Buffett (1989): We've never succeeded in making a good deal with a bad person.

Warren Buffett mentioned about his investment mistakes of the preceding 25 years in his 1989 letter to shareholders. Let us round off that list of what he feels were his key investment mistakes.

"My most surprising discovery: the overwhelming importance in business of an unseen force that we might call 'the institutional imperative'. In business school, I was given no hint of the imperative's existence and I did not intuitively understand it when I entered the business world. I thought then that decent, intelligent, and experienced managers would automatically make rational business decisions. But I learned over time that isn't so. Instead, rationality frequently wilts when the institutional imperative comes into play."

How often have we seen merger between two companies not producing the desired outcome as was projected at the time of the merger? Or, how often have we seen management retain excess cash under the rationale that it will be used for future acquisitions? Further still, a lot of companies do things just because their peers are doing it even though it might bring no tangible benefits to them. The master has labeled these so called propensities to do things just for the sake of doing them 'the institutional imperatives' and has termed them as one of his most surprising discoveries. Further, he advises investors to steer clear of such companies and instead focus on companies, which appear alert to the problem of 'institutional imperative'.

Given the master's great predisposition towards choosing business owners with the highest levels of integrity and honesty, it comes as no surprise that one of his investment mistake concerns the quality of the management. This is what he has to say on the issue.

"After some other mistakes, I learned to go into business only with people whom I like, trust, and admire. As I noted before, this policy in itself will not ensure success: A second-class textile or department store company won't prosper simply because its managers are men that you would be pleased to see your daughter marry. However, an owner - or investor - can accomplish wonders if he manages to associate himself with such people in businesses that possess decent economic characteristics. Conversely, we do not wish to join with managers who lack admirable qualities, no matter how attractive the prospects of their business. We've never succeeded in making a good deal with a bad person."

Next on the list of investment mistakes is a confession that makes us realise that even the master is human and is prone to slip up occasionally. But what makes him a truly outstanding investor is the fact that he has had relatively fewer mistakes of commission rather than omission. In other words, while he may have let go of a couple of very attractive investments, he's hardly ever made an investment that cost him huge amounts of money.

This is what he has to say: "Some of my worst mistakes were not publicly visible. These were stock and business purchases whose virtues I understood and yet didn't make. It's no sin to miss a great opportunity outside one's area of competence. But I have passed on a couple of really big purchases that were served up to me on a platter and that I was fully capable of understanding. For Berkshire's shareholders, myself included, the cost of this thumb-sucking has been huge."

The master rounds off the list with a masterpiece of a comment. It gives us an insight into his almost inhuman like risk aversion qualities and goes us to show that he will hardly ever make an investment unless he is 100% sure of the outcome. It comes out brilliantly in this, his last comment on his investment mistakes of the past twenty-five years: "Our consistently conservative financial policies may appear to have been a mistake, but in my view were not. In retrospect, it is clear that significantly higher, though still conventional, leverage ratios at Berkshire would have produced considerably better returns on equity than the 23.8% we have actually averaged. Even in 1965, perhaps we could have judged there to be a 99% probability that higher leverage would lead to nothing but good. Correspondingly, we might have seen only a 1% chance that some shock factor, external or internal, would cause a conventional debt ratio to produce a result falling somewhere between temporary anguish and default.

We wouldn't have liked those 99:1 odds - and never will. A small chance of distress or disgrace cannot, in our view, be offset by a large chance of extra returns. If your actions are sensible, you are certain to get good results; in most such cases, leverage just moves things along faster. Charlie and I have never been in a big hurry: We enjoy the process far more than the proceeds - though we have learned to live with those also."

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=10/25/2007&story=3

Buffett (1989): Human beings have this perverse tendency of making easy things difficult and one must not fall into such a trap.

In his 1989 letter, we got to know Warren Buffett's views on growth rates in a finite world and the mischief being played by investment bankers and promoters in order to justify a rather 'difficult to service' fund raising.

As the years have gone by, we have noticed that the master's letters have become lengthier and have come packed with even more investment wisdom. This has however, made it difficult to incorporate all the wisdom from one particular year in a single article.

In a section titled 'Mistakes of the First Twenty-five Years', the master has reviewed some of the major investment related mistakes that he has made in the twenty-five years preceding the year 1989. Let us go through those and try our best to avoid them if similar situations play themselves out before us:

"It's far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price. Charlie (Buffett's business partner) understood this early; I was a slow learner. But now, when buying companies or common stocks, we look for first-class businesses accompanied by first-class managements."

"Good jockeys will do well on good horses, but not on broken-down nags. The same managers employed in a business with good economic characteristics would have achieved fine records. But they were never going to make any progress while running in quicksand."

It should be worth pointing out that in the early years of his career, the master bought into businesses based on statistical cheapness rather than qualitative cheapness. While he experienced success using this approach, the difficult time faced by the textile business made him realize the virtue of a good business i.e. businesses with worthwhile returns and profit margins and run by exceptional people. According to him, while one may make decent profits in an ordinary business purchased at very low prices, lot of time may elapse before such profits can be made. Hence, he feels that it is always better to stick with wonderful company at a fair price, as according to him, time is the friend of a good business and an enemy of a bad business.

"Easy does it. After 25 years of buying and supervising a great variety of businesses, Charlie and I have not learned how to solve difficult business problems. What we have learned is to avoid them. To the extent we have been successful, it is because we concentrated on identifying one-foot hurdles that we could step over rather than because we acquired any ability to clear seven-footers."

The master's reluctance to invest in tech stocks during the tech boom is legendary and perfectly sums up what he intends to convey from the above paragraph. Invest in companies whose businesses are within your circle of competence and keep it easy and simple. According to him, human beings have this perverse tendency of making easy things difficult and one must not fall into such a trap

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=10/19/2007&story=4

Buffett (1989): His view on high growth rates, EBITDA and zero coupon bonds

We saw Warren Buffett make some significant dents in the efficient market theory and also got to know his take on arbitrage. Let us see what the master has to say in his 1989 letter to shareholders.

