Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.A)

All Comments on BRK.A

  • commenter
    Ishortyou
    Oct 08 08:17 PM
    @VIC: A Radically Different Context for Value Was Going On Outside [view article]
    I think the FDIC has to stop being a thug and stay away from Citi, Wachovia and Wells Fargo discussions, so far its hormonal imbalance thugish behaviour is making the negotiations difficult, instead of stabilizing the banking sector its making it worse, so stay away FDIC! Reply
  • commenter
    User 276142
    Oct 08 07:16 PM
    @VIC: A Radically Different Context for Value Was Going On Outside [view article]
    You have the ticker wrong, it was SATS the spin-off from DISH. Reply
  • commenter
    USC-Col
    2006-Honors
    Finance/Econ
    Grad MD
    Oct 08 06:59 PM
    @VIC: A Radically Different Context for Value Was Going On Outside [view article]
    I agree that an investor should approach anything of substantial value in this market with caution because the market is going through an entire sell-off. I believe that an increase in the money supply would be a grave mistake, considering that inflation is rampantly high. In other words, a massive increase in the money supply is going to make dollars worth substantially less. Printing money is not the answer because if we print more it'll essentially be monopoly money. I think the Fed's decision to dole out loans to company's such as AIG, to lower the discount rate to banks, and to intervene when they believe banks are going to fail are actions that are preventing the depression spoken of. They are inadvertently putting money into the money supply, such as AIG's bond collateralized loan made today. Without the global banks infusion of U.S banks and businesses with cash, without the established FDIC, and without the technology that eases communication and accessibility, we would already be in a recession. My question has always been...Is it necessarily a recession? Or is the economy just naturally correcting itself. For example, a lot of homes and mortgages were overvalued for the past few years by mortgage brokers who had their best interest at heart, and not necessarily the consumer. I just believe similiar to some economist, that the housing market is correcting itself. In other words, the housing market is just returning to what it would have been naturally had their not been an artificial price increase. Should we necessarily panic with the current recession symptoms? It just seems that the stock market is correcting itself. Similiar to the tech bubble, were we currently in an energy and financial bubble? All that is occuring now is the stock market is returning to levels it would have been at originally had the mortgages industry not done so well for a while, and had the energy stocks tripled on the backs of oil demand increase and global unrest. For the economist out there better than I, is this necessarily a recession, with leading indicators of a global stock market sell-off, or is the stock market at levels it would have been if their were no influences that inflated and overvalued a lot of stocks over the past 7 years? Reply
  • commenter
    Tulls19
    Oct 08 06:23 PM
    Buffett Buys GE, Goldman: Should You Follow? [view article]
    I own GE stock and am contemplating selling at a huge loss out of anger and doubt about what this company is really worth and here is why.

    1. GE's annual report tells us that the company is strategically positioned around the world. OK so they are positive that they are strategically positioned around the world and yet earlier this year Imelt or Omlet as I like to call him couldn't even get their earnings right in pre-release statements and sent the share price down 16% in ONE day.

    2. NBC has failed to keep up with Fox news in the ratings. To figure out why I took a look at their news coverage and what do you know. The chearleading for Obama going on on that network will alienate all but the far left for years to come. If you don't believe me try listening to Keith Oberman for 5 minutes with an open mind to the center and right's points of view. I wrote to them to complain and had the privileged of receiving a form letter and I started seeing more of Oberman than ever before. So sadly I have have and unrealized loss of 6K on GE stock and I watch Foxnews because not even when it is in my own economic self interest can I bring myself to tolerate even 5 minutes of Obermans smugness.

    3. GE bought back Billions of dollars worth of shares in the high 30's and has now issued 12 Billion dollars worth of common and up to 6 Billion worth of preferred at the low 20's mark. So basically the company has squandered billions worth of capital that would have served the shareholders more had it been dispersed in dividends and now Buffet is being paid to take the risk while the common shareholders have been diluted. Keep in mind that the dividends paid on these new issues will be weighing on earnings for the duration of there existence as will the $4 to $1 debt ratio the company has to finance and pay interest on.

    4. With the debt that the company is carrying and the credit market frozen you would think that the liquidity received from recent offerings would be a boon and would be kept for the time being to insure that AAA credit rating on GE capital and yet Omlets press release mentions only the potential acquisitions that GE could make with this money. Yes we have seen how competent thay have been at capital allocation so far.

    In the end I have no one to blame for my investment but myself but I would urge anyone thinking about investing in GE to think about whether GE is really looking out for its shareholders given my experience with them so far.

     Reply
  • commenter
    valueinvesto
    r123
    Oct 08 04:25 PM
    @VIC: Top Hedge Fund Picks [view article]
    They should rename this conference: pump your own book and hope you find people stupid enough to blindly follow. Reply
  • commenter
    JohnKing
    Oct 08 03:48 PM
    My Website
    @VIC: Top Hedge Fund Picks [view article]
    Sounds like most of those guys watch Cramer. Reply
  • commenter
    Value
    Investor
    Oct 08 02:50 PM
    My Website
    Buffett Buys into Constellation: Watching a Master at Work [view article]
    Warren Buffett didn't get rich by following the herd. Buy when others are feraful is often heard, he at least has followed his own principles, it could be that after a 35% from its highs the market is now trying to put in a bottom. Reply
  • commenter
    huangjin
    Oct 08 01:50 PM
    Why Is Everybody Selling as Buffett Is Loading Up? [view article]
    Hmm...ex-Goldman Sachs CEO creates $700 billion plan to buy securities...Buffett enters sweetheart deal with Goldman Sachs...

