it to shareholders, would be where I lean, rather than the high growth tech stocks that consistently dilute the hell out of you and went parabolic years ago. I love GOOG, but ad spending is toast. I finally forced myself to buy a bit of MSFT the other day, but cant help but look at the 10 year chart and think WTF... Everything in the world is going right for Amazon, so by nature, as a contrarian, that in and of itself is reason not to touch it here.

These big pops on favorable short term news seem like obvious entry points for a short. Frankly, I dont see how its possible to lose money if you put on some sort of long bond, short stock trade, with consideration to weightings of course. There's really no chance a company like this, with the debt load they carry, doesnt eventually file.

Why is it, that, regardless of content, the majority of the Twitter links you post are filled with losers who's posting history, 90%+ revolves around a Trump obsession?

I dont see what people are complaining about regarding measures and steps to open things back up... Disagree? Continue hiding in your houses for the rest of your life. Re-opening the economy for those whom wish to work and live their lives doesnt force you to do anything.

Sure, on the surface it sounds like it, but removing political biases on the part of those trumpeting this "horrible decision", is it not credible to at least question these people? They've been horribly wrong about things directly related to the purpose of their existence and continuously seem to have a pro China position, even down to the OK being given to re-open wet markets...

LOL yea, or that the government response was a disaster, even though the numbers turned out to be pretty underwhelming. Or that Cuomo and De Blasio did a great just, when NY was the dumpster fire, WHILE broadcasting that the entire US was basically going to be Italy, when in realty it only ended up being his state and his elected officials... He didn't commit to things on purpose though, a lot of hucksters do this. That way, either way, they can claim they were right. Its a very NYer way to behave.

Both are scoundrels whom worship nothing but money.

Eh Ill take the other side and say its actually quite easy. I know because Ive done it. By my mid-late 20's I was able to grow from pretty much scratch an investment management business into a low 8 figure AUM. At that point I was able to effectively monetize it in a manner which let me live life the way I wanted to. I really could care less about accumulating money beyond a certain point. But the reason its easy is because the key ingredients are simple. You can work hard to organically acquire AUM, or you can buy it. From there, its networking, and selling either 1) "supposed" strategies, 2) gross returns. This is done by leveraging 1) your access(a key for Tilson whom was boys with Ackman and Einhorn) or 2) your proprietary "research". It really is a pretty simple formula and I've seen plenty of others do it as well. Another dirty secret, is...its even easier if you just sell people what they want to hear anyway and will say anything to get a deal done. Its not hard to make money without ethics or morals. My opinion of Tilson is he's just a leech or a coattail rider. His fund was also basically just a mini Pershing.

No idea lol. 1x EBIDTA printed a few weeks ago. Can see the reasons this gets abandoned, but more perplexed than panicked myself.

Raw land is a really low risk, low cost way to play a boom. Especially in a state with minimal RE taxes. St John/Jax/St Augustine is super hot so buying large swaths of acreage like this and then just waiting out developers is a pretty easy game to play. It might ebb and flow, but it does so ascending from left to right. There arent really many scenarios I can find where FL doesnt greatly outstrip most other states in terms of population growth, and this is going to be the case for a long time or until something politically inspired changes drastically(IE taxes).

What are they buying? https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/article/new-york-group-adds-4-446-acres-to-its-st-johns-county-holdings Some interesting read throughs. Ive spoke with a few developers and investment firms in FL last couple weeks, this "recession" is largely being welcomed as a last chance to get on the train before it runs away. Florida seems unstoppable and many of the developing trends just make it more so the case. The tax heavy and anti business mentality of the blue states will only become more apparent as things slow down.

https://nypost.com/2020/04/14/long-island-bicyclist-verbally-attacked-by-chris-cuomo-fires-back/ LOL, Cuomo the liar. Sooo sick... yea ok. Its all an act with these folks.

Trimmed a bit off trading positions in GOOG and SPG.

Indeed, but this is what happens when people begin revolving their investment decisions around "IM STAYIN HOME 4 GOOD!". I mean look at even what some folks here are saying... NFLX, CVNA, TDOC, NVAX, all you need to outperform for the next decade!

Ive always said, keep me safe and you can read my texts, watch me shit, hear me react to a lousy earnings reports, or record me getting laid. These things are not synonymous with my freedom. I'd rather those "invasions of privacy" than shutting down my business, telling me when and where I can travel, and making me dress like its Halloween in order to get milk for my kids. To each their own though.

https://www.espn.com/wwe/story/_/id/29031903/wwe-deemed-essential-business-florida-mayor-says Who cares. Its an essential business!