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  • Is Berkshire Hathaway Now a Bargain? [View article]
    There are two distinct pieces to any Berskshire related discussion .
    Let's talk about intrinsic value first. Despite its present size, berkshire's oerating businesses should grow earnings at a 10+% clip over a full business cycle. Performance will be lumpy (insurance pricing, super cat performance, housing and economy), but for someone with a long term view, these businesses will grow earnings. This portion of berkshire does not have a huge dependence of Buffet as performance is driven by talented and motivated managers. Moving to investments, it's investment portfolio is positioned superbly. If I'm doing my math right, Buffet deployed 20 billion in bonds recently and still has a war chest of 20+ billion remaining (growing by 8+ billion every year). Most of the existing 70+ billion equity portfolio is invested in 15+% ROE opportunities. It's safe to say that intrinsic value over longer periods of time will grow at 15% but growth will be lumpy.
    The stock price will be affected by two factos: lumpy growth and how markets value liquidity. Lumpy growth has been a way of life at berkshire and is one of things I like about berkshire. When liquidity is freely available and the rest of world is levering (tons of stupid money chasing all kinds of model driven gains), berkshire's stock price will languish. When the opposite happens and the leverage is unwound, people will disregard buffet's age and embrace the war chest and AAA rating.
    If your edge is patience and a longer time horizon, a long position in berkshire at today's prices can double your money in the next 5-6 years. Beyond that, there are any number of ways to make something simple more complicated.
    May 19 00:11 am |Rating: 0 0
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