Have you ever wondered why despite such enormous wealth and infrastructure, the US economy canters at a mere 3%-4% growth rate per annum and why a country like India, which has very little infrastructure in comparison to the US, is galloping at 7%-8% rate. Or better still, what happened to the 40%-50% growth rates that the Indian IT companies notched up so successfully in the not so recent past? The master has the following explanation to these phenomena:

"In a finite world, high growth rates must self-destruct. If the base from which the growth is taking place is tiny, this law may not operate for a time. But when the base balloons, the party ends: A high growth rate eventually forges its own anchor."

Indeed, in a world where resources are limited, consistently high growth rates would create pressure on those resources, thus resulting into either exhaustion of the resources or slowing down of growth. To better illustrate this point, let us return to the Indian IT industry. The demand for qualified IT professionals (a limited resource as we can produce only so much per year) has been so high in recent times that this has resulted in a disproportionate rise in salaries and attrition levels, thus impeding profit growth. Further, it is much easy to double revenues on a base of Rs 500 - Rs 600 m than on a base of Rs 50,000 m - Rs 60,000 m. Hence, those who are expecting these companies to grow at the same rate as in the past, might be in for some real surprise.

Another important topic that the master has touched upon in his 1989 letter is the gradual deterioration in the quality of representation of a company's true cash flow by certain promoters and their advisors in order to justify a shaky deal. While earlier, a company's cash flow, to justify its debt carrying capacity took into account its normal capex needs and modest reduction in debt per year, things had come to such a pass that EBITDA emerged as a substitute for a company's cash flow. Important to note that EBITDA not only excludes the normal capex needs of the company, but it was deemed enough to cover just the interest expense on debt and not the repayment of debt. This is what the master had to say on such practices:

"To induce lenders to finance even sillier transactions, they introduced an abomination, EBDIT - Earnings Before Depreciation, Interest and Taxes - as the test of a company's ability to pay interest. Using this sawed-off yardstick, the borrower ignored depreciation as an expense on the theory that it did not require a current cash outlay. Capital outlays at a business can be skipped, of course, in any given month, just as a human can skip a day or even a week of eating. But if the skipping becomes routine and is not made up, the body weakens and eventually dies. Furthermore, a start-and-stop feeding policy will over time produce a less healthy organism, human or corporate, than that produced by a steady diet. As businessmen, Charlie and I relish having competitors who are unable to fund capital expenditures."

Thus, since EBITDA does not even cover the normal capex needs of the company, the master advises investors to be wary of companies and investment bankers who rely on these yardsticks to justify a leveraged deal. The master also touches upon a special type of bond known as the zero coupon bonds and goes on to add that whenever the inherent advantage that these bonds offer (deferring interest payment and not recording them till the maturity of bonds) combine with lax standards for cash flow estimation like the EBITDA, it sure is a recipe for disaster. This is what he has to say on the combination of both:

"Whenever an investment banker starts talking about EBDIT - or whenever someone creates a capital structure that does not allow all interest, both payable and accrued, to be comfortably met out of current cash flow net of ample capital expenditures - zip up your wallet. Turn the tables by suggesting that the promoter and his high-priced entourage accept zero-coupon fees, deferring their take until the zero-coupon bonds have been paid in full. See then how much enthusiasm for the deal endures."

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=9/20/2007&story=3

Buffett (1988): Arbitrages and Efficient Market Hypothesis

From Warren Buffet's 1987 letter to shareholders, we got to know his preference for businesses that are simple and easy to understand. In the same letter, Buffett also explained the concept of 'Mr Market' in a rather detailed way. Let us now see what the master has to offer in his 1988 letter to shareholders.

The year 1988 turned out to be quite an eventful one for Berkshire Hathaway, the master's investment vehicle. While the year saw the listing of the company on the New York Stock Exchange, it also turned out to be the year when Buffett made what can be termed as one of its best investments ever. Yes, we are talking about the company Coca Cola. The letter too was not short on investment wisdom either. Although he did discuss previously touched upon topics like accounting and management quality, these are not what we will focus on. Instead, let us see what the master has to say on some novel concepts like arbitrage and his take on the efficient market theory.

For those of you who would have thought that Warren Buffett is all about value investing and extremely lengthy time horizons, the mention of the word 'arbitrage' must have come as a pleasant surprise or may be, even as a shock. However, the master did engage in 'arbitrage' but in very small quantities and this is what he has to say on it.

"In past reports we have told you that our insurance subsidiaries sometimes engage in arbitrage as an alternative to holding short-term cash equivalents. We prefer, of course, to make major long-term commitments, but we often have more cash than good ideas. At such times, arbitrage sometimes promises much greater returns than Treasury Bills and, equally important, cools any temptation we may have to relax our standards for long-term investments."

First of all, let us see how does he define arbitrage.

"Since World War I the definition of arbitrage - or "risk arbitrage," as it is now sometimes called - has expanded to include the pursuit of profits from an announced corporate event such as sale of the company, merger, recapitalization, reorganization, liquidation, self-tender, etc. In most cases the arbitrageur expects to profit regardless of the behavior of the stock market. The major risk he usually faces instead is that the announced event won't happen."

Just as in his long-term investments, in arbitrage too, the master brings his legendary risk aversion technique to the fore and puts forth his criteria for evaluating arbitrage situations.

"To evaluate arbitrage situations you must answer four questions: 

• (1) How likely is it that the promised event will indeed occur? 
• (2) How long will your money be tied up? 
• (3) What chance is there that something still better will transpire - a competing takeover bid, for example? and 
• (4) What will happen if the event does not take place because of anti-trust action, financing glitches, etc.?"

And how exactly does he differ from other arbitrageurs? Let us hear the answer in his own words.

"Because we diversify so little, one particularly profitable or unprofitable transaction will affect our yearly result from arbitrage far more than it will the typical arbitrage operation. So far, Berkshire has not had a really bad experience. But we will - and when it happens we'll report the gory details to you."

