Wednesday insights

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

How boomers are stealing from babies (Link)
Recently, the C.D. Howe Institute used an economic technique called lifetime generational accounting to assess the fairness of Canada's fiscal policies. Every generation pays taxes and gets government provided benefits in return. The cost of broadly shared programs like defense or the bureaucracy, is generally split equally across all generations. But the size and scope of individually focused benefits like health care, education, welfare and public pensions, along with the taxes meant to pay for them can vary greatly over time. These variations will depend on politics and demographics.

In this study all figures are adjusted to birth-year values.

Baby boomers can expect to pay, on a net basis, around $200,000 per person over their lifetimes for all the health care, education and other social services they receive. That might seem like a lot, but it’s nothing compared to the current generation of newborns who are expected to pay $736,000 more in taxes than they will receive in individual benefits. The luckiest Canadians are those born in the 1970s. On average, these kids of boomer parents face a net tax burden of just $27,000 each for their lifetime of social benefits.

This huge discrepancy between newborns and older generations is the result of an aging population, which reduces the proportion of working folk who are available to pay taxes, while increasing the amount of health care and elderly benefits owing, combined with the accumulation of past government debt.

What if you retire at a stock market peak? (Link)
Sam’s entire family has terrible luck when it comes to the timing of their retirement.

Sam’s great-grandparents retired at the end of 1928. Over the ensuing three years or so the stock market would drop close to 90%. Sam’s grandparents didn’t fare much better, retiring at the tail end of 1972. This was right before a brutal bear market which would see stocks cut in half from 1973 to 1974. Inflation also ran at a rate of 121% over the first 9 years of their retirement. Sam’s parents retired at the end of 1999, feeling pretty good at the top of the tech bubble. In the first decade of their retirement, they would witness the U.S. stock market go down by 50% on two separate occasions.

With balanced portfolios let see how Sam’s family actually ended up with an annual 4% withdrawal rate and a starting value of $1,000,000.

Even retiring right around the peak of the market, their portfolios actually ended up in a good position in each case. In each case, the ending market value for the portfolio is higher than the original amount even after accounting for annual withdrawals.

J.P. Morgan 2019 retirement guide (Link)
Here's one chart from this year's guide showing how a $10,000 initial investment fared over the past 20 years depending on whether the investor stayed invested or instead, missed some of the market's best days. As you can see you don't have to miss many good days to feel the impact. Your return quickly goes from positive to negative by missing only the 20 best days.

Independent brands and bookstores

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

Private label sales dominate national brands (Link)
In 2018, the mass retail channel topped supermarkets for the first time in annual private label dollar sales volume in food and nonfood consumables. Data revealed that private label dollar volume in the mass retail channel surged 41% over the last five years, compared to a gain of only 7.4% for national brands.

Costco’s, Kirkland Signature brand pulled in $39 billion in 2018 which dwarfed those of Kraft-Heinz, which generated $26 billion last year.

Why independent bookstores are thriving in spite of Amazon (Link)
Before Amazon even existed, many mom-and-pop independent bookstores were supposed to disappear by the entrance of Barnes & Noble. But today, it’s Barnes & Noble that is trying to survive the Amazon retail apocalypse, while independent bookstores are doing just fine. The number of independent bookstores in the US is up 31% since 2009 and book sales at independent bookstores grew 7.5% annually over the past five years.

Books still make up about 80% of sales for independent bookstores sales so why are they doing so well? Many of these independents attract a loyal base of customers who seek a social hub outside of the online world. They offer anything from ukulele lessons to speed-dating events. These customers come to hang out but also buy books too.

Weekend catch-up

Your weekend edge - catch up with this week's readings:

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

Investment decision making - Ten advantages everyday investors have over professionals (Link)
If we think about some of the main challenges encountered by investors around issues such as time horizons, over-trading, overconfidence, misaligned incentives and benchmark obsession, these problems are often exacerbated when investing in a professional context. Everyday investors are not immune from these behavioural issues that lead to poor investment decision making but it is important to acknowledge that the investment industry has certain structural features that serve to inflame a particular set of behavioural shortcomings. Many of these structural shortcomings are much harder to avoid when investing in a professional context versus the everyday investor. Here are a few of the advantages everyday investor have.
- There is no need to check your portfolio on a daily basis
- You can make decisions consistent with your own time horizon
- Your incentives are perfectly aligned
- There is no need to chase performance
- There is no requirement to be constrained by arbitrary benchmarks
- You don’t need to worry about what other people are doing

Notable quotes from Amazon's Annual Letter (Link)
From very early on in Amazon’s life, we knew we wanted to create a culture of builders – people who are curious, explorers. They like to invent. Even when they’re experts, they are “fresh” with a beginner’s mind. They see the way we do things as just the way we do things now. A builder’s mentality helps us approach big, hard-to-solve opportunities with a humble conviction that success can come through iteration: invent, launch, reinvent, relaunch, start over, rinse, repeat, again and again. They know the path to success is anything but straight. 

It’s critical to ask customers what they want, listen carefully to their answers, and figure out a plan to provide it thoughtfully and quickly (speed matters in business!). No business could thrive without that kind of customer obsession. But it’s also not enough. The biggest needle movers will be things that customers don’t know to ask for. We must invent on their behalf. We have to tap into our own inner imagination about what’s possible.

