ERICOPOLY

How does the election change the forecasts for California's demise? The liberals now have a supermajority, state income taxes were raised on the rich, sales tax was increased, etc... Gridlock is over in Sacramento

What if the judge rules against BAC, and then BAC appeals? Will that take another 5 years? It could, but at that point BAC is on the hook for substantial interest on the judgement amount in the event that they lose the appeal. What interest rate would that be these days?

Yes, it's just about perfect weather here. Just what I needed. You probably read that I started riding horses (first lesson today). I will soon be taking surfing lessons too (got a board from Costco). The Santa Barbara area is pretty much kick ass.

Dammit, the Republicans won. Cheer Up, Republicans You’re going to have a moderate Republican president for the next four years: Barack Obama. http://tinyurl.com/ajxup7z

Agreed, I didn't really want to write it, but I'm just paraphrasing the analyst. I was hoping it might generate some discussion around BAC's core future expenses (and the real possibility that it will grow over time, but hopefully offset by revenue growth of course), but I admit it's probably just a big unknown at this point. I'm pretty sure if ISI was working as you suggest, he wouldn't have upgraded the stock today, or put out those positive comments about the G-SIB capital requirement last week which were quoted earlier in this thread. :) I guess so it's just weird. He could talk away any company's expense reductions by saying that over the years compensation costs will rise and thus there are really no annual expense reductions. Nothing to see here, move along.

I read it now. The analyst is basically saying that the NewBAC and LAS put together will save $18b, but other expenses in the business will grow as the business grows. Well... duh. Will Wells Fargo's expenses be higher in 10 years? Yes. The big question is not whether or not any given business will see expenses rise over time, as they certainly will, it's whether they'll rise in excess of revenue gains. And meanwhile, for the given present level of revenue can they squeeze out $18b of costs. Yes, they can and more than that when you think of the opportunity in their funding costs.

That's bizarre to say net of $1b/yr of ongoing legal expense. Those legal expenses already exist, and will come down if anything, thus they don't drag on the future expense reduction that is unrelated to legal. I get the feeling these analysts work for big buyers of stock who want to acccumulate at low prices.

They did however manage to find a very pessimistic return of capital estimate to throw in there from a separate analyst: While Staite didn't offer any predictions on an increased return of capital to investors during 2013, Deutsche Bank analyst Matt O'Connor on Tuesday estimated that Bank of America would return a total of $2.981 billion to common shareholders next year, through $1.481 billion in dividends, plus $1.500 billion in share buybacks. The analyst expects Bank of America's 2013 dividend yield on common shares to be 1.3%.

http://www.americanbanker.com/issues/177_212/bofa-scores-service-award-for-branch-experience-1054062-1.html Bank of America Corp. (BAC) received an XCelent Service Award for its branch experience and post-account opening service in a report published Thursday by Celent. Staff at the international financial research and consulting firm opened accounts at B of A, BB&T, Chase, Citibank, Fifth Third, HSBC, PNC, Regions, SunTrust, TD Bank, US Bank and Wells Fargo to conduct its research. Celent said in an announcement that B of A was able to offer the broadest array of solutions on the spot, including offering the most thorough needs assessments, demonstrating ATMs and having an investment specialist on staff. Among the talking points for B of A branch staff were: mortgages, including duration, balance and rate; credit cards including international fee waivers and rewards; investment accounts and porting some of a savings account into B of A Merrill investment vehicles; and savings accounts and CDs.

I'll need nearly $30 per common share for that, so I'm thinking that's a little early. I'll be 45 in Jan 2019. Another 45 yrs at 25% and I'll be a trillionaire! Regarding that... pretty unlikely. 1/2 of this is going to be in a Roth IRA. Before I'd get to the trillion Congress would probably act to limit the size of RothIRAs. So I'd hate to be the one who spoils it for everyone else.

Probably close to mid-$3s, but I haven't calculated. Up until a couple of weeks ago I had a relatively small amount. I then decided to sell out of the $3 strike 2014 calls (which had moved up at a much faster % pace than the common) and load up on the warrants which seemed to either have paced or lagged the common. The theory being that I'd have greater upside long term while perhaps having less downside volatility over the near term.

1.42m

Look, if you can make 15% a year for 80 years then you'll be able to find lots of pretty ladies who will call you whatever you want.

