Tag Archives: Berkshire Hathaway

WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1993

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WB Letter 1993

Dexter Shoe

H.H.Brown shoes (Purchased by Berkshire) has made an acquisition of Dexter Shoe in the year 1993, which is in the business of manufacturing of popular-priced men’s and women’s shoes. Buffett & Charlie admire Dexter as a business. Dexter’s has a 77 retail outlets and company is a leading manufacturer of golf shoes which is producing 15% of U.S. output.

WB 1993 01

Example – Good player into the worst industry matrix

BS01

BS02

BS03

We can see in above example of three real estate companies where Company – 1 having a good matrix compared to the other two companies. Also equity dilution into the company – 1 is increased by 1% CAGR in last 10 years compared to 12% CAGR and 5% CAGR in last 10 years respectively for the company – 2 and company – 3. We can see that debt and equity both has increased into the second and third company whereas company – 1 has maintained balance sheet strength. During a good period, the company – 1 has the least inventories as a % of sales and other 2 companies has higher inventory as a % of sales. Sales of a company – 1 has increased by 10% CAGR in last 10 years compared to -7% CAGR and -6% CAGR in last 10 years respectively for the company – 2 and company – 3. We can see stock performance then company – 1 has given 53% CAGR in last 17 years compared to -9% CAGR and 15% CAGR in last 11 & 17 years respectively for the company – 2 and company – 3.

Chart01

Chart02

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We need to focus on the good player into the worst industry matrix for making an investment. Generally, the good player will gain the market share compared with the worst players in the industry and able to survive for the longer period of time. Also our invested capital get protection with the creation of wealth. The similar pattern we can able to find at infra, telecom, power sectors, etc.

Many of us misunderstood that insurance business of Berkshire get float as a free of cost but it is not true. When insurance business incurring underwriting losses then such losses need to take for consideration as a cost of float.

WB 1993 02

Mr. Buffett and Mr.Munger believe that they are not smart enough to make many right decisions. But they like to hold good business forever and avoid to make many decisions. We should consider “Risk” as a loss, not the academic definition of “Beta” as a volatility of the portfolio.

WB 1993 03

We should focus on what the company produces, what competitors are doing, how much borrowing company has taken rather than focusing on the price history of the company and the daily price movement of the stocks.

Criteria for focusing during investment evaluation –

WB 1993 04

Mr. Buffett has explained three scenarios of management and owners of the company which impacts to the performance and corporate governance of the company.

First scenario where no controlling authority and company managed by directors

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The second scenario where controlling owner also work as a manager

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The third scenario where controlling owner who is not involved in the management

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Warren Buffett’s Letters 1957 – 2012

WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1992

Posted on by under Bibliophile

WB Letter 1992

Mr. Buffett has written that they own a collection of business which is exceptional and also a run by an exceptional manager which has resulted in the higher returns.

Nowadays I have experience that everyone is becoming a market expert and providing their view on the short-term direction of the market. For such people, Mr. Buffett has given a good quote –

WB 1992 01

The Salomon Interlude

In 1991, Salomon Brothers caught for bond trading scandal and Mr. Buffett has performed as a chairman of Salomon for the ten months to resolve a problem at Saloman. At Salomon, they have been submitting false bids in an attempt to purchase more Treasury bonds than permitted by one buyer during the period between December 1990 and May 1991.

Five authorities – the SEC, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the U.S. Treasury, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice – had important concerns about Salomon.

Acquisitions

Many acquisition-hungry managers made an acquisition with the hope that they will transform business which will provide them with a good opportunity to earn. When a manager gets failed, they learn a lesson but shareholders pay fees for selecting them as an investment candidate. Mr. Buffett has accepted that during his earlier career, he also has made an acquisition but he able to achieve success due to cheapness into acquisitions and some of the acquisition got failed also. And due to such mistakes to get a failure, he revised his strategy to make an investment.

TATA Steel 01

TATA Steel 02

WB 1992 02

Berkshire has made an investment into the Central States Indemnity which is an insurance company provides an insurance to the credit-card holders who are unable themselves to pay because they have become disabled or unemployed.

H.H.Brown, a Subsidiary of a Berkshire has made an acquisition of Lowell Shoe Company which is into the manufacturing of the shoes for nurses, and other kinds of shoes as well.

Mr. Buffett has initial thought of purchase General Dynamics for the tendering stocks to the buyback and earns a small profit in short term. But Mr. Buffett began to study the company and he found that Bill Anders, CEO of the company has performed a decent job to run a business. Mr. Buffett has dropped the idea of buyback opportunity and decided to become a long-term investor of the company.

