원문 보기
Good day. My name is Martin O'Leary, and I'm from Houston, Texas . My question to you is this. In this year's annual report, in your letter to shareholders, you mentioned that you met Benjamin Graham 50 years ago and that he had a huge impact on your life, especially on your success in investing. Additionally, you have previously stated that The Intelligent Investor is by far the best book on investing ever written.
One of the main principles of the book was that if you bought a group of stocks, say 10 or 20, that were trading at 2/3 or less of their net current assets, you would be provided with a margin of safety along with a satisfactory rate of return. Today, if you found 10 or 20 stocks trading at 2/3 of their net current assets, would you be inclined to buy them for your own investment portfolio, not for Berkshire Hathaway?
And second question: since I mentioned the book, I'm wondering what books you and Mr. Munger have been reading recently and what would you recommend? Thank you. Yes, regarding your first question: if you found such a group—and I don't think you will— you would probably make a good profit by buying it.
But not because the business itself would eventually prove successful, but because... there would probably be a lot of corporate activity in such a group: whether it's a management buyout, or a takeover, or something like that. But such stocks trading below net working capital are now almost impossible to find.
If you were to enter a market where there are a lot of them, you would probably see that great businesses are also selling for much less, and we would be inclined to choose the cheap but great business. I don't think you'll come across one like that in a market that's at or near its peak. I don't think you'll find many stocks trading below net working capital anymore.
There's too much money to be making deals before they reach that point. But that was the method. That was 50 years ago. Is Walter Schloss here? Walter , are you here? Stand up if you are here. I met Walter 50 years ago when I met Ben Graham. And even though I know Walter came this year, he already knows everything I'm talking about, so he could have left.
But Walter actually practiced securities investment much closer to the original. He has been running the partnership for what seems like 46 years. And he, he, um, he did it much more often with the types of stocks that Ben was talking about in those days. And he has results that are simply sensational.
But, um, it's much better than those who get promoted and go on TV shows and do all that. Um, and he did it in what I usually call " stub companies." You know, you get one free puff and that's it, but they do n't cost anything. And these were situations with working capital below par. Walter had to expand on that a bit, but these are great, just great results over a significant period—I mean 46 years.
This is a very significant period of time. So I think if you find a group like that and work with them as a group, and Ben always emphasized group operations, because when you're dealing with crappy companies but you expect a certain number to be absorbed and so on, it's better to have a whole group of them.
Whereas if you are dealing with great companies, you only need a few. Um, but I think if we saw that period again, we would be very active, but it wouldn't be the same securities. Charlie? Yes, and there is another change. Once upon a time, if a business went out of business , you could take the working capital and put it in the pockets of the shareholders.
Um , and today, as you can tell from all the restructuring costs, when things are going really badly, someone else owns a significant portion of the working capital. The whole culture has changed. If you have a small business in France and you're fed up with it, as happened with Marks & Spencer, the French say, "What the hell, are you trying to take your capital out of France?" These are French workers in this business.
And they don't care that... They don't say, "This is your working capital." " Take it away when the business no longer works for you." They say it's their working capital. The entire culture has changed on this issue. Not completely, but significantly compared to Ben Graham's time. There are many reasons why the investment, um, whatever you want to call it, idiosyncrasies of one era don't transfer perfectly to another.
This list was published tonight. I, I , I forget whether it was published in the 1951 edition of Securities Analysis or the 1949 edition of The Intelligent Investor , but there was a list of companies like Sac Low, Marshall Wells, Cleveland Worsted Mills, Foster Wheeler, and all of these companies were below working capital and were selling for three or four times their earnings.
And you know, if you bought a group of such stocks, you would make good money. But, you know, you...you definitely don't see that in companies of any significant size today. I've seen several lists of tech companies selling for less than their cash assets, but they're determined to spend that money, and in a year or two it might be gone.
This was a slightly different beast on Ben's list at the time. Did you ask the second question? Books you've read. Oh, the books I read. Well, tell them what books you've been reading, Charlie. Well, I mentioned one book—"The Genome." I have a really hard time putting the stress on the first syllable.
But it's a great book. And a shareholder sent me a book that few of you will like, written, I think, by Herb Simon. " Models of my life." And this is a very interesting book for a certain academic type of person. But this "Genome, " which is a history of a species in 23 chapters, and... it's just an amazing book.
And very interesting. I may have recommended it before, but if you haven't read Katharine Graham's "A Personal Story," I think you'll find it fascinating, and even more surprisingly, it's an honest story. You know, if I ever write my autobiography, I'll be like Arnold Schwarzenegger, but it's incredibly honest about what happened, and it's a real saga.
This is a good book. That Janet Lowe book about me, in my opinion, has a very interesting subdivision, so to speak, in its distribution. I notice that a significant number of people buy this book and send a copy to each descendant. They believe that if they do this, the offspring will behave more like their parents.
It will be interesting to see if this works. If so, it will sell better than the Bible. Hold your breath, boy . Very
Comments 0