WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1983 – 84

Posted on June 3, 2018 by Jimit Zaveri under Bibliophile

WB Letter 1983

Berkshire Hathway made an acquisition of majority stake into Nebraska Furniture Mart. Mrs.Blumkin leave Russia for America when she was the age of 23. She had no formal education, no knowledge of English.

WB 1983 01

Many retailers had pressurized to the furniture and carpet manufacturers to not to sell products to Mrs.B but Mrs.B has managed to run her business and also able to cut prices. She has to face many cases but she won all and received huge publicity.

WB 1983 02

Mr.Buffett has explained the concept of intrinsic value in a very well manner.

WB 1983 03

Mr.Buffett has explained how to look at the economic Goodwill with the example of the See’s Candy. He has an emphasis more on economic Goodwill rather than accounting Goodwill. Company’s ability to produce a higher return on assets compared to market then that excess return is economic Goodwill.

WB 1983 04

Also mentioned that assets heavy businesses require additional capital for the further growth.

WB 1983 05

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Great business creates a fortune during an inflationary year where the company requires less tangible assets. And also companies having availability of the fund for acquisition of the new business. They do not have to depend on the bringing additional fund by either debt or issuing new share capital.

I have quoted example of 2 two companies into the automobile business and one company is in the paint business.

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Example 1 – 3 which are asset heavy businesses, where we can see that borrowing is compounding, non-availability of free cash flow and wealth of shareholders does not created or get erode, whereas in example 4 – 6 which are asset light or least asset businesses, we can see that borrowing reduced or increased at a lower rate and investments into the books has compound well, availability of free cash flow which resulted into the wealth creation for the shareholders.

But the management who is not disciplined then they will do a silly things such as –

WB 1983 06

WB Letter 1984

Mr.Buffett has mentioned benefits of repurchase of shares.

WB 1984 01

WB 1984 02

Warren Buffett’s Letters 1957 – 2012

Disclaimer: Businesses discuss in this article is not a recommendation to Buy-Sell-Hold. And I am not a SEBI registered research analyst.

WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1982

Posted on May 27, 2018 by Jimit Zaveri under Bibliophile

WB Letter 1982

Mr.Buffett has mentioned characteristics of cyclical industries-

The product which can be differentiated and sell it by the branding of it then the company can able to earn extra from it. But the product where no chance to differentiate product then profitability is the major factor of market forces.

We cannot predict that when the cycle will going to turn, we cannot predict that when demand will overtake supply and prices of the commodity will start improving or supply increases much compared to demand and prices starts falling.

We should focus when any company is engaged in the corporate acquisition. If any company is issuing shares for the acquiring a company which having lesser intrinsic value then we should keep cautious. Such decision of the management provides us a clue regarding the perspective of the management and weather company is intended to create the wealth of the owners or not.

While management makes an acquisition at the expensive valuation by issuing their shares than some of the rationale given by management which we should check by putting highest cautions.

Mr.Buffett had provided a solution by which management can avoid value destruction for the existing owners of the company.

Many a time, management only focuses on the increasing future Earning Per Share (EPS) by sacrificing the strength of the balance sheet. But they forget that if the balance sheet does not remain strong for a longer period of time then business is going to have a tough time into the future.

The criterion which Mr.Buffett focuses while making an investment decision –

Warren Buffett’s Letters 1957 – 2012

Disclaimer: Businesses discuss in this article is not a recommendation to Buy-Sell-Hold. And I am not a SEBI registered research analyst.

WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1980 – 1981

Posted on April 26, 2018 by Jimit Zaveri under Bibliophile

I am really grateful to Riddhi for helping me with editing work.

WB Letter 1980

Mr.Buffett gave his opinion about the repurchase of outstanding shares of the company.

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He had discussed the effect of inflation to his shareholders in a very well manner.

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Buffett focuses on businesses that can enhance the Return on Equity with the rising inflation and without the need of additional capital requirement.

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When there is a temporary trouble to the business; and if the managers have an ability to cure that temporary problem and the business itself can generate good cash; then

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Buffett mentions that we should focus on strong business so that it does not depend on the good management.

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WB Letter 1981

Mr.Buffett has given his view on maximizing economic benefits rather than accounting appearance. And also stated some of the mistakes which the management is making.

Rather than buying companies which have the management with above-mentioned characteristics, he suggests buying a company which has the following characteristics.

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Few companies are able to enhance their margins though their sales which are not growing at a very high rate and are still sustaining their market share.

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In India, there is an air cooler manufacturing company which grew well without major additional capital.

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In the above table; we can see that Sales and Net profit has grown by 30% and 48% CAGR respectively. And if we see cumulative capital expenditure made by the company; then it is just 10% of the cumulative net profit. The company has grown its sales and profitability without the requirement of major additional capital.

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Mr.Buffett gives a good logical perspective that when the company can earn higher Return on equity; then they should invest their earnings into the business itself. And if the company is unable to earn higher Return on equity; then they should distribute earnings to the owners so that the owners can deploy capital in a better way. But we should be aware of companies that are raising capital for the dividend payout.

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Warren Buffett’s Letters 1957 – 2012

WARREN BUFFETT’S LETTER – 1976 – 1979

Posted on April 20, 2018 by Jimit Zaveri under Bibliophile

I am really grateful to Riddhi for helping me with editing work.

WB Letter 1976

Performance of the company has shown significant improvement in the year 1976 and company has been able to achieve 17.30% returns on shareholders’ equity.

Textile operation

Return on sales and Return on capital employed of textile operations was inadequate due to sluggish industry condition. Performance of any company can be measured by looking at the return on sales and return on capital employed and whether the business has a temporary problem or not.

Insurance operation

In the year 1976, insurance underwriting business has shown good performance due to the increase in the premium rates.

WB Letter 1977

People measure higher earnings per share on the basis of the past record-breaking earnings but according to Mr.Buffett, if the company issued 10% additional equity capital and if due to that there is an increase in earnings per share by 5%; then it is not considered a good performance. He mentioned that rather focusing on the higher reported earnings per share, we should focus on the return on equity capital (I.e. RoE).

Textile operation

Textile operations once again were reported as poor earning in the year 1977. Mr.Buffett gave a reason to the shareholders for remaining into the textile business.

WB 1977 01

Insurance operation

Mr.Buffett quoted the shifting of a pendulum from good period to the worst period –

WB 1977 02

He mentioned his investment criteria as –

WB 1977 03

WB Letter 1978

Diversified Retailing Company got merged into the Berkshire Hathway and due to this merger; holding of Berkshire into the Blue Chip Stamps increased to ~58%.

Textile operation

When a product is indifferentiated and business is capital intensive in nature, we earn inadequate return whereas we can earn above-average returns during a tight supply or shortage of product.

WB Letter 1979

Investment into equities shares carried out till 1979 at the lower of aggregate cost or market value. But from the year 1979, the accounting profession has decided to carry out investment at the market value.

Mr.Buffett has mentioned “Return on Capital Employed” as the criteria for measuring managerial performance.

WB 1979 01

A few years ago, Mr.Buffett had decided to purchase a Waumbec Mills in Manchester, the stock was available statistically cheap, well below the working capital of the business and, in effect, got very substantial amounts of machinery and real estate for less than nothing. But this decision resulted into the poor performance and faced too many difficulties to manage the business. Due to this experience, Mr.Buffett communicates an effective point to understand –

WB 1979 02

According to Mr.Buffett, we should focus on the management who utilize retained earnings effectively and will translate a dollar retained by them into a dollar or more of subsequent market value for us.

Mr.Buffett recognized his mistake in buying a bond and he had accepted this in front of his shareholders.