Mental Model: The Shoichi Yokoi Fallacy Shoichi Yokoi was a Japanese tailor born in 1915. When he was 25 years old, his country sent him to war with the idea that he and his fellow soldiers were to fight to the death and avoid the shame of surrender. In 1944, the United States military seized…
The October panini study continues and I hit upon a huge winner today! It is like autumn distilled into a sandwich. It involves the same eight wheat bread I used yesterday in the blue cheese and plain turkey version, only the meat is a black pepper-edged smoked turkey, with slices of apple-smoked gouda cheese, mayonaise, cranberry chutney, arugula, and a drizzle of olive oil. It would be perfect if you have a cup of spiced cider or apple slices on the side.
Today was one of the most enjoyable days I’ve ever had. Sometimes, it is the really simple things in life that give it meaning. Everything else is a distraction. I’ll probably spend my evening reading.
Some of you had asked me to explain how I research stocks – specifically, where I look for investment ideas, which data sets I use, and how I find potential holdings for the portfolios I manage for my household and businesses.
The Japanese have a concept known as Arigata-meiwaku. The rough translation is “Unwelcome Kindness” or “Misplaced Kindness”. Arigata-meiwaku is used to describe a situation in which someone does something for you that you didn’t want them to do, and you tried to avoid it. Nevertheless, the person went through with the plan, determined to help you or…
I’ve done case studies in the past of slower growing, highly profitable businesses such as Clorox, Nestlé, Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble, and Colgate-Palmolive among them. We’ve also discussed case studies of some initial public offerings, such as an investment in Tiffany & Company twenty-five years ago. I thought it might be interesting to look at another…
Personally, my household owns shares of Nestlé SA, the Swiss-based chocolate, water, coffee, condensed milk, packaged food, and nutrition giant. I’ve never been able to get as much of it as I want due to valuation1, but whenever the stock is within striking distance of my conservatively estimated calculation of intrinsic value, I write a…
One of the additions I have been considering adding to the KRIP is The Clorox Company. However, it appears somewhat overvalued right now, offering a lower earnings yield and slower sales growth compared to the S&P 500 if you view the index itself as a single stock, which doesn’t bode well on a relative basis. That…
It is a fairly regular occurrence for me to get messages from individuals who advocate a portfolio consisting entirely, or almost entirely, of gold, held for the long-term. They usually follow the same pattern, are from the same demographic, and come through the contact form. This morning, there was a comment left about gold and I decided…
I had a hard time waking up this morning so I stayed behind in the room to drink some coffee, take a shower, and study a company I’ve been researching lately. I met everyone over at the Animal Kingdom theme park for our lunch reservations at Yak and Yeti. What has been on my mind…