"The other way we differ from some arbitrage operations is that we participate only in transactions that have been publicly announced. We do not trade on rumors or try to guess takeover candidates. We just read the newspapers, think about a few of the big propositions, and go by our own sense of probabilities."

Another important topic that the master touched upon in his 1988 letter was that of the Efficient Market Theory (EMT). This theory had become something like a cult in the financial academic circles in the 1970s and to put it simply, stated that stock analysis is an exercise in futility since the prices reflected virtually all the public information and hence, it was impossible to beat the market on a regular basis. However, this is what the master had to say on the investment professionals and academics who followed the theory to the 'Tee'.

"Observing correctly that the market was frequently efficient, they went on to conclude incorrectly that it was always efficient. The difference between these propositions is night and day."

In order to justify his stance, the master states that if beating markets would have been impossible, then he and his mentor, Benjamin Graham, would not have notched up returns in the region of 20% year after year for an incredibly long stretch of 63 years, when the market returns during the same period were just under 10% including dividends. Hence, despite evidences to the contrary, EMT continued to remain popular and forced the master to make the following comment.

"Over the 63 years, the general market delivered just under a 10% annual return, including dividends. That means US$ 1,000 would have grown to US$ 405,000 if all income had been reinvested. A 20% rate of return, however, would have produced US$ 97 m. That strikes us as a statistically significant differential that might, conceivably, arouse one's curiosity. Yet proponents of the theory have never seemed interested in discordant evidence of this type. True, they don't talk quite as much about their theory today as they used to. But no one, to my knowledge, has ever said he was wrong, no matter how many thousands of students he has sent forth misinstructed. EMT, moreover, continues to be an integral part of the investment curriculum at major business schools. Apparently, a reluctance to recant, and thereby to demystify the priesthood, is not limited to theologians."

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=9/13/2007&story=3

Buffett (1987): "If you aren't certain that you understand and can value your business far better than Mr. Market, you don't belong in the game."

We saw the master expand upon his concept of owner earnings and the only two basic jobs that he and his partner Charlie Munger engage in through his 1986 letter to his shareholders. Let us see what investment wisdom he brings to the table in his 1987 letter.

We are living in a fast changing world and every few years there comes a technology or a product that just brings about a revolution and spreads across the globe like a mania. Few examples that come to mind are the automobiles and aeroplanes in the US in the early 20th century or the recent Internet and dot-com mania. However, the fact that the companies in such revolutionary industries rake up equally impressive returns on the stock market is far from truth. While loss making abilities of the US auto companies and airliners are legendary, not less infamous either is the amount of wealth that has been destroyed in the Internet bubble at the cusp of the 21st century. No wonder this is what the master has to say on which companies end up winners in the stock market.

"Experience indicates that the best business returns are usually achieved by companies that are doing something quite similar today to what they were doing five or ten years ago. That is no argument for managerial complacency. Businesses always have opportunities to improve service, product lines, manufacturing techniques, and the like, and obviously these opportunities should be seized. But a business that constantly encounters major change also encounters many chances for major error. Furthermore, economic terrain that is forever shifting violently is ground on which it is difficult to build a fortress-like business franchise. Such a franchise is usually the key to sustained high returns."

"Berkshire's experience has been similar. Our managers have produced extraordinary results by doing rather ordinary things - but doing them exceptionally well. Our managers protect their franchises, they control costs, they search for new products and markets that build on their existing strengths and they don't get diverted. They work exceptionally hard at the details of their businesses, and it shows."

Indeed, with technology changing so fast in industries such as auto and Internet, it becomes really difficult to zero in on a company that will continue to exist ten years from now and in the process still give attractive returns. This is definitely not the case with a single product company existing in an industry, where more the things change more they remain the same.

In an era when investing in equities had been reduced to nothing more than moving in and out of companies based on their quotations, the master was a breed different from the rest. He did not let fluctuations in stock prices influence his investment decisions but rather viewed investments from the point of view of a business analyst, judging companies on the basis of their operating results and viewing stock market not as a guide but as a servant. Laid out below is what perhaps is one of the most lucid yet one of the most effective explanations of how one should view the stock market.

The master says, "Ben Graham, my friend and teacher, long ago described the mental attitude toward market fluctuations that I believe to be most conducive to investment success. He said that you should imagine market quotations as coming from a remarkably accommodating fellow named Mr. Market who is your partner in a private business. Without fail, Mr. Market appears daily and names a price at which he will either buy your interest or sell you his.

Even though the business that the two of you own may have economic characteristics that are stable, Mr. Market's quotations will be anything but. For, sad to say, the poor fellow has incurable emotional problems. At times he feels euphoric and can see only the favorable factors affecting the business. When in that mood, he names a very high buy-sell price because he fears that you will snap up his interest and rob him of imminent gains. At other times he is depressed and can see nothing but trouble ahead for both the business and the world. On these occasions he will name a very low price, since he is terrified that you will unload your interest on him.

Mr. Market has another endearing characteristic - he doesn't mind being ignored. If his quotation is uninteresting to you today, he will be back with a new one tomorrow. Transactions are strictly at your option. Under these conditions, the more manic-depressive his behavior, the better for you.

But, like Cinderella at the ball, you must heed one warning or everything will turn into pumpkins and mice - Mr. Market is there to serve you, not to guide you. It is his pocketbook, not his wisdom that you will find useful. If he shows up some day in a particularly foolish mood, you are free to either ignore him or to take advantage of him, but it will be disastrous if you fall under his influence. Indeed, if you aren't certain that you understand and can value your business far better than Mr. Market, you don't belong in the game."

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=9/6/2007&story=4

Buffett (1986): The concept of Owners Earnings and Maintainance Capex

We got to know the master's views on his textile business. Let us go a year further and try to discuss what the guru has to say in his 1986 letter to shareholders.

