On Turnarounds

We have written in past reports about the disappointments that usually result from purchase and operation of "turnaround" businesses. Literally hundreds of turnaround possibilities in dozens of industries have been described to us over the years and, either as participants or as observers, we have tracked performance against expectations. Our conclusion is that, with few exceptions, when a management with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for poor fundamental economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.

Chrysler, Sears, Readers Digest....larger economic and competitive issues dominate management skill. Humans, they get so deluded about what they can control.

Berkshire Hathaway, Chairman's Letter - 1979

Overall, we opt for Polonius (slightly restated): "Neither a short-term borrower nor a long-term lender be."

Fairly accurate statement I might say.

Coincidences

I think life is random. While events can be scheduled/predicted in the short term, long term control is largely illusional. Also, specific sets of highly correlated events which can take up a lot of your time and energy, and contribute a lot to your happiness are driven by coincidences. I know what you are thinking. Exactly.

3 weeks back we were having a discussion at work about disguised ethnicities and I brought up that Freddie Mercury was actually Farrokh Bulsara, a Parsi from Mumbai (George Michael is Greek btw). Then a week later I was at a coffee shop which for some reason played 2 hours of Queen straight. Then, I left that coffee shop and went to get a sandwich at Jimmy Johns, which for some reason was playing Queen as well. The right song at the right time - you have no idea what that can do to you. I have been obsessively listening to Queen songs since, and by default the opening riff from "Under Pressure" (copied by Vanilla Ice to make Ice Ice Baby) makes its rounds in my head.

A lovely dream

Silently crossing the ocean of death,
You come as a lovely dream,
My tears call for you hour by hour;
Wandering everywhere, everywhere repulsed,
I was sealed in this dark dream of this life;
Now you have come as a lovely dream.

Now I see darkness pour down like dark hair,
In its folds gleam the jewels of the evening stars,
Now the sky fills with the pain of song,
And trembles with the hum of crickets underfoot.
You worship with incense from the trembling forest -
Now you have come as a lovely dream.

from "The Housewarming", Rabindranath Tagore

I wish I could read it in the original Bengali, but one does what one can.

Warren Buffet Shareholder's Letter from 1978

"We make no attempt to predict how security markets will behave; successfully forecasting short term stock price movements is something we think neither we nor anyone else can do.  In the longer run, however, we feel that many of our major equity holdings are going to be worth considerably more money than we paid, and that investment gains will add significantly to the operating returns of the insurance group."

Turned out to be a fairly accurate forward looking statement.

Names Again

Names of the sandwiches at work :

Ice Man
Spider Man
He Man
Super Man

"Super Man" was my veggie sandwich, and it tasted like a wet sock. I just have to re-iterate my previous statement about names being indicate of content. Alternate names:

Rubber Sole
Wooden Sole
Wet Rubber Sole
Wet Sock

Now thats more like it. Creative and informative.