Investing strategy of Berkshire has been little change and also Mr. Buffett has made some compromise on the price to purchase a business’s due to market condition and their increased size.

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Now, how to know an attractive price? Mr. Buffett has explained that we look attractive price with the framework of value or a growth investor – what we consider to ourselves. He explained that growth is always a component of the calculation of the value of any company. He mentioned that people using value investing term everywhere with the paying higher price then calculated the value in the hope that someone pays higher to purchase an asset from them. But such activities do not consider as an investment, it is a speculation.

People consider value investing where attribute such as low Price – to – Earnings ratio, low Price to Book Value ratio or high dividend yield or combination from mentioned and not consider value investing where reverse attributes are available. Many a time, business growth also tell us little about the value but it is also true that often growth has a positive impact on the value. We have to analyze that whether a business can able to generate a good return on the incremental invested capital or business generating a low return on incremental capital. Former one provides the benefit of growth to the investors and latter one hurts to the investment.

Ex – Value Trap

Taken from Thoughts on Thoughts blog

MTNL

The company looks very cheap on the basis of the financial metrics, but if someone who does not have paid attention to the business of the company then—

MTNL Chart

An investor has lost his capital also. So, that in value investing also, we cannot escape from the future. (For detail article, Kindly visit – http://neerajmarathe.blogspot.in/2010/04/mtnl-value-trap.html)

Value Trap – One of the educational providing company which fall under the criteria of value investing –

Jetking

The company is not able to generate good growth in sales and in the profitability but investment and cash have grown well. Also currently the company is available below cash + investment which fall under the criteria of the value investing. But what about the growth into the business or on the survival of the business. Will be cash & investment remain with the company in the future? Lower sales, higher expenses, lower profitability and for last 3 years the company has stopped paying a dividend. Should we consider such investment as value investing or value trap?

Ex – Growth at the low return on capital companies

The company which is generating a good sales growth but they is not able to generate a higher return on capital they employed then those companies require to take debt or dilute an equity (in-short they need external funding). Investors in such companies will face difficult to create wealth or sustain wealth.

High growth with low return

We can see that companies having a higher sales growth but cannot able to generate a higher return on capital then they require to bring external finance to fund the growth. The growth of such companies will extend for the long period but investors face difficult to create wealth.

High growth with low return chart

Ex – Growth at the higher return on capital companies

Reverse to above if company having a good growth with having a higher return on employed capital then company does not require to bring external financing (if they having a borrowing or a dilution of capital then the size of it is very small in proportion) to fund the growth of a company and also investors of such a company can create a good wealth.

High growth with high return

High growth with high return c 1

Ex – Higher growth but no value

If we just focus on the growth of the company and not on the quality of the growth then we need to lose our capital also.

High growth but no value

A company having good growth but does it have a quality of growth?

High growth but no value C 2

More dangerous balance-sheet quality after FY2010 –

High growth but no value 1

Every time does not value investing or growth investing provides a better investment opportunity but a rational combination of the both can be good investment opportunities.

Mr. Buffett has explained valuation matrix given by Mr. John Burr Williams which is determined by the cash inflows and outflows – discounted at an appropriate interest rate – that can be expected to occur during the remaining life of the asset. He has given matrix which similarly uses for bond and stocks. But bond involves fixed future cash inflow in-terms of coupon received by us and in equities such coupon is not fixed, we cannot say with surety about future cash inflow and outflow for business. Cash inflow and outflow into equities are highly dependence on the nature of a business, quality of management. For overcoming such problem Mr. Buffett uses two rules at Berkshire –

WB 1992 04

WB 1992 05

According to Mr. Buffett, new issue market is controlling by the stockholders and institution; also new issues come during favorable market conditions and we need to pay a higher multiple. Here, we are not going to get any bargain whereas in the secondary market, many a time, we get x value business at the 1/2x.

Warren Buffett’s Letters 1957 – 2012

WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1988-89

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WB Letter 1988

Borsheim’s

Berkshire Hathway has made an investment in the Borsheim’s which is a jewelry business in Omaha. This business is run by family members of Mrs.Blumkins (Founder of The Nebraska Furniture Mart). This business also getting managed by the people who have similar quality as Mrs.B such as an extraordinary combination of brains, integrity, and enthusiasm for work. All members of the Friedman family has been continued with the managing business as they were managing before Berkshire has acquired an interest.

WB 1988 01

Insurance business of the company remains in the pressure since long time and company expect to the float/premiums ratio to be at least three times in the year 1989 and 1990 with help of the team of Mike Goldberg, Ajit Jain, Dinos Iordanou, and the National Indemnity managerial team.

