Sunday, 11 October 2015

Weekend reading

Thank you to all of you who read, shared and commented on the Rockwood Holdings/Outsiders case study. The response has been overwhelming and I'm glad that this great story of capital allocation and sensible management is out in the public domain.

Quotes From The Symposium Of Warren Buffett And Charlie Munger (Value Walk)

“The nature of acquisitions is that they get to the board at a point where if you turn them down you are rejecting the chief executive, you are embarrassing him in front of his troops, you’re doing all kinds of things. So, it just doesn’t happen.”

Reminds me of a quote from the 2014 Berkshire AGM on how companies select compensation committee members: "Board delegates decision to a compensation committee and they don’t look for Dobermans, they want cocker spaniels with their tails wagging. I voted for compensation plans in various places that were far from perfect"

This is fascinating and shows that forecasting is not an easy subject: What people in 1900 thought the year 2000 would look like (WaPo)

I’m game for (what appears to be) an underwater croquet match if anyone is interested (second to last picture). 

Related: Can You See the Future? Probably Better Than Professional Forecasters from Jason Zweig (WSJ)

Great podcast from the London School of Economics on advertising: One plus One Equals Three: a masterclass in creative thinking (LSE)

"Every year in the UK, GBP18.3bn is spent on all forms of advertising and marketing of which 4% is remembered positively, 7% is remembered negatively and 89% isn't noticed or remembered. [...] 17 billion quid is pissed away by so called experts every year." Reminds me of the investment business.

Adam Grant's (author of Give and Take) monthly newsletter (Granted)

Great interview with Joe Koster (of Boyles Asset Management and Value Investing World) on Value Walk (Part 1 and Part 2)

Tom Russo: Global Value Investing (Talks at Google)