YES I would.. irregardless of what class of asset it is.. 15% after that many years is tremendous I guess you wouldn't include Walter Schloss as a 'superinvestor' then even though Buffett calls him one That gets a bit strange because if a fundholder puts all of his money into Schloss' fund and mirrors Schloss performance, isn't the fundholder also a superinvestor?

I view BAC more favorably. Reason: AIG relies more on external factors to boost it's ROE -- interest rates and insurance rates. Both can be low for a very long time. 2/3 of BAC's upside is dependent on their own actions -- cost cutting and working through legacy nonperforming things. Only 1/3 of the upside is dependent on the interest rate curve normalizing. Thus, I think BAC management is in greater control of the catalyst that will take the stock back to 10% ROE (or book value really), and AIG is not in control of it's catalyst for a similar ROE. I would like others who are more knowledgeable about AIG to comment.

That's a shame, I think that's when it starts to get interesting... Well I don't want to be famous. I want the money, but not the fame. So while it would be interesting to be a anonymous billionaire, I can do all the same things with $50 million and $1.5m annual income from blue chips. NetJets etc... Do I want to be a famous rich guy and be on TV all the time like Buffett? Not really, but I do like Becky Quick an awful lot, and Poppy. Man you should come on TV, one thing it will be good to learn and know when to go all in the other thing is it will be good to see someone talk about god in the right way on tv.. Legally I can talk about god any way I want, socially though... Maybe with a voice scrambler and a bag over my head.

Nah, a Value Trap.

Man, how long can someone take to explain why stocks bottom? Spit it out, short and concise, move on.

Lol, I guess like other things its better to keep some things for yourself and not telling your wife...but I am waiting for Eric's point of view on that...lol She knew about it, she did get annoyed because it made me grumpy. However, she likes the new digs in California and that's only made possible by my Fitty Cent Dollah' Git Rich or Die Try'n personal unregistered hedge fund.

He grew up in a privileged household where his father was on Reagan's staff (well, a policy advisor to Reagan) and Volcker was a friend of the family & household guest. So he has this confidence of being an imagined important person that isn't born from his own competence. That's my psychoanalysis of him anyhow.

That's a shame, I think that's when it starts to get interesting... Well I don't want to be famous. I want the money, but not the fame. So while it would be interesting to be a anonymous billionaire, I can do all the same things with $50 million and $1.5m annual income from blue chips. NetJets etc... Do I want to be a famous rich guy and be on TV all the time like Buffett? Not really, but I do like Becky Quick an awful lot, and Poppy.

And in that webcast Bruce Thompson comments that LAS' 60+ days delinquent first mortgages will fall by 300,000 per annum over next two years from today's level of 936,000 to a normalized level of 250,000 to 300,000 by FYE 2014. Twelve months ago the level was 1,226,000 so that 300,000 per annum reduction that Bruce talks about is consistent with the pace of reduction experienced over the past year. I take it that newly delinquent mortgages are popping out of the woodwork at a normalized pace today in 2012, so this is merely getting the existing backlog of 600,000 excess worked through.

This webcast from Nov 2nd is pretty good: http://investor.bankofamerica.com/phoenix.zhtml?p=irol-eventDetails&c=71595&eventID=4859159 Bruce Thompson presenting at BancAnalysts Association of Boston Conference. Once again he reiterates that they are going from 12b in expenses all the way down to 2b at Legacy Assets & Servicing. Says that although all the work will be done by end of 2014, it might take yet another 6 months for the last of the elevated expenses to settle down. So by mid-2015 all is calm.

There was a day last week when the volume was 2,000,000. Today, barely more than 10% of that with a rising price on a day when the stock was down quite a bit. Nearly two weeks ago when I was getting filled at 3.65 I was buying as much as 100,000 warrants at a time without moving the price, getting filled in 10 seconds! It may have been Paulsen selling them to you because of redemptions! ;D You may be catching up to him after all. Cheers! There are 85,000 people worldwide with more than $50 million. http://www.statista.com/statistics/204095/distribution-of-ultra-high-net-worth-individuals-for-selected-countries/ I'm working on that list, and when I get there I'm out of the game for the most part.

There was a day last week when the volume was 2,000,000. Today, barely more than 10% of that with a rising price on a day when the stock was down quite a bit. Nearly two weeks ago when I was getting filled at 3.65 I was buying as much as 100,000 warrants at a time without moving the price, getting filled in 10 seconds!