As a company grows, everything needs to scale, including the size of your failed experiments. If the size of your failures isn’t growing, you’re not going to be inventing at a size that can actually move the needle. Amazon will be experimenting at the right scale for a company of our size if we occasionally have multibillion-dollar failures. Of course, we won’t undertake such experiments cavalierly. We will work hard to make them good bets, but not all good bets will ultimately pay out. This kind of large-scale risk taking is part of the service we as a large company can provide to our customers and to society. The good news for shareowners is that a single big winning bet can more than cover the cost of many losers.

Debt-laden Canadians (Link)
Household debt in Canada has reached levels that could be qualified as excessive. Canadians owe C$2.16 trillion which as a share of gross domestic product, is the highest debt load in the G7.

Canada's personal savings rate is near its lowest in recorded history

The Canadian mutual fund industry experienced its weakest RRSP season in 10 Years
Over the first three months of 2019, the Canadian mutual fund industry captured net sales of $5.9 billion, down significantly from net sales of $17.6 billion during the 2018 RRSP season.

Price elasticity of chocolate
Among consumers in the US, the demand for premium chocolate is less price elastic than for mainstream chocolate brands. Premium brands like Lindt exhibited less volume decline relative to mainstream brands like Hershey. For every 1% increase in pricing, Lindt experiences a 1% decrease in volume, while Hershey's volume decrease is more pronounced at 1.7%.

What are the main drivers behind people's chocolate choices? “Taste and good flavors” and “good quality” tops the list of reasons. “Low price” is less of a consideration which would favour premium players like Lindt.

Coffee bean – Record low prices with record high consumption (Link)
Although coffee has never been more popular, the price of coffee beans is at their lowest point in over a decade. Why? Factors include technological advances that have boosted production and the collapse in the currency of the world’s largest coffee producer, Brazil.

Today, the Brazilian Real is 60% less valuable against the USD than it was in 2011, and has depreciated over 12% in just the last year. Since Brazil’s currency is so cheap, so is the coffee that Brazil sells in US dollars to the rest of the world. These unsustainable low prices are sending coffee farmers out of business.

However, these low coffee bean prices have not translated into cheaper cups of coffee at your local café. The average cup at many major cities around the world is close to $3. Coffee prices remain high due to strong demand and rising costs of producing the drink, alongside things such as rent, overheads, labor, milk and sugar.

Chocolate & Coffee

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

Price elasticity of chocolate
Among consumers in the US, the demand for premium chocolate is less price elastic than for mainstream chocolate brands. Premium brands like Lindt exhibited less volume decline relative to mainstream brands like Hershey. For every 1% increase in pricing, Lindt experiences a 1% decrease in volume, while Hershey's volume decrease is more pronounced at 1.7%.

What are the main drivers behind people's chocolate choices? “Taste and good flavors” and “good quality” tops the list of reasons. “Low price” is less of a consideration which would favour premium players like Lindt.

Coffee bean – Record low prices with record high consumption (Link)
Although coffee has never been more popular, the price of coffee beans is at their lowest point in over a decade. Why? Factors include technological advances that have boosted production and the collapse in the currency of the world’s largest coffee producer, Brazil.

Today, the Brazilian Real is 60% less valuable against the USD than it was in 2011, and has depreciated over 12% in just the last year. Since Brazil’s currency is so cheap, so is the coffee that Brazil sells in US dollars to the rest of the world. These unsustainable low prices are sending coffee farmers out of business.

However, these low coffee bean prices have not translated into cheaper cups of coffee at your local café. The average cup at many major cities around the world is close to $3. Coffee prices remain high due to strong demand and rising costs of producing the drink, alongside things such as rent, overheads, labor, milk and sugar.

Debt-laden Canadians

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

Debt-laden Canadians (Link)
Household debt in Canada has reached levels that could be qualified as excessive. Canadians owe C$2.16 trillion which as a share of gross domestic product, is the highest debt load in the G7.

Canada's personal savings rate is near its lowest in recorded history

The Canadian mutual fund industry experienced its weakest RRSP season in 10 Years
Over the first three months of 2019, the Canadian mutual fund industry captured net sales of $5.9 billion, down significantly from net sales of $17.6 billion during the 2018 RRSP season.

Monday reads

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

Investment decision making - Ten advantages everyday investors have over professionals (Link)
If we think about some of the main challenges encountered by investors around issues such as time horizons, over-trading, overconfidence, misaligned incentives and benchmark obsession, these problems are often exacerbated when investing in a professional context. Everyday investors are not immune from these behavioural issues that lead to poor investment decision making but it is important to acknowledge that the investment industry has certain structural features that serve to inflame a particular set of behavioural shortcomings. Many of these structural shortcomings are much harder to avoid when investing in a professional context versus the everyday investor. Here are a few of the advantages everyday investor have.
- There is no need to check your portfolio on a daily basis
- You can make decisions consistent with your own time horizon
- Your incentives are perfectly aligned
- There is no need to chase performance
- There is no requirement to be constrained by arbitrary benchmarks
- You don’t need to worry about what other people are doing

Notable quotes from Amazon's Annual Letter (Link)
From very early on in Amazon’s life, we knew we wanted to create a culture of builders – people who are curious, explorers. They like to invent. Even when they’re experts, they are “fresh” with a beginner’s mind. They see the way we do things as just the way we do things now. A builder’s mentality helps us approach big, hard-to-solve opportunities with a humble conviction that success can come through iteration: invent, launch, reinvent, relaunch, start over, rinse, repeat, again and again. They know the path to success is anything but straight. 

