Liberty

The Watch does have GPS access through the phone as long as the phone is within bluetooth/wifi distance, so that already exists. What most people don't realize is that dreaming up a list features isn't enough. People who don't know how making things work just handwave it all away and think you can sprinkle magic and it'll just work. They forget that you actually have to do the design and engineering and make it work, and that there are serious technological and manufacturing limitations and constraints. Design is not about how something looks - that aesthetics - design is about making choices. A Fitbit can have GPS because its makers made other design choices that allow it to have GPS (screen type and size, what kind of software it can run, what kind of connectivity it has, battery size, what are the use cases and what type of daily power budget is required, etc). The Apple Watch has made different design choices and has different use cases, and right now the technology requires some tradeoffs, such as the lack of onboard GPS and cell radio. As technology progresses, these tradeoffs will stop being necessary, just like the original iPhone didn't even have 3G, a front-facing camera, couldn't shoot video, etc.

Exactly. And if someone could reliably forecast currency moves, they wouldn't be sharing their secret sauce in the media, they'd be leveraging up 50x and buying as much as they can.

The technology does exist. Fitbit already has GPS. Apple could have added it if they wanted to. I think it's a classic example of them just leaving things out to have things to add to future versions. I'm not saying you can't have a GPS on your wrist. I'm saying you can't have a GPS on an Apple Watch and have batteries last long enough. A Fitbit isn't an Apple Watch, not even close.

Every generation says this about its teenagers. But that's a different point from what the article is making. It's not a "get off my lawn" statement to say that those who came of age during the great post-war boom had it easier on average, and lived through more ebulient times than those who did during the great depression and WWII. How that affects the expectations of those who come after is the question. But of course every generation forgets what it's like to be a teenager and complains about kids. That'll never change :D

The watch can track distance pretty well even without the phone. Someone did a test of it, running a course that they knew exactly the distance of, and the watch got it basically right on the nose. What you won't have is the tracing of the route on a map. Later versions will no doubt have GPS and a cell radio, but the tech just isn't there yet, You can't have a computer on your wrist of that size that has all these radios without going through the battery like crazy.

http://brooklyninvestor.blogspot.ca/2015/05/the-missing-manual-berkshire-hathaway.html

You certainly can't please everybody, and if you try, you'll just make your products worse. Edit: You know a product is hot when politicians want to be associated with it: http://9to5mac.com/community/jeb-bush-praises-apple-watch-health-apps-newt-gingrich-prepares-to-review-it/

Maybe a "shallow C+" grade fells worse to me than it does to you :) I saw it differently. To me the article is not about the impossibility of doing special things or succeeding. The way they use "you are not special", and imply that you are not "the protagonist of the world's story" means "good things you want won't happen to you just by being you, you have to work for them, it'll require some patience". Hence the graphics showing the expectations of good things happening right from the start. I don't see it as a contradiction, because the article is not about "you have to lower your expectations and aim low", just about "you have to calibrate your expectations and realize that these things don't just happen on their own" and "it's not because your parents had it better than their parents that you'll automatically have it better than yours". I don't really think the article was really about the wannabe rock star syndrome "I want to play guitar and be paid millions but it's not happening waaah waah". I saw it as a more down to earth "I want a nice house and nice things and a fulfilling career right out of the gate". I thought their example of social media was quite on point, but I guess it depends who you follow. I don't really use facebook, but I follow a lot of people (use it as a kind of inbox if they want to direct message me), and a lot of what I see are photos from trips, new cars, weddings, big houses, people having fun, people at sports events and concerts, etc. It's a bit similar to how earlier TV had an impact on people by showing them a life they don't have (notice how every cop in movies lives in a mansion?). I don't think people will explicitly complain about that, but it certainly doesn't help expectations to have this filter that distorts things and shows us an infinite number of people having a good time when our brains have evolved to be in a small tribe and compute social status relatively.

