The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 10 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Davis: Credit ratings reliably predict auto insurance accident risk
“Somebody's credit rating is a great predictor of whether they'll crash their car. Well, because they're responsible and they tend not to cheat.”
Davis: Baupost cash allocations have historically averaged 15% to 40%
“The cash, if I remember rightly at Baupost is sort of average between, you know, 15 and 40% for sort of the whole time. I don't think there's ever been a time when it's gone, maybe below 15.”
Davis: Berkshire's charity program made its shares difficult to borrow and short
“Berkshire for many, many years had a charity program where if you owned a share of Berkshire each year, you were given a dollar amount per share that you could assign to any charity of your choice... But In order to be able to do that, you had to own the share…”
Davis details Warren Buffett's five root causes of money manager underperformance
“In our research department, we have a letter that Warren wrote in 1965, I think that, or 66 that lists the reason that he believes most money managers, institutional managers tend to underperform.
And we framed that letter and put it on the wall in the researc…”
Davis: Athletic Brewing is probably worth $1B to $2B
“I would say there is good no alcohol beer the athletic club. I mean, that, by the way, that's a company that probably has got a, probably worth over a billion dollars today or two billion dollars, a couple of guys in Connecticut.”
Davis: Father Held 30% Cash in 1975, Lagging the Recovery
“My father was 30% cash in 1975. And so the fund dramatically lagged in one of the best market years of a decades. 75 and market went up 30% or something like that. And you know, the fund probably went up 20 because it was a third in cash.”
Davis: Value Managers Gained 9% to 25% During 2000 Market Drop
“In 2000, the market went down nine percent, if I remember right, maybe nine, nine and a half. And it wasn't like, managers like us who had stuck to sort of a discipline, you know, went down two and the market went down nine. It's like we were up nine or 10, yo…”
Davis: Amazon succeeded without creating super-voting share structures
“Amazon never needed that. They didn't create super voting shares where you could own a tiny economic interest.”
Davis: Grandfather grew $100K into $2B and gave 100% to charity
“My grandfather built this fortune. I mean, it was amazing. He started borrowed a 100,000 dollars. When he died, it was eight hundred million. It was held in a trust as long as my grandmother, his wife was alive. And when she died, it was two billion. But a hun…”
Davis: Graham family sold The Washington Post over 7 months without leaks
“The Washington Post evolved. I mean, it was one of the great, great examples in all of corporate history of fiduciary leadership and servant leadership of the Graham family to make the decision to sell the newspaper that it needed to be in safer and better han…”