In the year 1988, Berkshire has made an acquisition of Coca-cola and Federal Home Loan Mortgage Pfd. (“Freddie Mac”).

Coca Cola 1988

Mr.Buffett had made an investment into one arbitrage situation – Rockwood & Co. when he worked at Graham-Newman Corp. Rockwood & Co. is a chocolate manufacturing company based in Brooklyn. During the year 1954, the price of the cocoa soared due to the temporary shortage.

WB 1988 02

Mr.Buffett give few points to keep in mind while making an investment into arbitrage opportunities-

WB 1988 03

Efficient Market Theory which is more in trend and many people believe that market knows everything. Yes, Market know many a thing which we also don’t know, but it is also a fact that many a time, the market also provides us an opportunities to make an investment which reward us in future.

Mr.Buffett also mentioned that if a market is efficient and know everything then he has not generated decent returns by investing into the various arbitrage opportunities. We also have seen wealth creation through investing into the equities and if market knows everything then few people are not able to generate good wealth. But with such arguments, we should not forget that market also knows many a thing and already discounted those into a price of securities.

WB Letter 1989

Borsheim’s – Jewelry business focusing more on the controlling cost and this cost control attracts more sales volume.

WB 1989 01

Berkshire has tripled advertising expenditure for the See’s Candies which reach the highest percentage of sales and which has converted into the good sales.

Coca-cola has started a new journey into the year 1981 with the appointment of the Roberto Goizueta as a CEO and Don Keough. Due to both, a product of the company started gaining momentum and sales has been started improving. They transform business in a manner which can benefit the shareholders.

Berkshire Hathway purchased preferred of the Gillette Co. –

WB 1989 02

As Mr.Buffett mentioned, we also need to look for the cover over depreciation as we look for the cover over the interest expenditures. Depreciation & capital expenditure is also a real expense, we can delay it but we cannot avoid it. If the company continuously keeps on avoiding capital expenditure then business will no longer remain into existence.

WB 1989 03

Low depreciation cover companies

Low dep cover

We can see in above image that companies having a low depreciation cover then those companies need to bring external finance (Debt or dilution of capital) for expansion whereas those companies having a good depreciation cover then those companies do not need to bring external finance to fund expansion (repayment of debt or buyback of shares also can be done).

High depreciation cover companies

High dep cover

Mr.Buffett has mentioned his past mistakes for the review purpose. He believes that before committing a new mistake, we need to review our old mistakes.

WB 1989 04

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WB 1989 10

We can learn and correct our mistakes from the learning from the mistakes of Mr.Buffett. These mistakes show us a transformation of Mr.Buffett from buying a “cigar butt” to a business which has an economic value.

Warren Buffett’s Letters 1957 – 2012

WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1985 – 86

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WB Letter 1985

Mr.Buffett indicate that Berkshire Hathway has a capability to earn superior return generally earn by corporate America.

WB 1985 01

We need to focus on the mistakes which we have made and try to learn from our mistakes.

WB 1985 02

Berkshire liquidates its textile business in the year 1985. Cyclical nature of the business and huge competition makes them helpless which resulted in the shutdown of the textile business.

WB 1985 03

If management having good managerial skills then company able to produce the good economic return.

WB 1985 04

Commodity business only able to produce profit while prices of the product are fixed or capacity is shorted. And managers can enhance capacity with the availability of capital when things look good in future.

Acquisition of Scott & Fetzer

WB 1985 05

CEO of the Scott & Fetzer – Ralph Schey is capable enough. When he took charge of the company, at that Time, Company had 31 businesses. Ralph had disposed of many of the businesses which have limited profitability and result of that company left with 17 businesses. Capital allocation decision of the Ralph is good enough which Mr.Buffett admired.

After the purchase by Berkshire, Schey spent two years revising World Book segment by selling off the Japanese division and trimming domestic operations in much the same way as he had tightened Scott Fetzer.

WB Letter 1986

Mr.Buffett mentioned that he and Mr.Charlie only having a major two job to perform – one is to retain and attract a good manager to manage a business and other is to allocate capital of Berkshire Hathway in a way which helps to earn more money than average.

Acquisition of the Fechheimer Bros. Co.

WB 1986 01

Mr.Buffett mentioned that he only acquire a company when economic characteristics of the business are favorable, and connected with the right people who can handle position with integrity.

Mr.Buffett on Accounting numbers –

WB 1986 02

Warren Buffett’s Letters 1957 – 2012