Yes. Both of these are actually very important points. 8) Ok, so you think that if Elon Musk (and people like him) didn't have hugely high expectations and wasn't dissatisfied with reality, that we wouldn't get progress. Does that cleverly destroy the thesis of the article? Meanwhile, the actual article mentions that you should "Stay wildly ambitious" and aim to be a great success and all that. This is not an article extolling the virtues of reduced expectations and lowering the bar. All it says is that to get there you have to work hard for it and shouldn't have unrealistic expectations about being inherently special and deserving of all that as soon as you turn 22. Elon Musk works like crazy for his success and went through very thought times for long periods of time, nothing contradictory here, even though applying a general mental model to one individual isn't the most useful thing anyway. Your second point is that if we don't have expectations, we should be happy, problem solved. Easier said than done. That's not very realistic, as even buddhists monks struggle with that despite working full-time on it. I think a more useful point is to have well calibrated expectations -- most of us here are probably fairly introspective people, and our investing heroes certainly preach that practice, so it's probably not a huge problem. But most people are more 'go with the flow' and look around at what others are doing to see what they should do; I know many people my age (early 30s) who assume it's entirely normal to have a house as big as their parents, with as much luxury (vehicles, electronics, travel, evenings outs), despite their parents having had decades more to accumulate wealth and climb the career ladder. These are their expectations of what is normal for them, and that's causing a problem because they end up buying on credit and finding it hard and that makes them stressed out and unhappy, and feel its unfair that they can't get a wonderful career straight away, etc. Not everyone of course, but it's certainly something widespread. Now we can blame the availability of credit or whatever, and there are certainly multiple factors. But expectations of what they should be able to have and what it takes to get there is near the root of much of this IMO. And I think you are still upset about what I wrote. At least that's how it comes out. I wasn't upset, I just saw those as jokes, not as actual points that needed to be addressed. But now I did anyway since you asked. Will you share your views, please? You alluded to a non-shallow point of view on this, and it has made me curious.

Way to be a hipster and feed your Mammoth* by publicly putting down something that someone else liked without actually saying anything ;) * http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/06/taming-mammoth-let-peoples-opinions-run-life.html What is your non-shallow view of the issue? So you are saying that I cannot express a negative opinion on this forum without writing a dissertation? Ericopoly had two great observations about health and about generalization. I also made two points that you ignored. If you want more thoughts, ask nicely instead of writing snarky replies. Have fun with your expectations. What were your two points? That I should tell Elon Musk and that if expectations are 0 then reality is happiness (as if that was actually a real math equation)? Oh, sorry to not have addressed those. I'm not sure what there is to add. I was merely saying playfully, not in a snarky way, as per the smiley, that putting things down like you did tends to be a social status thing, as pointed out in that other article which I linked (and I assumed you were familiar with, since you are at the point of ranking articles from that site). If you have things to say on the topic, just say them, no need to be a hipster about it.

Way to be a hipster and feed your Mammoth* by publicly putting down something that someone else liked without actually saying anything ;) * http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/06/taming-mammoth-let-peoples-opinions-run-life.html What is your non-shallow view of the issue?

I don't think the article claimed to be an exhaustive list of all things that can lead to unhappiness. They also forgot to mention torture and malnutrition.. Or are you saying you are in poor health Eric? I hope not. I didn't see the article as putting down a generation, and I'm pretty sure the author is part of it (he was in college in early 2000s). To me it feels totally intuitive that we inherit a lot of expectations about what life should be like from our parents, even if not explicitly, and people who were raised by depression and WWII people probably expected life to be a lot harder and tougher than it turned out to be, and the generation that was raised by baby boomers who lived through a great increase in prosperity, social freedom, cultural expansion, technological wonders, etc, probably have significantly higher expectations which can be hard to meet. Knowing this and re-calibrating can be a way to be much happier. None of this is saying that it's bad to want to be special and happy and all that. The article explicitly says that it's great, just that you have to work for it, it doesn't just happen on its own for everyone in their early 20s.

Yep, they deployed 1.3bn in the past 90 days :) Update: New presentation: http://phx.corporate-ir.net/External.File?item=UGFyZW50SUQ9NTgxMDI3fENoaWxkSUQ9Mjg2NjM4fFR5cGU9MQ==&t=1

TDG isn't Boeing. What matters isn't how many aircrafts are sold in the short-term. What matters to TDG is RPM (revenue-passenger-mile), because they make the vast majority of their FCF on the aftermarket for their vast installed based with lifecycles measured in decades. What also matters is if they can maintain or improve their content % on new platforms, which they have been doing. RPM is a relatively non-cyclical thing which barely dipped after 9/11 and the GFC of 2008-2009, and has been growing mid-single-digit the rest of the time. TDG makes relatively little to OEM sales, and even loses some money by providing parts while new platforms are in development. The aftermarket is where it's at. Fair enough - as you can tell, I haven't spent much time on the name, so the cyclical point seems off base. But is mid single-digit growth worth 25-30x FCF? Guess that's the "Platform Value" of future anticipated acquisitions. RPM are growing at mid-single digit. TDG's FCF/share can grow much faster than that, as it has. They are very adept at using leverage, which I think makes sense because of the stability of their cashflows (these sole-source, proprietary, regulated aftermarket parts on platforms that fly for decades are kind of like growing annuities), have a multi-decade track record of M&A and operational excellence (they are very good at increasing margins at the companies they buy), and they aren't afraid of shrinking the equity with buybacks and special dividends when they have excess capital.

