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Posts Tagged ‘buffett’

Carlos Slim became the world second richest man ovetaking Warren Buffet.

Slim said shortly afterward that he wasn't concerned about his ranking or taking over the top spot, but he expressed differences with Buffett, the chairman of Berkshire Hathaway inc., and Gates, the chairman and co-founder of Microsoft Corp.

"It's not about having who knows how many bonds, to spend them on whatever one wants or live it up all year," said Slim, an engineer who wears modest suits and whose main indulgence appears to be expensive cigars. "I don't have apartments abroad. I don't have a house abroad."

Slim, who owns Mexico's dominant phone company and has holdings throughout Latin America, said his vision of a businessman's role in the world is at odds with that of Buffett, who announced last year he would donate $1.5 billion every year to the bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

"It's very interesting, because he leaves those who are running his affairs the responsibility of being very profit

What the hell? Greed of money?>?

1943: (13 years old)

* Buffett filed his first income tax return, deducting his bicycle as a work expense for $35.

1945: (15 years old)

* in his senior year of high school, Buffett and a friend spent $25 to purchase a used pinball machine, which they placed in a barber shop. Within months, they owned three machines in different locations.

1949: (19 years old)

* in 1949, he was initiated into Alpha Sigma Phi Fraternity while an undergraduate at the Wharton Business School at the University of Pennsylvania. His father and uncles were also Alpha Sigma Phi brothers from the chapter at Nebraska, where Warren eventually transferred.

1950: (20 years old)

* Buffett enrolled at Columbia Business School after learning that Benjamin Graham and David Dodd, two well-known securities analysts, taught there.

1951: (21 years old)

* Buffett discovered Graham was on the Board of GEICO insurance at the time. After taking a train to Washington, D.C. on a Saturday, Buffett knocked on the door of GEICO’s headquarters until a janitor allowed him in. there, he met Lorimer Davidson, the Vice President, who was to become a lasting influence on him and life-long friend.
* Buffett graduated from Columbia and wanted to work on Wall Street. Buffett offered to work for Graham for free but Graham refused. he purchased a Sinclair gas station as a side investment, but that venture did not work out as well as he had hoped. meanwhile, he worked as a stockbroker. during that time, Buffett also took a Dale Carnegie public speaking course. Using what he learned, he felt confident enough to teach a night class at the University of Nebraska, “Investment Principles.” the average age of the students he taught was more than twice his own.

1952: (22 years old)

* Buffett married Susan Thompson.

1954: (24 years old)

* Benjamin Graham offered Buffett a job at his partnership with a starting salary of $12,000 a year. here, he worked closely with Walter Schloss.
* Susan had her first child, Howard Graham Buffett.

1956: (25 years old)

* Benjamin Graham retired and folded up his partnership.
* Buffett’s personal savings are now over $140,000.
* Buffett returned home to Omaha and created Buffett Associates, Ltd., an investment partnership.

1957: (27 years old)

* Buffett had three partnerships operating the entire year.
* Buffett purchased a five-bedroom, stucco house on Farnam Street for $31,500.
* Susan was about to have her third child.

1958: (28 years old)

* Buffett had five partnerships operating the entire year.

1959: (29 years old)

* Buffett had six partnerships operating the entire year.
* Buffett was introduced to Charlie Munger.

1960: (30 years old)

* Buffett had seven partnerships operating the entire year.
* the partnerships were: Buffett Associates, Buffett Fund, Dacee, Emdee, Glenoff, Mo-Buff, and Underwood.
* Buffett asks one of his partners, a doctor, to find ten other doctors who will be willing to invest $10,000 each into his partnership. Eventually, eleven doctors agreed to invest.

1961: (31 years old)

* Buffett revealed that Sanborn Map Company accounted for 35% of the partnerships’ assets.
* Buffett explained that in 1958, Sanborn sold at $45 per share when the value of the Sanborn investment portfolio was $65 per share. this meant buyers valued Sanborn at “minus $20″ per share, and buyers were unwilling to pay more than 70 cents on the dollar for an investment portfolio with a map business thrown in for nothing.
* Buffett reveals that he earned a spot on the board of Sanborn.

1962: (32 years old)

* Buffett’s partnerships, in January 1962, had in excess of $7,178,500 of which over $1,025,000 belonged to Buffett.
* Buffett merges all partnerships into one partnership.
* Buffett discovered a textile manufacturing firm, Berkshire Hathaway. Buffett’s partnerships began purchasing shares at $7.60 per share.

1965: (35 years old)

* When Buffett’s partnerships began aggressively purchasing Berkshire they paid $14.86 per share while the company had working capital (current assets minus liabilities) of $19 per share, this did not include the value of fixed assets (factory and equipment).
* Buffett took control of Berkshire Hathaway at the board meeting and named a new President, Ken Chace, to run the company.

1966: (36 years old)

* Buffett closes the partnership to new money.
* Buffett wrote in his letter “unless it appears that circumstances have changed (under some conditions added capital would improve results) or unless new partners can bring some asset to the partnership other than simply capital, I intend to admit no additional partners to BPL.”
* in a second letter, Buffett announced his first investment in a private business — Hochschild, Kohn, and Co, a privately owned Baltimore department store.

1967: (37 years old)

* Berkshire paid out its first and only dividend of 10 cents.

