Investing is the process of putting aside money today in exchange for more money in the future. This process involves risk but, when well managed, can help grow your wealth over time due to the power of compounding. This is the investing archive that includes articles published on JoshuaKennon.com. If you are looking for more great content, visit Joshua’s Investing for Beginners site at About.com, a division of The New York Times.
It’s been a long time since I’ve talked really about Nestlé SA other than mentioning it in passing last week. It was on my mind this morning, so I wanted to revisit it and talk about the business.
It is a common mistake for inexperienced investors to look at the realized or unrealized gains or losses reported by their broker, using it as a proxy for economic reality. Total return, particularly on an after-tax basis, can be wildly different. Here is one real-world illustration of how the difference may arise.
Long story short, I’ve been looking into Taipei for various reasons and, in the process, discovered that McDonald’s serves limited edition White and Black burgers there. Besides the fact it warms this American’s heart to know that I’m collecting New Taipei dollars (McDonald’s dividend day was last week and, with the exception of my two sisters, I have practically every member of my family holding shares somewhere, so the deposit is fresh on my mind as I saw it come in across the accounts), I would very much like to try these out of sheer curiosity.
The Executives at Edward Jones Should Feel Humiliated About Their Mutual Fund Practices Trust departments, trust companies, and money management firms provide a valuable service to the civilization. For centuries, men and women who had built up a nest egg could go down to their local branch, meet with the bank, and sign a contract…
Good morning, fellow Nestlé stockholders! It’s that magical day of the year when the annual dividend gets paid out to American owners (or, technically, those who have opted to buy the ADR). While those of you who hold your shares of Nestlé through Switzerland directly got your 2.15 CHF per share dividend on April 17th, those of you who opt for the Nestlé ADR traded here in the United States (which is likely most of you) get your dividends today!
One of the most famous value investors of the past 100 years was a man named Christopher H. Browne. His father started a small firm, Tweedy, Browne & Company, that was Benjamin Graham’s stockbroker. It was through Tweedy Browne that Warren Buffett bought his personal shares of Berkshire Hathaway, taking control of the textile mill he would…
One of the projects on my personal study plate is examining the various business models of multi-level marketing systems that rely, in part, on referral businesses paying tiered levels of commissions on sub-distributorships brought into the enterprise by existing dealers; companies like Amway, Mary Kay, and Herbalife.
Imagine that back in 2007, you had $3,000,000 to invest on behalf of a private family investment partnership you were running. You decide to split this into three different companies. One of these was AIG, the insurance conglomerate. AIG shares fell from a high of $1,459.00 each to $6.60. The Board of Directors had to do a 20-1 reverse stock split to keep the thing from trading for less than the value of bottle caps.
I’ve been browsing real estate all day for a project that needs my attention. I ended up wandering from community to community, and at one point, clicking on random states. I somehow came across what has to be the ugliest piece of property I’ve ever seen in my life but now I can’t look away. I’m fascinated.
I’m taking it as a given that practically everyone who reads this site has already gone through Warren Buffett’s stockholder letter, which Berkshire Hathaway released today. Personally, I love how, for only the third or fourth time in his career, Buffett essentially provides enough mathematical evidence to say to people, “You’re a moron for not buying Berkshire Hathaway at these prices, but I’ll never come right out and say it.” He did it in sort of a clever way, too, to encourage people to run the figures.