TDG isn't Boeing. What matters isn't how many aircrafts are sold in the short-term. What matters to TDG is RPM (revenue-passenger-mile), because they make the vast majority of their FCF on the aftermarket for their vast installed based with lifecycles measured in decades. What also matters is if they can maintain or improve their content % on new platforms, which they have been doing. RPM is a relatively non-cyclical thing which barely dipped after 9/11 and the GFC of 2008-2009, and has been growing mid-single-digit the rest of the time. TDG makes relatively little to OEM sales, and even loses some money by providing parts while new platforms are in development. The aftermarket is where it's at.

Ostensibly, this is an article about Millennials/Gen Y'ers, but I think it contains a lot of wisdom and mental models that can be useful to everyone. See if it applies to yourself or people you know. Enjoy: http://waitbutwhy.com/2013/09/why-generation-y-yuppies-are-unhappy.html

If you are sure that these guys have a huge moat and will grow earnings or cash flow a share by > 10%, then a 20x multiple can be cheap imo. It's interesting to read these posts from 2013, where 20x is considered an acceptable hurdle that most of us would consider expensive. I've certainly come to appreciate the hidden value of ~25x EPS on strong, sustainable growth, but I wonder what folks would substitute for 20x in the earlier quote in today's environment. TDG is currently around 60x TTM EPS. I recognize much of the bump in P/E is the substantial increase in debt/interest expense, so the relative increase in EV/EBIT is less so. The downside of course is the significantly reduced margin for error in business execution introduced by the debt load. GAAP EPS is not the metric to use with acquisitive companies like this. VRX doesn't have a PE of 75x either. Look at FCFx or at least the company's adjusted cash EPS. TDG has been trading between 20-25x FCF lately.

http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-elon-musk-spacex/

Thanks!

Thanks Joel, but I don't think your upload worked.

The Visa Europe transaction is hairy. Currently owned by the European banks, they want to hand off all liabilities to Visa Inc. Similar to the US, the retailers in the European Union want to sue Visa and the banks want Visa Inc. to be liable for these charges (even if it from an earlier time). If you purchase for $20 billion, you could still be liable for another $5 to $10 billion over time. As far as China opening up, based on conversations I have had with people in the payments industry, this is mostly a rubber stamp thing for China. They want to portray themselves as being a free trade economy. However, folks in the payment industry aren't very certain that V/MA can be very profitable. Banks are going to run very hard negotiations given Union Pay's incumbent position. Having said that I am long MA/V since 2010 but at current valuations I am starting to think harder about what to do. Thanks for sharing your current thinking. You are my 'go to' person when it comes to MA/V/PCLN :)

I think the 70D is awesome, but isn't it a little early to name it "Car of the 21st Century"? Are they really that confident that there won't be something more amazing in say 2075 or 2095? We already have the best car which will be produced this century only 15 years in? It's a marketing term, you are being too literal. Basically it stands for "we really, really like this one, we think it's what the future should be".

http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2015-tesla-model-s-70d-instrumented-test-review New 70D named "Car of the 21st century" by Car and Driver.

Thanks. To be clear, I'm not back in the stock, but I do keep an eye on the thread. :)

Looks like iOS has 72% of the enterprise market in the US. Not too shabby for a consumer product. http://venturebeat.com/2015/05/11/ios-slips-to-72-enterprise-share-in-q1-2015-android-hits-26-and-windows-phone-stays-flat-at-1/ Interesting post about the penetration of smartphones in the US and China (among other things): http://www.asymco.com/2015/05/11/winning-against-non-consumption/ http://www.asymco.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Screen-Shot-2015-05-11-at-5-11-2.45.29-PM.png Once penetration gets closer to maxed out (will take a while for the biggest market, China, and even longer for India, etc), you still have the replacement cycle, which by then will be bigger than replacement + growth is today.