myinvestingnotes.blogspot.my (Bullbear Buffett Stock Investing Notes)

Keep INVESTING Simple and Safe (KISS) ****Investment Philosophy, Strategy and various Valuation Methods**** The same forces that bring risk into investing in the stock market also make possible the large gains many investors enjoy. It’s true that the fluctuations in the market make for losses as well as gains but if you have a proven strategy and stick with it over the long term you will be a winner!****Warren Buffett: Rule No. 1 - Never lose money. Rule No. 2 - Never forget Rule No. 1.

Saturday 14 April 2012

Guest Lecture by David Swensen: Investment Management (Yale lecture)

Uploaded by YaleCourses on Nov 19, 2008

Financial Markets (ECON 252)

David Swensen, Yale's Chief Investment Officer and manager of the University's endowment, discusses the tactics and tools that Yale and other endowments use to create long-term, positive investment returns. He emphasizes the importance of asset allocation and diversification and the limited effects of market timing and security selection. Also, the extraordinary returns of hedge funds, one of the more recent phenomena of portfolio management, should be looked at closely, with an eye for survivorship and back-fill biases.

00:00 - Chapter 1. Introduction: Changing Institutional Portfolio Management
03:59 - Chapter 2. Asset Allocation: The Power of Diversification
16:44 - Chapter 3. Balancing the Equity Bias into Sensible Diversification
20:48 - Chapter 4. The Emotional Pitfalls of Market Timing
32:58 - Chapter 5. Survivorship and Backfill Biases in Security Selection
43:17 - Chapter 6. Finding Value Investing Opportunities as an Active Manager
49:02 - Chapter 7. Yale's Portfolio and Results
54:48 - Chapter 8. Questions on New Investments, Remaining Bullish, and Time Horizons

Complete course materials are available at the Open Yale Courses website:http://open.yale.edu/courses

This course was recorded in Spring 2008.

Friday 13 April 2012

George Soros Lecture Series: Financial Markets

Uploaded by opensocietyinstitute on Oct 11, 2010

The Lecture Series

Open Society Institute chairman and founder George Soros shares his latest thinking on economics and politics in a five-part lecture series recorded at Central European University, October 26-30, 2009. The lectures are the culmination of a lifetime of practical and philosophical reflection.

Soros discusses his general theory of reflexivity and its application to financial markets, providing insights into the recent financial crisis. The third and fourth lectures examine the concept of open society, which has guided Soros's global philanthropy, as well as the potential for conflict between capitalism and open society. The closing lecture focuses on the way ahead, examining the increasingly important economic and political role that China will play in the future.

Learn More and watch the Lecture Series:http://www.soros.org/resources/multimedia/sorosceu_20091112

Behavioral Finance: The Role of Psychology

Uploaded by YaleCourses on Nov 19, 2008

Financial Markets (ECON 252)

Behavioral Finance is a relatively recent revolution in finance that applies insights from all of the social sciences to finance. New decision-making models incorporate psychology and sociology, among other disciplines, to explain economic and financial phenomenon, such as erratic stock price variations. Psychological patterns such as overconfidence and perceived kinks in the value function seem to impact financial decision-making, but are not included in classical theories such as the Expected Utility Theory. Kahneman and Tversky's Prospect Theory addresses such issues and sheds light on irrational deviations from traditional decision-making models.

00:00 - Chapter 1. What Is Behavioral Finance?
09:01 - Chapter 2. Market Volatility: Random, or Socially Influenced? A Present Value Analysis
19:58 - Chapter 3. Overconfidence: Its Ubiquity and Impact on Financial Markets
38:29 - Chapter 4. The Kahneman and Tversky Prospect Theory or, How People Make Choices
58:50 - Chapter 5. The Regret Theory and Fashion as a Measure of the Market

Complete course materials are available at the Open Yale Courses website:http://open.yale.edu/courses

This course was recorded in Spring 2008.

Warren Buffett - The World's Greatest Money Maker

"How to Choose Your Strategy" Presented by Nicole Wachs of TradeKing

Warren Buffett - What is Franchise Value?