The letter, as usual, though did contain quite a bit of commentary on the company's major businesses, it also had general investment related wisdom. This time around the master chose to speak on himself and his partner's role. This is what he had to say:

"Charlie Munger, our Vice Chairman, and I really have only two jobs. One is to attract and keep outstanding managers to run our various operations. This hasn't been all that difficult. Usually the managers came with the companies we bought, having demonstrated their talents throughout careers that spanned a wide variety of business circumstances. They were managerial stars long before they knew us, and our main contribution has been to not get in their way. This approach seems elementary - if my job were to manage a golf team - and if Jack Nicklaus or Arnold Palmer were willing to play for me - neither would get a lot of directives from me about how to swing."

"The second job Charlie and I must handle is the allocation of capital, which at Berkshire is a considerably more important challenge than at most companies. Three factors make that so - 

• we earn more money than average; 
• we retain all that we earn; and, 
• we are fortunate to have operations that, for the most part, require little incremental capital to remain competitive and to grow. 

Obviously, the future results of a business earning 23% annually and retaining it all are far more affected by today's capital allocations than are the results of a business earning 10% and distributing half of that to shareholders. If our retained earnings - and those of our major investees, GEICO and Capital Cities/ABC Inc. - are employed in an unproductive manner, the economics of Berkshire will deteriorate very quickly. In a company adding only, say 5% to net worth annually, capital-allocation decisions, though still important, will change the company's economics far more slowly."

The master's non-interference in the management of the businesses he owned is now almost legendary. But just like the companies he invested in, he made sure that the people he put in charge had outstanding track records. Once that was done, he would completely move out of their way and let them manage the business. Indeed, when a business with favorable economics is run by an exceptional manager, the last thing one would want to do is upset the applecart. Yet again, while the line of thinking is simple yet extremely effective, it must have stemmed from the master's own experience of managing the operations of the textile business of Berkshire Hathaway. Having been at the wheels for years, he must have realised how difficult it is to successfully run a business and deliver knock out performances year after year.

Berkshire Hathaway, from the time Buffett has been at the helm, has never paid dividends to shareholders. This is because the master has always felt that he would be able to find a better use of capital than paying out dividends. And find he did! The returns that the company has generated for its shareholders have vastly exceeded returns by any other American company. A very difficult task indeed, especially over a very long period of time. He is also very right in saying that a company that earns above average returns and retains all earnings is likely to see its economics deteriorate much faster than a company retaining only 5% if the retained capital is not put to good use. In the end, the honours should definitely go to the company that makes the most effective use of capital.

The master rounded off the 1986 letter by introducing a concept of owner earnings, the one he frequently uses to evaluate companies. It is nothing but

(a) reported earnings plus 

(b) depreciation, depletion, amortization, and certain other non-cash charges minus

(c) the average annual amount of capitalised expenditures for plant and equipment that the business needs to fully maintain its long-term competitive position and current volumes.

While owner earnings looks similar to cash flow after capex and working capital needs, it does not take into account capex and working capital investment required for generating more volumes but instead takes into account capex that is required to maintain just the steady state operations. In other words, what we call as the maintenance capex. Since inflationary pressures can make maintenance capex look very large, analysts who do not consider it are bound to overestimate the worth of the company. In fact, this is what he has to say on those who do not consider the all-important (c) item in their evaluations.

"All of this points up the absurdity of the 'cash flow' numbers that are often set forth in Wall Street reports. These numbers routinely include (a) plus (b) - but do not subtract (c). Most sales brochures of investment bankers also feature deceptive presentations of this kind. These imply that the business being offered is the commercial counterpart of the Pyramids - forever state-of-the-art, never needing to be replaced, improved or refurbished. Indeed, if all US corporations were to be offered simultaneously for sale through our leading investment bankers - and if the sales brochures describing them were to be believed - governmental projections of national plant and equipment spending would have to be slashed by 90%."

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=8/30/2007&story=3

Buffett (1985): Energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks in a chronically leaking boat

With volatility being the order of the day, we as investors indeed need some calming influence so as to help us stay rational and make sense of the crisis that has gripped the global capital markets currently. And what better way to do this than to turn to the man who answers to the name of Warren Buffett and who arguably, is one of the world's best practitioner of the art of rationality and objective thinking.

In the following few paragraphs, let us see what the master offers by way of investment wisdom in his 1985 letter.

This letter like his previous letters touches upon a variety of topics, some covered before while others brand new. What we would like to reproduce here is the biggest and the best of them all. The year 1985 was the year when the master finally chose to shut down his textile business by liquidating all of company's assets. While going through the brief history of the business and explaining his rationale behind the sale, the master has systemically busted some of the biggest myths related to investing and shown us why one should prefer business that generate returns with as little capital employed as possible. He has also shown why reliance on book values and replacement costs while valuing a company could turn to be dangerous.

While the discourse is indeed exhaustive, we believe that every sentence is worth its weight in gold. Laid out below is an edited account of his textile business shutdown:

"In July we decided to close our textile operation, and by year end this unpleasant job was largely completed. The history of this business is instructive.

When Buffett Partnership Ltd., an investment partnership of which I was general partner, bought control of Berkshire Hathaway 21 years ago, it had an accounting net worth of US$ 22 m, all devoted to the textile business. The company's intrinsic business value, however, was considerably less because the textile assets were unable to earn returns commensurate with their accounting value. Indeed, during the previous nine years (the period in which Berkshire and Hathaway operated as a merged company) aggregate sales of US$ 530 m had produced an aggregate loss of US$ 10 m. Profits had been reported from time to time but the net effect was always one step forward, two steps back.

We felt, however, that the business would be run much better by a long-time employee whom we immediately selected to be president, Ken Chace. In this respect we were 100% correct: Ken and his recent successor, Garry Morrison, have been excellent managers, every bit the equal of managers at our more profitable businesses.

We remained in the business for reasons that I stated in the 1978 annual report (and summarized at other times also): "(1) our textile businesses are very important employers in their communities, (2) management has been straightforward in reporting on problems and energetic in attacking them, (3) labor has been cooperative and understanding in facing our common problems, and (4) the business should generate modest cash returns relative to investment." I further said, "As long as these conditions prevail - and we expect that they will - we intend to continue to support our textile business despite more attractive alternative uses for capital."

