Yearly Archives: 2009

Carry-on Luggage

My wife and I flew to San Diego last week on Delta.  The flights left on time and were generally comfortable.  The in-flight movies left a little to be desired, but I survived. 

Delta, like many carriers, now charges to check bags ($20).  My wife’s wedding dress, which we were bringing for her friend, was too big to carry-on so we had to pay the fee.  In the past, we would have checked our other two bags for convenience since we had to wait at baggage claim regardless.  But we didn’t want to pay another fee and decided to carry-on our two rollers.

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Take the Loss

I was talking to a friend about his portfolio.  He has a big slug of Pfizer.  I told him he should reduce it to about 4% of his equities.  He said he couldn’t because it was at a loss.  So what?

Investors don’t like to sell positions at a loss.  It’s depressing and is essentially admitting a mistake.  However, whether you are holding a security at a loss or gain is largely irrelevant, ignoring the tax consequences.  What’s important when evaluating a security is whether you believe it’s currently undervalued and how that valuation compares to your other options.

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The New Normal – Slower Growth Ahead

With a year’s perspective after the credit crunch, certain economic and market patterns are now apparent.  From September 2008 until March of this year, the market was signaling that there was the potential for the whole banking system to fail … Continue reading

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Financial Reporting Numbers Games

One of the subjective criteria that we assess when analyzing a company is the quality of the corporate management.  As with many aspects of our research process, this process is subjective.  It is impossible to read the Curriculum Vitae for … Continue reading

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G20: Economic Council?

The G20 declared itself “the world’s main economic governing council” during its summit held at the end of September.  It’s a grand proclamation, but it is unclear as to whether the G20 can deliver.  The first stumbling block is whether … Continue reading

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