Warren Buffet-at a glance

Warren Buffett, a billionaire investor is the world's second-richest person, and perhaps America's most-revered capitalist. Buffett, 78, bought Berkshire, a struggling textile mill, in 1965,whose market value is approx $145 billion at present. Berkshire owns close to 80 companies. According to Berkshire's latest proxy filing, as of February 28, Buffett owned 26.9 per cent of Berkshire in aggregate and controlled 31.8 per cent of the company's voting power. Berkshire's stock price is high, trading in the last year for high five-figure and low six-figure amounts for a Class "A" share, because there are few shares outstanding. Buffett does not believe in stock splits and encourages long-term investing.

Buffett has nearly all his net worth, estimated in March at $40 billion by Forbes magazine, invested in Berkshire. He has said every Berkshire share he has will go to philanthropies after his death. In June 2006, he pledged 85 percent of his net worth to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and four family charities. He supports several charities and nonprofit offering programs for the poor, hungry and homeless.Buffett tells his shareholders that he thinks of them as "owner-partners" who will retain their part-ownership in Berkshire indefinitely.

Buffett draws a $100,000 annual salary to run Berkshire. He drinks five cans of Cherry Coke a day. Buffett has lived in the same house for a half-century, a 10-room, five-bedroom home on less than three-quarters of an acre in Omaha, near his office. The home was assessed at $727,600 last year. Buffett plays ukulele and is a bridge partner of Bill Gates, the Microsoft Corp chairman and Berkshire director.

Mr.Jhunjhunwala- the Pied Piper of Indian bourses

Rakesh Jhunjhunwala is a Chartered Accountant by qualification but an investor / trader by profession. He is one of the most famous and respected equity investors in India and manages his own portfolio as a partner in his asset management firm, Rare Enterprises. He is tagged by the media as 'India's Warren Buffet' .For a man who purchased Tata Tea for Rs 5000 when he was only fifteen years old, Rakesh Jhunjhunwala has a total networth of ap-proximately Rs 6000 crore along with his wife Rekha Jhunjhunwala.

Mr Jhunjhunwala is a canny stock picker for long term investment and reputed for his eye on macroeconomics. Much like Mr Warren Buffet, he buys into the business model of a company and for judging the longevity and growth potential, he gives top priority to 'competitive ability', 'scalability' and 'management quality' of the enterprise. According to Mr Jhunjhunwala, believing in the vision and the beliefs of the entrepreneur and validating the risks that may not be perceived by the entrepreneur are the key success factors for an investor. The typical traits to look for while identifying potential multi-baggers are - low institutional holding, under-researched and general pessimism about the stock.

Mr Jhunjhunwala has managed to identify numerous multi-baggers in the past decade, notable being Praj Industries, Crisil, Titan, Nagarjuna and PSUs like BEML and Bharat Electronics, among others. He says -A good time to sell a stock is not based on any 'price' targets, but when the 'earnings' expectations have peaked or the business model has peaked or the valuations appear ridiculously unreasonable.

Look out for “What is the Big Man bullish on?” at http://www.theequitydesk.com/rakesh_jhunjhunwala.asp

Are toxic assets really toxic?

Accountants record. They don’t analyze. There isn’t a right number and a wrong number. There are just useful numbers and useless numbers. In her book Dear Mr. Buffett, Janet Tavakoli quotes an email from Warren Buffett:

“I’ve looked at the prospectuses, and they are not easy to read. If you want to understand the deal you’d have to read around 750,000 pages of documents.”

A lot of people make the argument that these assets are not toxic at some prices. Theoretically, that’s true. If there’s value in an asset – at some deep discount to par – a high-risk asset can become a low-risk investment.These toxic assets are “meta-bets”. A low price is little help if there is inadequate cash flow or collateral built into the asset. A low price can’t fix an inherent flaw in an asset. If the cash flow generating potential of the asset is almost non-existent, the asset is essentially worthless.

A lot of these toxic assets were similarly structured. They were built to fail.A bad house is a good value at some price. A risky mortgage is a good value at some price. But “meta-bets” are trickier. They can suffer from the same sort of problem Buffett described with the very worst junk bonds – you can actually take a good asset, with good cash flows and then put so much debt on top of it that the only way you can fix the problem is by restructuring the debt. In such cases, a low price is no longer enough. The terms are the problem.

Twas the night before Christmas--from investopedia

Here's an interesting poem for the investors and people who are politically involved.I liked it and thought of sharing as it suits perfectly on this festive season..!!

'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house

Not a broker was churning, as they were home with a spouse;

The stocks had been researched and purchased with care,

In hopes that high returns soon would be there.

Investors were nestled all snug in their beds,

While visions of ten baggers danced in their heads.

The Investopedia Staff had done their week-long preach,

But they hadn't yet run out of things to teach.

When on CNBC there arose such a clatter,

Investors sprang from their chairs to see what was the matter.

Up to the TV they flew like a flash,

To hear the latest rumors and political trash.

The analyst picks - a normal part of the show;

But smart investors knew it was all so much blow.

When, what to their wondering eyes should appear,

But Warren Buffett, with something for investors to hear.

Click to continue reading further.... "Read more"...........

Wish you all a Merry Christmas-- A day of sharing,giving and rejoicing..!!!!!