For the latest Warren Buffett, go to http://WarrenBuffettNews.com -

There is much less difference between buying a whole company and buying shares of a company. One difference is that you can change the managers much easier. But if you have to change the managers, then it probably isn't a business that you want to be in anyway. Another advantage to owning 100% is that you can decide how to allocate the excess capital. You can't do that if you only own 5%. At Berkshire, the game is to try to figure out where to put capital.

Most managers like to grow. They prefer to grow intelligently, but if they can't do that they will try other methods. In the banking industry, they measure themselves by size of their balance sheets, not by profits. Banks don't necessarily have economies of scale beyond a certain point. It is much better to have a large competitive advantage in a smaller market. There isn't much advantage to shareholders for the banks that they own to expand.

Gillette makes about 2/3 of its money outside of the United States. Companies that can do well in international markets are great. Depending on the different countries they are in, there are many factors that can be better or worse because of tax rates or public opinion. A good business can be found anywhere, but it is easier in the United States if you understand the economy and the business landscape a bit better.

Franchise value is what a brand has if a customer will leave a store if they don't carry the brand. They would rather walk across the street and pay a nickle more than to buy another brand. That is franchise value, and it is very valuable. It is wholly in the customer's mind. If you've got the right product in that way, you may be paying for taste or something else. The second thing to think about is how durable that franchise value is.

Grantham on China and value investing

Value Investing Tips - How to Assess a Company's Management

Value Investing Academy - Real People, Real Results

Mary Buffett Reccommends Value Investing Academy

Invest from Business Perspective and Importance of Ability to Raise Prices

The Power of Consumer Monopoly

Warren's Criterias for Choosing Winning Business

Key Differences Between Warren Buffett and others in Wall Street

Warren Buffett On Value Investing- How to allocate capital.

Trading Losses - Why It's So Hard To Get Back To Breakeven

The Importance of Exit Strategy

*Make BIG Money Trading -WATCH NOW!

- Ultimate Trading Cycles - by Greg Secker

The Hidden Secret of Technical Analysis

Candlestick Patterns for Trading

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My 18 points guide to Successfully compounding your money in Stocks

Be a good stock picker.
Think as a business owner.
Always look at value rather than the price. Do the homework.
Buy and hold is alright for selected stocks.
Compounding is your friend, get this to work its magic.
Mr. Market is there to be taken advantage of. Do not be the sucker instead. BFS;STS.
Always buy a lot when the price is low.
Never buy when the stock is overpriced.
It is alright to buy when the selected stock is at a fair price.
Phasing in or dollar cost averaging is safe for such stocks during a downtrend, unless the price is still obviously too high.
Do not time the market for such or any stocks.
By keeping to the above strategy, the returns will be delivered through the growth of the company's business.
So, when do you sell the stock? Almost never, as long as the fundamentals remain sound and the future prospects intact.
The downside risk is protected through only buying when the price is low or fairly priced.
Tactical dynamic asset allocation or rebalancing based on valuation can be employed but this sounds easier than is practical, except in extreme market situations.
Sell urgently when the company business fundamental has deteriorated irreversibly.
You may also wish to sell should the growth of the company has obviously slowed and you can reinvest into another company with greater growth potential of similar quality. However, unlike point 16, you can do so leisurely.
In conclusion, a critical key to successful investing is in your stock picking ability.

http://myinvestingnotes.blogspot.com/2012/07/my-18-points-guide-to-successfully.html

11 Lessons From Peter Lynch

Peter Lynch taught me:

1. Behind every stock is a company. Find out what it’s doing.
2. Never invest in any idea you can’t illustrate with a crayon.
3. Over the short term, there may be no correlation between the success of a company’s operations and the success of its stock. Over the long term, there’s a 100% correlation.
4. Buying stocks without studying the companies is the same as playing poker – and never looking at your cards.
5. Time is on your side when you own shares of superior companies.
6. Owning stock is like having children. Don’t get involved with more than you can handle.
7. When the insiders are buying, it’s a good sign.
8. Unless you’re a short seller, it never pays to be pessimistic.
9. A stock market decline is as predictable as a January blizzard in Colorado. If you’re prepared, it can’t hurt you.
10. Everyone has the brainpower to make money in stocks. Not everyone has the stomach.
11. Nobody can predict interest rates, the future direction of the economy, or the stock market. Dismiss all such forecasts and concentrate on what’s actually happening to the companies in which you’ve invested.

