James Guleke

@DividendGrowth Have conviction

Mohnish Pabrai made his largest investment mistake in 2023 He sold all of his Micron $MU stock low, after holding for about five years If he had held, his track record would have been off the charts Never sell

Indexing has historically worked quite well if you stay invested over a long period. But there's another basket of companies that has performed much, much better. 🐐 (This graph is log scale.) $BRK.A

OAKTREE'S HOWARD MARKS JUST EXPLAINED WHY MOST INVESTORS SELL THEIR BIGGEST WINNERS TOO EARLY He used Amazon as the example. The stock went from $90 in 1999 to $6 in 2001, down 93%. If you were smart enough to buy it at $6, here's the question that will mess with your head: "What about when it got to $60 and you made 10 times your money? Most people would sell." "What about when it got to $600 and you made 100 times your money? Would you sell half? Would you sell 90%?" At the time Marks wrote that memo, Amazon was $3,300. If you sold at $600 when you were up 100x, you left 85% of the gains on the table. Then he made his real point: "Buffett invested for 70 years and says he made all his money on 12 ideas. Charlie Munger said he made all his money on 4 ideas." "If you realize how scarce great compounders are, then the big mistake is getting off too soon."

@atherton_chris Wow yeah that sounds incredible. Awesome poster too. It would go well with our office decor.

Hard to say.....different times of my life. I like Tom Petty, but wouldn't say I'm a huge fan, but I had a pretty girl on my shoulders most of the show. Changes the algebra. When I was 14 going on 15, at the Unicorn in Houston, I saw Red Hot Chili Peppers (Blood Sugar Sex Magik tour), Smashing Pumpkins opened (when Gish came out), Pearl Jam opened for them (when Ten came out). My Spotify overlords tell me I listen to Bon Iver the most.

Introduce yourself with 10 bands you've seen live: Radiohead Bon Iver Fugazi Jason Isbell Nine Inch Nails Pearl Jam The Pixies Robert Earl Keen TV on the Radio Primus James McMurtry Tool Meshuggah Tyler Childers Ryan Bingham Opeth Arcade Fire Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers Chris Stapleton Paul Wall Mastodon Beastie Boys Rage Against the Machine Slim Thug Bruce Springsteen Bob Schneider Cannibal Corpse Band of Horses Jon Spencer Blues Explosion Lord Huron Phosphorescent GWAR Cypress Hill Red Hot Chili Peppers The Jesus Lizard SOFI TUKKER Mochakk Kanye West BB King Jay-Z Malaa Jane’s Addiction Parliament Funkadelic Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals Big Head Todd & The Monsters Foo Fighters Bun B The Smashing Pumpkins Charlie Robison The Dave Matthews Band Sia Dom Dolla Alice in Chains Uncle Lucius Bob Dylan MK Cory Morrow Dinosaur Jr. Willie Nelson Chemical Brothers Zach Bryan Weezer David Ramirez Franz Ferdinand Reckless Kelly Tchami Alt-J My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult Travis Scott The Reverend Horton Heat Randy Rogers Band Run The Jewels Ministry Brent Cobb Butthole Surfers Modest Mouse R.E.M. Kings of Leon The Flaming Lips Bleu Edmondson Juvenile Coldplay David Garza Thievery Corporation Son Volt Van Morrison Muse Bruce Robison The Lumineers Dr. John Pat Green David Gray Michael Franti & Spearhead

“Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.” - Henry David Thoreau

“You don’t get rich by diversifying into 50 mediocre assets. You get rich by finding 2 or 3 asymmetric home runs.” — Stanley Druckenmiller.

The Billionaire Wildcatter He borrowed $13,000 to buy a dying South Texas gas well. Then applied the Rockefeller playbook to shale gas: own the wells, the rigs, the pipes, and the route to market. Thread