1969: (39 years old)

* following his most successful year, Buffett liquidated the partnership and transferred their assets to his partners. Among the assets paid out were shares of Berkshire Hathaway.

1970: (40 years old)

* as chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, began writing his now-famous annual letters to shareholders.

1973: (43 years old)

* Berkshire began to acquire stock in the Washington Post Company. Buffett became close friends with Katharine Graham, who controlled the company and its flagship newspaper, and became a member of its board of directors.

1979: (49 years old)

* Berkshire began to acquire stock in ABC. With the stock trading at $290 per share, Buffett’s net worth neared $140 million. However, he lived solely on his salary of $50,000 per year.
* Berkshire began the year trading at $775 per share, and ended at $1,310. Buffett’s net worth reached $620 million, placing him on the Forbes 400 for the first time.

1988: (58 years old)

* Buffett began buying stock in Coca-Cola Company, eventually purchasing up to 7 percent of the company for $1.02 billion. it would turn out to be one of Berkshire’s most lucrative investments, and one which he still holds.

1999: (69 years old)

* Buffett is named the top money manager of the 20th century in a survey by the Carson Group, ahead of Peter Lynch and John Templeton.

2002: (72 years old)

* Buffett entered in $11 billion worth of forward contracts to deliver US dollars against other currencies. By April 2006, his total gain on these contracts was over $2 billion.

2004: (73 years old)

* His wife, Susan, dies.

2006: (75 years old)

* Buffett announced in June that he would give away more than 80%, or about $99 billion, of his $491 billion fortune to five foundations in annual gifts of stock, starting in July 2006. the largest contribution will go to the bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

2007: (76 Years old)

* in a letter to shareholders, Buffett announced that he was looking for a younger successor or perhaps successors to run his investment business. Buffett had previously selected Lou Simpson, who runs investments at Geico, to fill that role. However, Simpson is only six years younger than Buffett.

2008: (77 Years old)

* Buffett becomes the richest man in the world according to Forbes.

[..MAVERICK..]: Warren Edward Buffett’s Time Line – World’s Richest Man

Fuld and Buffett spoke on Friday, March 28, 2008. They discussed Buffett investing at least $2 billion in Lehman. two items immediately concerned Buffet during his conversation with Fuld. first, Buffett wanted Lehman executives to buy under the same terms as Buffett. Fuld explained to the Examiner that he was reluctant to require a significant buy‐in from Lehman executives, because they already received much of their compensation in stock. However, Buffett took it as a negativethat Fuld suggested that Lehman executives were not willing to participate in a significant way. second, Buffett did not like that Fuld complained about short sellers. Buffett thought that blaming short sellers was indicative of a failure to admit ones own problems.

Following his conversation with Buffett, Fuld asked Paulson to call Buffett, which Paulson reluctantly did. Buffett told the Examiner that during that call, Paulson signaled that he would like Buffett to invest in Lehman, but Paulson did not load the dice. Buffett spent the rest of Friday, March 28, 2008, reviewing Lehmans 10‐K and noting problems with some of Lehmans assets. Buffetts concerns centered around Lehmans real estate and high yield investments, lending‐related commitmentsderivatives and their related credit‐market risk, Level III assets and Lehmans securitization activity. on Saturday, March 29, 2008, Buffett learned of a $100 million problem in Japan that Fuld had not mentioned during their discussions, and Buffett was concerned that Fuld had not been forthcoming about the issue. The problems Buffett saw in the 10‐K along with Fulds failure to alert Buffett to the issue in Japan cemented Buffetts decision not to invest in Lehman.

At some point in their conversations, Fuld and Buffett also discovered that there had been a miscommunication about the conversion price. Buffett was interested only in convertible preferred shares. Buffett told Fuld that he was willing to agree to a $40 conversion price per share, while Fuld thought Buffett was offering to buy in at up‐ 40, or 40% above the current market price, which would have been about $56 per share. on Friday, March 28, 2008, Lehmans stock closed at $37.87. Fuld spoke to Lehmans Executive Committee and several Board members about his conversations with Buffett. Lehman recognized that an investment by Buffett would provide a stamp of approval. However, Lehman already had better offers for its April capital raise, and Lehman did not think it could give a better deal to Buffett at the same time it gave a less attractive deal to others. on Monday, March 31, 2008, before Buffett could tell Fuld that he was not interested, Fuld called Buffett to say that Lehman could not accept his terms.

Last‐Ditch Effort with Buffett

[Hugh Skip E. McGee, III, the head of Lehmans Investment Banking Division] contacted [President David L. Sokol, president ofBerkshire Hathaway's MidAmerican Energy] again in late August or early September 2008 and outlined Lehmans Gameplan for survival, specifically SpinCo. During a subsequent telephone call with Sokol, McGee explained the good bank/bad bank scenario and stated that Lehman would need an investor. Sokol believed the e‐mail and call were intended to induce Sokol to pass that information on to Buffett, so Sokol briefed Buffett on SpinCo. Buffett thought the idea would not solve Lehmans problems.

Sometime during the week prior to Lehmans bankruptcy, McGee again reached out to Sokol with what both Sokol and McGee described to the Examiner as a Hail Mary pass. McGee asked, Do you have any ideas to save us? Sokol, who was bear hunting in Alaska at the time, told McGee that he did not.

'Hail Mary' to Warren Buffett: Untold Details of Lehman's Fall