BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY INC. ACQUISITION CRITERIA We are eager to hear from principals or their representatives about businesses that meet all of the following criteria: (1) Large purchases (at least $75 million of pre-tax earnings...
Read MoreWhen I was a risk manager and bond manager for a life insurance company (at the same time, dangerous, but great if done right) I had to have models that drove yields on corporates from Treasury yields. Initially, I found...
Read MoreWhen I closed my piece on Warren Buffett’s Annual Letter, I ended with an important statement tat when I read it in the morning, I thought many would find it cryptic. Here it is: And much as I like Buffett and Ray...
Read MoreAfter reviewing what I wrote Saturday night on Buffett’s Annual Letter to shareholders, I said to myself, “That wasn’t very critical.” Now perhaps I have less to criticize him over — he...
Read MoreI’ve written a lot about Buffett over the years. I think this is the eighth shareholder letter that I have written about. I have the unique perspective of being both an actuary and a...
Read MoreWhen you are in the bust phase of the credit cycle, there are no good solutions. Do you try to reflate? You can try to, and you will succeed (sort of), if the Fed Funds rate maintains a respectable positive value...
Read MoreThis is a continuation of an irregular series which you can find here. Maybe if I were more scientific, I would have called it “All Exponential Growth Processes Run Into Constraints and...
Read MoreAugust-October 2008 was a tough era to blog in as the crisis broke. It was the height of popularity for my blog, I haven’t had that level of readership since. Rather than go chronologically, this era lends itself to...
Read MoreWhen I came to work at Provident Mutual, I gained a friend who reported to me. Roy was a real character. He had his rules for life, and they all made sense to some degree. When he opined on why we did business...
Read MoreEddy Elfenbein wrote an interesting post on the market doubling from its bottom. But given all of the odd things going on in the markets, and one of my mottoes is “Weird begets weird,” I asked how unusual the...
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