Wesco Annual Meeting, May 7, 2008
Notes courtesy of Peter Boodell

Pabrai began by reiterating the notion that we as investors or entrepreneurs should look for opportunities with low risk but high uncertainty. If your risk is low, losses will be not break you. Since Wall Street hates uncertainty, it tends to misinterpret certain situations and companies, over-punishing them in the process. This gives patient, diligent value investors a potential advantage.

Ken Shubin Stein, of Spencer Capital, laid out his philosophy, which includes:
• Looking for asymmetric payoffs (limited downside, with much upside)
• Bottom-up fundamental analysis
• A “scientific” research process
• Belief that volatility is the key to successful long term investing

Zeke Ashton, of Centaur Capital, opened with some observations of some of the things that we, as value investors, think we should not do.

Vitaly Katsenelson- portfolio manager with Investment Management Associates and author of Active Value Investing, laid out his rationale for suggesting that markets are currently range-bound, and will continue to be so for the foreseeable future:

First up were Mark Sellers and Victor Fasciani from Sellers Capital LLC, whose Sellers Capital Fund has booked an impressive 36% annualized (net of fess) since inception. Seller’s runs a highly concentrated portfolio of companies with what they believe to be “wide moats”.

The afternoon session was chock full of practical value investment techniques, applicable to real situations.

THIS IS A LIVE BLOG OF THE QUESTION-AND-ANSWER SESSION BEING HELD BY WARREN BUFFETT AND CHARLIE MUNGER AT THE BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY ANNUAL SHAREHOLDERS MEETING IN OMAHA. MOST RECENT DISPATCHES WILL APPEAR AT THE TOP. ALL TIMES ARE CENTRAL.

THIS IS THE FIRST HALF OF THE BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY ANNUAL SHAREHOLDERS MEETING AT THE QWEST ARENA IN OMAHA, NEBRASKA ON SATURDAY, MAY 3, 2008 AS LIVE-BLOGGED ON WARREN BUFFETT WATCH. ALL TIMES ARE CENTRAL.

Catch the latest edition of the Festival of Stocks at Fat Pitch Financials. This blog digest of last week's blog posts links to several stock reviews and a whole lot more.

In the end, it comes down to Charlie’s most basic guiding principles, his fundamental philosophy of life: Preparation. Discipline. Patience. Decisiveness.

Warren Buffett, chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and one of the most successful investors of our time, is the 2007 recipient of the Berkeley Award for Distinguished Contributions to Financial Reporting.

Some 50 years ago, John Larry Kelly came up with a formula to determine how much you should bet on a gamble or investment to optimize your bankroll. Now known as the Kelly Formula, the equation determines the optimal percentage of your cash to bet on a favorable bet.