It turned out that I was very wrong about (4). Though 1979 was moderately profitable, the business thereafter consumed major amounts of cash. By mid-1985 it became clear, even to me, that this condition was almost sure to continue. Could we have found a buyer who would continue operations, I would have certainly preferred to sell the business rather than liquidate it, even if that meant somewhat lower proceeds for us. But the economics that were finally obvious to me were also obvious to others, and interest was nil.

The domestic textile industry operates in a commodity business, competing in a world market in which substantial excess capacity exists. Much of the trouble we experienced was attributable, both directly and indirectly, to competition from foreign countries whose workers are paid a small fraction of the U.S. minimum wage.

Over the years, we had the option of making large capital expenditures in the textile operation that would have allowed us to somewhat reduce variable costs. Each proposal to do so looked like an immediate winner. Measured by standard return-on-investment tests, in fact, these proposals usually promised greater economic benefits than would have resulted from comparable expenditures in our highly-profitable candy and newspaper businesses.

But the promised benefits from these textile investments were illusory. Many of our competitors, both domestic and foreign, were stepping up to the same kind of expenditures and, once enough companies did so, their reduced costs became the baseline for reduced prices industrywide. Viewed individually, each company's capital investment decision appeared cost-effective and rational; viewed collectively, the decisions neutralized each other and were irrational (just as happens when each person watching a parade decides he can see a little better if he stands on tiptoes). After each round of investment, all the players had more money in the game and returns remained anemic.

Thus, we faced a miserable choice: huge capital investment would have helped to keep our textile business alive, but would have left us with terrible returns on ever-growing amounts of capital. (Comment:  Gruesome business) After the investment, moreover, the foreign competition would still have retained a major, continuing advantage in labor costs. A refusal to invest, however, would make us increasingly non-competitive, even measured against domestic textile manufacturers.

My conclusion from my own experiences and from much observation of other businesses is that a good managerial record (measured by economic returns) is far more a function of what business boat you get into than it is of how effectively you row (though intelligence and effort help considerably, of course, in any business, good or bad). Should you find yourself in a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks.

There is an investment postscript in our textile saga. Some investors weight book value heavily in their stock-buying decisions (as I, in my early years, did myself). And some economists and academicians believe replacement values are of considerable importance in calculating an appropriate price level for the stock market as a whole. Those of both persuasions would have received an education at the auction we held in early 1986 to dispose of our textile machinery.

The equipment sold (including some disposed of in the few months prior to the auction) took up about 750,000 square feet of factory space in New Bedford and was eminently usable. It originally cost us about US$ 13 m, including US$ 2 m spent in 1980-84, and had a current book value of US$ 866,000 (after accelerated depreciation). Though no sane management would have made the investment, the equipment could have been replaced new for perhaps US$30 to US$ 50 m.

Gross proceeds from our sale of this equipment came to US$ 163,122. Allowing for necessary pre- and post-sale costs, our net was less than zero. Relatively modern looms that we bought for US$ 5,000 apiece in 1981 found no takers at US$ 50. We finally sold them for scrap at US$ 26 each, a sum less than removal costs."

Conclusion: The master's liquidation of his textile business shows what could potentially lie in store for a business with a rather poor economics, despite the presence of an excellent management. Thus, while Buffett was able to correct his mistake by devoting some of the textile company's capital to other more profitable businesses, no such luxuries await small investors. Hence, they can do their investment returns a world of good by refusing to invest in such businesses, no matter how cheap they might look based on book value and replacement costs.

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=8/23/2007&story=2

Buffett (1984): 'Investments in bonds' and 'Corporate dividend policies'

We saw Warren Buffett put forth his views on the concept of 'economic goodwill' and why he prefers companies that have a high amount of the same. Let us now see what the master has to offer in terms of investment wisdom in his 1984 letter to the shareholders.

While Buffett has devoted a lot of space in his 84' letter to discussing in detail, some of Berkshire's biggest investments in those times, but as usual, the letter is not short on some general investment related counsel either. In a rather simplistic way that only he can, the master gives his opinion on a couple of extremely important topics like 'investments in bonds' and 'corporate dividend policies'. On the former, he has to say the following:

"Our approach to bond investment - treating it as an unusual sort of "business" with special advantages and disadvantages - may strike you as a bit quirky. However, we believe that many staggering errors by investors could have been avoided if they had viewed bond investment with a businessman's perspective. For example, in 1946, 20-year AAA tax-exempt bonds traded at slightly below a 1% yield. In effect, the buyer of those bonds at that time bought a "business" that earned about 1% on "book value" (and that, moreover, could never earn a dime more than 1% on book), and paid 100 cents on the dollar for that abominable business."

Berkshire Hathaway in 1984 had purchased huge quantities of bonds in a troubled company, where the yields had gone up to as much as 16%. While usually not a huge fan of long term bond investments, the master chose to invest in the troubled company because he felt that the risk was rather limited and not many businesses during those times gave as much return on the invested capital. Thus, despite the rather limited upside potential, he went ahead with his bond investments. This is further made clear in his following comment:

"This ceiling on upside potential is an important minus. It should be realized, however, that the great majority of operating businesses have a limited upside potential also unless more capital is continuously invested in them. That is so because most businesses are unable to significantly improve their average returns on equity - even under inflationary conditions, though these were once thought to automatically raise returns."

Years and years of studying companies had led the master to conclude that there are very few companies on the face of this earth that are able to continuously earn above average returns without consuming too much of capital. Indeed, such brutal are the competitive forces that sooner or later and in this case, more sooner than later that returns for majority of the companies tend to gravitate towards their cost of capital. If we do a similar study on our Sensex, we will too come to the conclusion that there are not many companies that were a part of the index 15 years back and are still a part of the same index. Hence, while valuing companies, having a fair judgement of when the competitive position of the company, the one that enables it to consistently earn above average returns is likely to deteriorate. This will help you to avoid paying too much for the company's future growth.