My thoughts on $BRK People overcomplicate $BRK because they try to value every piece perfectly down to the decimal. They debate price to book, intrinsic value formulas, and build giant spreadsheets modeling every subsidiary. Meanwhile I look at it much more simply. $BRK has roughly $400b in cash and around $300b in stocks. That’s about $700b right there between cash and equities alone. So when the company is worth around $1t, you’re basically paying roughly $300b for everything else. That includes the railroad, the energy business, insurance operations, manufacturing, distribution, service businesses, and one of the greatest collections of operating assets ever assembled. And honestly I think people massively underestimate the value of the insurance float. The float is one of the greatest financial assets ever created because $BRK gets access to enormous amounts of capital at extremely attractive economics. Most people do not fully understand how powerful that becomes over decades. That float has quietly fueled one of the greatest compounding machines in financial history. But the part that fascinates me most is the discipline. Almost every CEO on earth would have cracked by now sitting on $400b of cash. Most management teams would feel pressure to force acquisitions just to appear active. $BRK has basically said if we cannot find something intelligent to buy at scale, we are willing to wait. People look at the cash and think it’s dead money, but optionality matters. $BRK effectively owns a giant call option on future chaos. When markets panic and liquidity disappears, $BRK becomes one of the only entities on earth capable of writing enormous checks instantly without relying on financing markets. That is a huge strategic advantage. The other thing people miss is how rare true permanence is in capitalism. Most corporations optimize for optics. CEOs rotate, incentives change, cultures decay, and strategies constantly shift depending on sentiment. $BRK was built differently. It was designed almost like an anti Wall Street structure where long term thinking itself became the competitive advantage. In many ways that culture may end up being Buffett’s greatest creation, even bigger than the stock portfolio itself. A lot of companies talk about long term thinking. $BRK actually structured the organization around it. I also think people misunderstand what $BRK really is. They think it’s just “an insurance company that owns stocks.” But $BRK is basically a giant ecosystem of real world economic activity. Railroads, energy infrastructure, manufacturing, freight movement, insurance, distribution, consumer spending, and financial assets all under one umbrella. In many ways it’s almost like owning a miniature version of the American economy. But unlike an index fund, the capital allocation is centralized under highly disciplined operators. You get diversification without complete chaos along with durability, liquidity, tax efficiency, reinvestment flexibility, and world class balance sheet. And honestly the most underrated asset may simply be trust. If $BRK calls during a crisis, people pick up the phone. If $BRK wants to buy a family owned business, sellers trust the company will preserve the culture and operate responsibly. I also think people are underestimating Greg Abel. Nobody is Warren Buffett and nobody ever will be, but that doesn’t mean $BRK suddenly stops being $BRK. Greg already understands the culture, operational discipline, and capital allocation philosophy better than almost anyone alive. That’s why $BRK almost a forever asset or a savings account on steroids. No, it’s not going to triple overnight and no, it’s not some hyper growth AI stock. But when I look at over $700b between cash and equities, elite operating businesses, insurance float, fortress balance sheet strength, world class reputation, and disciplined reinvestment talent, I have a hard time viewing it as expensive. 🌹

Howard Marks yesterday: “I don’t know enough to be confident in this.” Marks was asked about AI and gave a response every investor would do well to get comfortable saying. Whether its AI or another sector, recognizing the limits of our knowledge is everything, as Buffett explains: “If I have any advantage, it’s probably that I know when I know what I am doing, and I know when I don’t know what I am doing.” “If I don't know, I don't invest.”

Golden Tempo was literally dead last in the final turn and then outkicked everyone to win the Kentucky Derby. What an insane finish.

Nick Sleep on holding cash "Whilst we are conscious that holding cash does not meet our long term investment goals, we are in no hurry to invest the money in companies that do not meet our criteria."

‘Buffett does business in a way only he can pull off: a fair offer, no negotiation, that's it. With Warren, you get one shot. If he doesn't like your proposal, or you don't like his, it's over.’ - Lloyd Blankfein

Contrarian Research Report: May 8, 1995

@liftingminerals Competition

Oklahoma land bros: random question, in order to drill a new well you must have 51% of the acreage leased; why not just stop at 51% and force pool everyone else at 1/8th in order to have a much higher NRI in the well?

Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, says that US Government raising taxes doesn’t do anything to help the average American He says raising taxes does nothing because Congress just launders the money to their friends, special interest groups and “17,000 lobbying groups” “I don't know anyone, and you guys in the room, you might be Democrats, Republicans who thinks that sending another trillion dollars to Washington D.C will actually improve anything. So when you say raise taxes, if you said raise taxes and directly give it to the people who need it, do it. That does not happen. It goes to all these interest groups, and they give it to their friends and all that.” “Which is why the people are considered a swamp. It's kind of a swamp, the 17,000 lobbying groups. But bank companies are guilty too. They're just fighting for their one self-interest as opposed to what's good for my country”

BREAKING: US oil prices surge above $108/barrel, now up +25% over the last week. That’s nearly +$10/barrel since President Trump’s “address to the nation” last night.

Markets are 5% to 6% cheaper, we’re not in it to make 5% or 6%.

The great Lloyd Blankfein on Bitcoin: “It’s not a medium of exchange…it’s not a good store of value…it’s not an asset you retreat to when you need safety.” “It could go to a million dollars for a bitcoin, but it’s going to get there without me.” Good inter with ARS.

This paragraph by C.S. Lewis hits so hard: “Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance. The smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may be able to go on to victories you never dreamed of. An apparently trivial indulgence in lust or anger today is the loss of a ridge or railway line or bridgehead from which the enemy may launch an attack otherwise impossible.”