    What is $5 billion to Buffett anyway? The two deals are about 5% of his company. He bought CEG after it collpased. The electric battery company is interesting, but again, $230 million. Peanuts.     Reply
  • commenter
    globalq
    Oct 08 01:43 PM
    @VIC: Jeff Matthews on Evaluating GE- What Would/Did Warren Do? [view article]

    Three articles at Seeking Alpha requires a response

    @VIC: Jeff Matthews on Evaluating GE- What Would/Did Warren Do?
    GE Looks Very Attractive Here.
    Why Is Everybody Selling as Buffett Is Loading Up?

    This whole Buffett transaction speaks to the questionable health of GE. Buffett is buying $3 billion of preferred shares of GE, with 10 % dividend, and an option to buy $3 billion of GE common shares for $22.25 at any time over five years. Who would not take a deal like that?

    People - that includes analysts - are not stupid. The following events show that there are fundamental problems at GE.

    + Where GE had an unquestioned AAA rating - GE was buying its money at AAA rates, it's now paying 10%. The marginal / disappointing performance since Q1, puts into question GE managements' repeated statements - "we are protecting our AAA rating."
    The.

    + Where GE purchased in recent years some $25 B of their stock at a price of about $35, it sold $547.8 million shares priced at $22.25.

    + Where GE was known for its predictability and stability of earnings - it is known for unforeseen disappointments. An analyst recently reduced his earnings forecast for GE for 2008, 2009 and 2010.

    + Where GE was increasing dividends annually - it's now stopping dividend increases that went back to the ‘70s.

    + Where GE was a picture of stability and growth - it now has to placate talking head analysts by divesting divisions at the bottom of a market, and give the appearance that something productive is taking place.

    + Where GE was a picture of stability and growth - the continuing cataclysmic stock price dive in the past year together with the relentless stock price slide in the past 5 years.
    Please see the following chart on GE and tell me what you like –
    clearstation.etrade.co...
    There appears to be no bottom to this decline in GE. It just broke The $20 mark – below a multiyear bottom of the early 2000s.

    Some questions that should be asked during these times about the future of this company?
    1. Q – What would be the outcome in the price of GE shares if the AAA rating were to drop one notch in the near future?
    2. Q – What will be the repercussion to the price of GE stock if there is an earnings ‘disappointment’ below the low end of accepted levels?
    3. Q – What will be the repercussion to the price of GE stock if the CEO and the CFO were asked to leave?


    Reply
  • commenter
    Brewer
    Oct 08 01:04 PM
    Pay Little Heed to Economic Reports and Move On [view article]
    tedstr is right, apple is on a clear upswing. They simply have the better mousetrap when it comes to any of their products, iPod, iPhone or Mac, they all are far better than the 'competition'. Reply
  • commenter
    Geoff
    Considine
    Oct 08 12:39 PM
    My Website
    Tactical Asset Allocation, Part II [view article]
    Oleg:

    QPP uses three years of data to initialize the model as the baseline input--but projections have been extensively tested out of sample over decades. Black Swans may exist that defy the model---no one did well with 9/11 or 1987 crash---fair points. I have written about testing for extreme tails in a range of articles if you are interested.     Reply
  • commenter
    Stone Fox
    Capital
    Oct 08 12:27 PM
    My Website
    Why Is Everybody Selling as Buffett Is Loading Up? [view article]
    Right now, you can buy his investments for less then what he paid. What do you mean you can't get his deals? Reply
  • commenter
    Value Dope
    Oct 08 11:37 AM
    @VIC: Top Hedge Fund Picks [view article]
    sclarksons - before you get on your knees for Ackman, you should realize the guy's previous hedge fund Gotham Partners liquidated. Course, you value guys will take any non-value fund to the woodshed if it liquidates but ignore it with your own.

    Ackman's investors in his TGT fund have lost their asses too.

    BRK will be destroyed when WEB kicks it. I know we allthink Ajit will do fine and whoever the Chief Inv Officer will be fine but I'd be WEB accounts for 50% BRK value, so let's see how others do operating a monster like BRK w/o WEB's genius.     Reply
  • commenter
    z06kenny
    Oct 08 09:23 AM
    Tactical Asset Allocation, Part II [view article]
    I am hoping to get some advice from you re how to get my QPP running on my PC.

     Reply
  • commenter
    tedstr
    Oct 08 08:55 AM
    Pay Little Heed to Economic Reports and Move On [view article]
    better than that...the real story is the end of the Wintel monopoly. Intel chips in Macs and dual operating environments means every PC owner lusting after a beautiful Mac now has no barriers to entry. This is why their laptop business is booming and a wholesale switch to Macs is on. The phones are a sideshow to this phenom.

    This is why Gates is retiring, Vista was an attempt to mitigate the damage by emulating an Apple interface, gone horribly wrong, and Balmer is gone nuts over MSN, his only lifeboat. Buy apple, sell MSFT     Reply
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