After touching upon the topic of bond investments, the master then gives his take on dividends and this is what he has to say:

"The first point to understand is that all earnings are not created equal. In many businesses particularly those that have high asset/profit ratios - inflation causes some or all of the reported earnings to become ersatz. The ersatz portion - let's call these earnings "restricted" - cannot, if the business is to retain its economic position, be distributed as dividends. Were these earnings to be paid out, the business would lose ground in one or more of the following areas:

•  its ability to maintain its unit volume of sales, 
• its long-term competitive position, 
• its financial strength. 

No matter how conservative its payout ratio, a company that consistently distributes restricted earnings is destined for oblivion unless equity capital is otherwise infused."

While the master is definitely in favour of dividend payments, he is also aware of the fact that not all companies have similar capital needs in order to maintain their ongoing level of operations.

• Hence, in cases where businesses have high capital needs, a high payout ratio is likely to result in deterioration of the business or sooner or later will require additional capital to be infused. 
• On the other hand, companies that have limited capital needs should distribute the remaining earnings as dividends and not pursue investments which drive down the overall returns of the underlying business. 
• In a nutshell, capital should go where it can be put to earn maximum rate of return.

He then goes on to add how his own textile company, Berkshire Hathaway, had huge ongoing capital needs and hence was unable to pay dividends. He also further adds that had Berkshire Hathaway distributed all its earnings as dividends, the master would have left with no capital at all to be put into his other high return yielding investments. Thus, by not letting the operational performance of the company deteriorate by retaining earnings and not distributing it as dividends, he was able to avoid a situation in the future where he would have had too put in his own capital in the business.

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=8/16/2007&story=1

Buffett (1983): Great business fortunes built up during the inflationary years arose from ownership of operations that combined intangibles of lasting value with relatively minor requirements for tangible assets.

While corporate excesses and the concept of economic earnings, different from accounting earnings remained the focal points in the master's 1982 letter to shareholders, let us see what Warren Buffett has to offer in his 1983 letter.

In this another enlightening letter, Warren Buffett, probably for the first time discussed at length the concept of 'goodwill' and believed it to be of great importance in understanding businesses. Further, he blames the discrepancies between the 'actual intrinsic value' and the 'accounting book value' of Berkshire Hathaway to have arisen because of the concept of 'goodwill'. This is what he has to say on the subject.

"You can live a full and rewarding life without ever thinking about goodwill and its amortization. But students of investment and management should understand the nuances of the subject. My own thinking has changed drastically from 35 years ago when I was taught to favor tangible assets and to shun businesses whose value depended largely upon economic goodwill. This bias caused me to make many important business mistakes of omission, although relatively few of commission."

From the above quote, it is clear that the master's investment philosophy had undergone a sea change from when he first started investing. Further, with his company becoming too big, he could no longer afford to churn his portfolio as frequently as before. In other words, he wanted businesses where he could invest for the long haul and what better investments here than companies, where the economic goodwill is huge. The master had been kind enough in explaining this concept at length through an appendix laid out at the end of the letter. Since we feel that we couldn't have explained it better than the master himself, we have reproduced the relevant extracts below verbatim.

"True economic goodwill tends to rise in nominal value proportionally with inflation. To illustrate how this works, let's contrast a See's kind of business with a more mundane business. When we purchased See's in 1972, it will be recalled, it was earning about US$ 2 m on US$ 8 m of net tangible assets (book value). Let us assume that our hypothetical mundane business then had US$ 2 m of earnings also, but needed US$ 18 m in net tangible assets for normal operations. Earning only 11% on required tangible assets, that mundane business would possess little or no economic goodwill.

A business like that, therefore, might well have sold for the value of its net tangible assets, or for US$ 18 m. In contrast, we paid US$ 25 m for See's, even though it had no more in earnings and less than half as much in "honest-to-God" assets. Could less really have been more, as our purchase price implied? The answer is "yes" - even if both businesses were expected to have flat unit volume - as long as you anticipated, as we did in 1972, a world of continuous inflation.

To understand why, imagine the effect that a doubling of the price level would subsequently have on the two businesses. Both would need to double their nominal earnings to $4 million to keep themselves even with inflation. This would seem to be no great trick: just sell the same number of units at double earlier prices and, assuming profit margins remain unchanged, profits also must double.

But, crucially, to bring that about, both businesses probably would have to double their nominal investment in net tangible assets, since that is the kind of economic requirement that inflation usually imposes on businesses, both good and bad. A doubling of dollar sales means correspondingly more dollars must be employed immediately in receivables and inventories. Dollars employed in fixed assets will respond more slowly to inflation, but probably just as surely. And all of this inflation-required investment will produce no improvement in rate of return. The motivation for this investment is the survival of the business, not the prosperity of the owner.

Remember, however, that See's had net tangible assets of only $8 million. So it would only have had to commit an additional $8 million to finance the capital needs imposed by inflation. The mundane business, meanwhile, had a burden over twice as large - a need for $18 million of additional capital.

After the dust had settled, the mundane business, now earning $4 m annually, might still be worth the value of its tangible assets, or US $36 m. That means its owners would have gained only a dollar of nominal value for every new dollar invested. (This is the same dollar-for-dollar result they would have achieved if they had added money to a savings account.)

See's, however, also earning US$ 4 m, might be worth US$ 50 m if valued (as it logically would be) on the same basis as it was at the time of our purchase. So it would have gained US$ 25 m in nominal value while the owners were putting up only US$ 8 m in additional capital - over US$ 3 of nominal value gained for each US $ 1 invested.

Remember, even so, that the owners of the See's kind of business were forced by inflation to ante up US$ 8 m in additional capital just to stay even in real profits. Any unleveraged business that requires some net tangible assets to operate (and almost all do) is hurt by inflation. Businesses needing little in the way of tangible assets simply are hurt the least.