Lynch’s advice had a profound effect on my stock market approach. He taught me that investment success isn’t the result of developing the right macro-economic view or deciding when to jump in or out of the market. Success is about researching companies to identify those that are likely to report positive surprises.

Capital Expenditure

A great company with a Durable Competitive Advantage will have a ratio of Capital Expenditures to Net Income of less than 25%. Less is better.

Capital Expenditures are expenses on:
- fixed assets such as equipment, property, or industrial buildings
- fixing problems with an asset
- preparing an asset to be used in business
- restoring property
- starting new businesses

A good company will have a ratio of Capital Expenditures to Net Income of less than 50%.

A great company with a Durable Competitive Advantage will have a ratio of less than 25%.

Less is better.

Benjamin Graham's 113 Wise Words

The true investor scarcely ever is forced to sell his shares, and at all times he is free to disregard the current price quotation. He need pay attention to it and act upon it only to the extent that it suits his book, and no more. Thus the investor who permits himself to be stampeded or unduly worried by unjustified market declines in his holdings is perversely transforming his basic advantage into a basic disadvantage. That man would be better off if his stocks had no market quotation at all, for he would then be spared the mental anguish caused him by other persons' mistakes of judgement."

Philip Fisher's Wise Words

"The refusal to sell at a loss, while completely natural and normal, is probably one of the most dangerous in which we can indulge ourselves in the entire investment process.

More money has probably been lost by investors holding a stock they really did not want until they could 'at least come out even' than from any other single reason. If to these actual losses are added the profits that might have been made through the proper reinvestment of these funds if such reinvestment had been made when the mistake was first realized, the cost of self-indulgence becomes truly tremendous."

(Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits)

The Ultimate Hold-versus-Sell Test

Here is the overriding primary test, followed by observations on why it is so critically important:

Knowing all that you now know and expect about the company and its stock (not what you originally believed or hoped at time of purchase), and assuming that you had available capital, and assuming that it would not cause a portfolio imbalance to do so, would you buy this stock today, at today's price?

No equivocation. Yes or no?

Answers such as maybe or probably are not acceptable since they are ways of dodging the issue. No investor probably buys a stock; they either place an order or do not.

Here is the implication of your answer to that critical test: if you did not answer with a clear affirmative, you should sell; only if you said a strong yes, are you justified to hold.

Some thoughts on Analysing Stocks (KISS)

Ideally a stock you plan to purchase should have all of the following charateristics:

• A rising trend of earnings dividends and book value per share.
• A balance sheet with less debt than other companies in its particular industry.
• A P/E ratio no higher than average.
• A dividend yield that suits your particular needs.
• A below-average dividend pay-out ratio.
• A history of earnings and dividends not pockmarked by erratic ups and downs.
• Companies whose ROE is 15 or better.
• A ratio of price to cash flow (P/CF) that is not too high when compared to other stocks in the same industry.

Margin of Safety Concept: Stocks should be bought like groceries, not like perfume

The high CAGR in the early years of the investing period, due to buying at a discount, tended to decline and approach that of the intrinsic EPS GR of the companies over a longer investment time-frame.

Chapter 20 - “Margin of Safety” as the Central Concept of Investment

A single quote by Graham on page 516 struck me:

Observation over many years has taught us that the chief losses to investors come from the purchase of low-quality securities at times of favorable business conditions.

Basically, Graham is saying that most stock investors lose money because they invest in companies that seem good at a particular point in time, but are lacking the fundamentals of a long-lasting stable company.

This seems obvious on the surface, but it’s actually a great argument for thinking more carefully about your individual stock investments. If most of your losses come from buying companies that seem healthy but really aren’t, isn’t that a profound argument for carefully studying any company you might invest in?