Street Capitalist: Event Driven Value Investments

Yesterday, Liz Claman at Fox Business had a really great interview/roundtable with Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger, and Bill Gates. It was awesome to see and hear Munger, since out of the three, he’s much less exposed in the media. They cover a wide range of topics, so it was nice to see the different perspectives.

If you missed the interview, they’ll be re-airing it this weekend. Saturday at 9PM EST and Sunday at 10PM EST.

Rather than embed the videos and slow the blog’s loading time, I’ve provided direct links to each one of them.

1. Buffett: Right time to Buy Stocks

2. Buffett: Had Best Year in a Recession

3. Buffett on Banks, Ratings Downgrade

4. Buffett and Gates on the Future of Capitalism

5. Buffett and Bill Gates on the Estate Tax

6. Charlie Munger on Citi Bonuses

7. Charlie Munger on BYD

8. On Succession, the Future

I don’t know if anyone’s ever asked Bill Gates about Google, but it was nice to get his thoughts on the company’s competitive advantages — or in this case it’s wide, shark filled moat. As he said in the interview, Microsoft is not deterred by the moat or the sharks and will continue to charge ahead.

Munger’s views on harnessing solar power were pretty optimistic. I like that Buffett and Munger were quick to point out that it isn’t a space they would invest in. Simply because it’s too difficult to pick winners. I remember reading about John D. Rockfeller’s Standard Oil, and how before it, the refinery space was fragmented and situated atop shaky financial foundations. Many, many, many refineries failed. That’s how I view the solar / renewable space right now. There’s still more experimenting that has to be done in terms of getting the actual business right.

I wonder why Berkshire didn’t just sell Moody’s. It seems like both Buffett and Munger believed that Moody’s actions were incorrect. In the past, when this has happened, the security was simply sold. But it cold be that the position in Moody’s was too big to unwind, or more likely — Buffett believes that the ratings agencies will have to continue their existence. It may be impractical to do away with the ratings agencies all together, so the demand for their services will continue to persist.

One of the things I always like to hear from Buffett and Munger are their book recommendations. The topic didn’t appear to come up during the annual meeting, but yesterday Claman asked them the question.

Buffett:
1. Poor Charlie’s Almanack
2. Personal History: Katharine Graham

Munger:
3. Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

Gates:
4. Showing Up For Life by Bill Gates Sr.

Unfortunately I haven’t read any of these, but I know that Bill Gates and his father were on Charlie Rose a few days ago talking about the book. Malcolm Gladwell always pens a good article for the New Yorker, but sometimes his concepts seem a bit fluffy. I’ve never read any of his books, but I think I may take a look at Outliers because of Munger’s recommendation.