And that fact, of course, has been hard for many people to grasp. For years the traditional wisdom - long on tradition, short on wisdom - held that inflation protection was best provided by businesses laden with natural resources, plants and machinery, or other tangible assets. It doesn't work that way. Asset-heavy businesses generally earn low rates of return - rates that often barely provide enough capital to fund the inflationary needs of the existing business, with nothing left over for real growth, for distribution to owners, or for acquisition of new businesses.

In contrast, a disproportionate number of the great business fortunes built up during the inflationary years arose from ownership of operations that combined intangibles of lasting value with relatively minor requirements for tangible assets. In such cases earnings have bounded upward in nominal dollars, and these dollars have been largely available for the acquisition of additional businesses. This phenomenon has been particularly evident in the communications business. That business has required little in the way of tangible investment - yet its franchises have endured. During inflation, goodwill is the gift that keeps giving.

But that statement applies, naturally, only to true economic goodwill. Spurious accounting goodwill - and there is plenty of it around - is another matter. When an overexcited management purchases a business at a silly price, the same accounting niceties described earlier are observed. Because it can't go anywhere else, the silliness ends up in the goodwill account. Considering the lack of managerial discipline that created the account, under such circumstances it might better be labeled 'No-Will'. Whatever the term, the 40-year ritual typically is observed and the adrenalin so capitalized remains on the books as an 'asset' just as if the acquisition had been a sensible one."

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=8/9/2007&story=3

Buffett (1982): Always maintain strict price disciple; a too-high purchase price for the stock of an excellent company can undo the effects of a subsequent decade of favorable business developments.

While the world of stocks seems to be tearing apart on US subprime woes, what could be better than to indulge in some thought provoking lessons that can help you, as an investor, in staying calm in such situations of panic.  We saw Buffett (the master) talk about his policies for making acquisitions and how managers tend to overestimate themselves. Let us see what the investing genius had to offer in his 1982 letter to shareholders.

In what was probably a bull market, Berkshire Hathaway, the master's investment vehicle faced a peculiar problem. By that time, the company had acquired meaningful stakes in a lot of other companies but not meaningful enough for these companies' earnings to be consolidated with that of Berkshire Hathaway's. This is because accounting conventions then allowed only for dividends to be recorded in the earnings statement of the acquiring company if it acquired a stake of less than 20%. This obviously did not go down well with the master as earnings of Berkshire in the 'accounting sense' depended upon the percentage of earnings that were distributed by these companies as dividends.

"We prefer a concept of 'economic' earnings that includes all undistributed earnings, regardless of ownership percentage. In our view, the value to all owners of the retained earnings of a business enterprise is determined by the effectiveness with which those earnings are used - and not by the size of one's ownership percentage."

As for some examples in the Indian context, companies like M&M and Tata Chemicals, which hold small stakes in many companies should not be valued based on what dividends these companies pay to M&M and Tata Chemicals but instead one should arrive at the fair value of these companies independently and that value should be attributed on a pro-rata basis to all the shareholders, whether minority or majority.

While the master tackled accounting related issues in the first few portions of the 1982 letter, the next few portions were once again devoted to the excesses that take place in the market time and again. This is what he had to say on corporate acquisitions and price discipline.

"As we look at the major acquisitions that others made during 1982, our reaction is not envy, but relief that we were non-participants. For in many of these acquisitions, managerial intellect wilted in competition with managerial adrenaline. The thrill of the chase blinded the pursuers to the consequences of the catch. Pascal's observation seems apt: 'It has struck me that all men's misfortunes spring from the single cause that they are unable to stay quietly in one room.'"

He further goes on to state, "The market, like the Lord, helps those who help themselves. But, unlike the Lord, the market does not forgive those who know not what they do. For the investor, a too-high purchase price for the stock of an excellent company can undo the effects of a subsequent decade of favorable business developments."

The above comments once again bring to the fore a strict discipline that the master employs when it comes to paying an appropriate price. In fact, as much as his success is built on finding some very good picks like Coca Cola and Gillette, he has never had to sustain huge losses on any of his investment. The math is simple, if you lose say 50% on an investment, to make good these losses, one will have to unearth a stock that will have to rise at least 100% and that too in quick time. A very difficult task indeed! No wonder the master pays so much attention to maintaining a strict price discipline.

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=8/2/2007&story=5

Buffett (1981): Prefers buying 'easily-identifiable princes at toad-like prices'. These 'princes' are able to preserve margins and generate attractive return on capital year after year.

Warren Buffett wrote in his 1981 letter.

"Our acquisition decisions will be aimed at maximizing real economic benefits, not at maximizing either managerial domain or reported numbers for accounting purposes. (In the long run, managements stressing accounting appearance over economic substance usually achieve little of either.)

Regardless of the impact upon immediately reportable earnings, we would rather buy 10% of Wonderful Business T at X per share than 100% of T at 2X per share. Most corporate managers prefer just the reverse, and have no shortage of stated rationales for their behavior."

By making the above statements, Buffett is trying to highlight the difference between acquisition rationale for Berkshire Hathaway and most of the other corporate managers. While for the latter group of people, the motivation behind high premium acquisitions could range from reasons like penchant for adventure, misplaced compensations and a fair degree of overconfidence in their managerial skills, for Berkshire Hathaway, the maximisation of real economic benefits is the sole aim behind acquisitions.

Infact, the company is even happy to deploy large sums where there is a high probability of long-term economic benefits but an absence of ownership control. In other words, the company is comfortable both with total ownership of businesses and with marketable securities representing small ownership of businesses.

The paragraphs that follow bring to the fore some of the biggest qualities of the man and what makes him an extraordinary investor. Warren Buffett has a knack of knowing his circle of competence better than most and also a rather unmatched ability to learn from past mistakes. These could be gauged from the following comment:

• "We have tried occasionally to buy toads at bargain prices with results that have been chronicled in past reports. Clearly our kisses fell flat. 
• We have done well with a couple of princes - but they were princes when purchased. At least our kisses didn't turn them into toads. 
• And, finally, we have occasionally been quite successful in purchasing fractional interests in easily-identifiable princes at toad-like prices."

In the above paragraph, the master uses a childhood analogy and likens managers to princesses who kiss toads (ordinary businesses) to convert them into princes (attractive businesses). Put differently, there are certain managers who believe that their managerial kiss will do wonders for the profitability of a company and convert them from toads to princes. While the master has gone on to add that there are indeed certain managers that can achieve this feat, his own track record is nothing to write home about and hence, he would rather prefer buying 'easily-identifiable princes at toad-like prices'.

Although the opportunities for finding these types of companies are very rare, the master is willing to commit a large sum once such opportunities surface. According to him, such businesses must have two favored characteristics:

1. 
   
   An ability to increase prices rather easily (even when product demand is flat and capacity is not fully utilised) without fear of significant loss of either market share or unit volume, and
2. 
   
   An ability to accommodate large dollar volume increases in business (often produced more by inflation than by real growth) with only minor additional investment of capital.

Indeed, an ability to preserve margins and generate attractive return on capital year after year are the qualities that one should seek in a firm that one wants to invest in.

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=7/25/2007&story=8

Buffett (1980): The true value is determined by the intrinsic value of the company and not the dividends.

Warren Buffett in his 1980 letter to the shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway:

"The value to Berkshire Hathaway of retained earnings is not determined by whether we own 100%, 50%, 20% or 1% of the businesses in which they reside. Rather, the value of those retained earnings is determined by the use to which they are put and the subsequent level of earnings produced by that usage."

The maestro made the above statements because in those days he felt that the prevailing accounting convention/standards were not in sync with a value based investment approach (Infact, they still aren't). In the paragraphs preceding the one mentioned above, he painstakingly explains that while accounting convention requires that a partial ownership (ownership of say 20%) in a business be reflected on the owner's books by way of dividend payments, in reality, they are worth much more to the owner and their true value is determined by the 20% of the intrinsic value of the company and not by 20% of the dividends that are reflected on its books. In the Indian context, imagine someone valuing a company like say M&M -if it had say a 20% stake in Tech Mahindra- based on the 20% of dividends that the latter pays out to M&M. This will be a rather incorrect way of valuing M&M, which in effect should be valued taking into account 20% of the intrinsic value of Tech Mahindra and not the dividends.

"The competitive nature of corporate acquisition activity almost guarantees the payment of a full - frequently more than full price when a company buys the entire ownership of another enterprise. But the auction nature of security markets often allows finely run companies the opportunity to purchase portions of their own businesses at a price under 50% of that needed to acquire the same earning power through the negotiated acquisition of another enterprise."

Buffett, as most of us might know, is a strong advocate of buyback, especially at a time when the stock is trading significantly lower than its intrinsic value and the above paragraph is just a testimony to this principle of his. Indeed, when stock prices are low, what better way to utilize capital than to enhance ownership in the company by way of buy back. The master further goes on to add that one can buy a portion of a business at a much lower price, provided there is auction happening. In other words, when there is a panic in the market and everyone is offloading shares, the chances of getting an attractive price is much higher. On the other hand, when there is a competition between two or more companies for buying another enterprise, the competitive forces will more likely than not keep the acquisition price higher, in most cases, higher than even the intrinsic value of the company.

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=7/12/2007&story=2

Buffett (1978):"Turnarounds" seldom turn. Be in a good business purchased at a fair price than in a poor business purchased at a bargain price.

Warren Buffett in his 1978 letter to his shareholders places a great deal of importance on the quality of business and also the fact that he had to let go of many attractive investment opportunities just because the price was not right. In the following write up, let us see what the master has to offer in terms of investment wisdom in his 1979 letter:

"The inflation rate plus the percentage of capital that must be paid by the owner to transfer into his own pocket the annual earnings achieved by the business (i.e., ordinary income tax on dividends and capital gains tax on retained earnings) - can be thought of as an "investor's misery index". When this index exceeds the rate of return earned on equity by the business, the investor's purchasing power (real capital) shrinks even though he consumes nothing at all. We have no corporate solution to this problem; high inflation rates will not help us earn higher rates of return on equity."

The above paragraph clearly demonstrates that in order to improve one's purchasing power, one will have to earn after tax returns that are higher than the inflation rate at all times. Imagine a scenario where the inflation rate touches 9%, which means that a commodity that you purchased at Rs 100 per unit last year will now cost you Rs 109. Further, assume that you put Rs 100 last year in a business that earns 10% return on equity and the tax rate that currently prevails is 20%.

Thus, while you earned Rs 10 by virtue of the 10% return on equity, the tax rate ensured that only Rs 8 has flown to your pocket. Not a good situation since your purchasing power has diminished as while your returns were only 8% post tax, you will have to shell out Re 1 extra for buying the commodity as inflation has remained higher than the after tax returns that you have earned. Further, high inflation does not help the business too unless it has some inherent competitive advantages, which enables it to pass on the hike in inflation to the end consumers. Little wonder, investors lay such high emphasis on businesses that earn returns way above inflation so that the purchasing power is enhanced rather than diminished.

"Both our operating and investment experience cause us to conclude that "turnarounds" seldom turn, and that the same energies and talent are much better employed in a good business purchased at a fair price than in a poor business purchased at a bargain price."

In the above paragraph, the master once again extols the virtues of a good quality business and says that he would rather pay a reasonable price for a good quality business than pay a bargain price for a poor business. It would be worthwhile to add that in the early part of his investing career, the master himself was a stock picker who used to rely only on quantitative cheapness rather than qualitative cheapness. However, somewhere down the line, he started gravitating towards good quality businesses and out of this thinking came such quality investments as 'Coca Cola' and 'American Express'. These were the companies that 

• had virtually indestructible brands (a very good competitive advantage to have), 
• generated superior returns on their capital and 
• had ability to grow well into the future.

We prod you to find similar businesses in the Indian context, pick them up at a reasonable price and hold them for as long as you can. For if the master has made millions out of it, we don't see any reason as to why you can't.

http://www.equitymaster.com/detail.asp?date=7/5/2007&story=1