It’s critical to ask customers what they want, listen carefully to their answers, and figure out a plan to provide it thoughtfully and quickly (speed matters in business!). No business could thrive without that kind of customer obsession. But it’s also not enough. The biggest needle movers will be things that customers don’t know to ask for. We must invent on their behalf. We have to tap into our own inner imagination about what’s possible.

As a company grows, everything needs to scale, including the size of your failed experiments. If the size of your failures isn’t growing, you’re not going to be inventing at a size that can actually move the needle. Amazon will be experimenting at the right scale for a company of our size if we occasionally have multibillion-dollar failures. Of course, we won’t undertake such experiments cavalierly. We will work hard to make them good bets, but not all good bets will ultimately pay out. This kind of large-scale risk taking is part of the service we as a large company can provide to our customers and to society. The good news for shareowners is that a single big winning bet can more than cover the cost of many losers.

Weekend catch-up

Your weekend edge - catch up with this week's readings:

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

How one discount supermarket transformed the way Britain shops (Link) (Listen)

In 1990, a strange new German family-owned grocery chain named Aldi entered the UK market. It only stocked 600 basic items, all at very low prices. This would have shocked the average shopper in Britain who was accustomed to thousands of products and brands, vast fridges and aisles piled high with fresh fruit and vegetables. Most people were confident Aldi would fail in the UK, where there was discernible snobbery about discount stores. 

In the 1990s Aldi focused on building slowly and steadily and remained in the Midlands and the north of England, where store rents were cheaper, and the customers less affluent.  Aldi is a private company, with no shareholders other than Karl Albrecht’s family to answer to, so they could afford to take their time. Staying privately owned allowed Aldi to be unburdened by the short-term pressures for profits faced by its publicly traded rivals. 

Up until 2008, Aldi was still considered a niche UK retailer, locked out of the mainstream market. This all changed when the great financial crisis hit in late 2008. Inflation rose above 5%. Companies laid off staff. Household incomes were squeezed and the big grocery chains in the UK actually raised their prices in line with inflation to try to maintain their profit margins. People were forced to try discounters like Aldi. 

For Aldi, the timing was perfect, as it was just reaching critical mass in the UK. It had about 400 stores, and an established network of manufacturers delivering products that were not only low-price, but also of reasonable quality.  This new phase of rapid growth was inevitable, and Aldi’s managers believed the financial crash brought it on sooner than expected.

Today, Aldi is still growing and is now UK’s fifth largest retailer with over 7.5% market share. Aldi also has 12% of the market in Australia and 2% in the US with plans to raise its number of stores in the US from 1,800 to 2,500 by 2022, which would make it the third-biggest chain in the US by store count, after Walmart and Kroger.

Activist investors help push Japan towards shareholder capitalism $(Link)

The story of Ms. Murakami taking on the business establishment in Japan is remarkable. Her father Yoshiaki Murakami, a well-known bureaucrat turned activist investor, taught her the value of money by making her bet on the cost of dinner. Today Ms. Murakami runs C&I Holdings, a family fund that enables her to influence how Japanese executives run their companies. Her approach is uncompromising. “Whether I am female or young, I still hold the same number of shares and I can exercise them.” Activist investors like Ms. Murakami are helping to accelerate change in Japan’s corporate culture.

Business in Japan has long been an old boys club defended by yes-men with up to half of listed firms shares in the hands of friendly shareholders (mostly banks and insurance firms who tend to support managers). Change in Japan’s corporate culture will not happen overnight but Japan’s current prime minister, Shinzo Abe has enacted new laws as part of his economic-growth strategy to challenge hoary boardroom practices, with the aim of promoting American-style shareholder capitalism. This transformation in Japan is occurring just as US politicians such as Elizabeth Warren argue for a model that looks decidedly Japanese.

You have to live it to believe it (Link)

Seeing the world around you may not be good enough to understand how it works. You have to actually experience it to learn how to operate in it. MIT scientists tested two of cats. The two cats grew up seeing the same thing. But one actually experienced real world conditions while the other merely viewed it. Once the two cats were both brought back to normal conditions the cat who only watched leaped towards the steep ledge and fell straight off. It also failed to blink when an object accelerated towards its face. It couldn’t associate visual objects with what their bodies were supposed to do. The cat that experienced the real world was normal and the other was effectively blind. 

One of the most important topics in business and investing is whether all of us are, in some ways, like these blind cats. Sure, we’ve read about the Great Depression. But most of us didn’t live through it. Can we actually learn lessons from it that make us better when investing? 

In theory, people should make investment decisions based on their goals and the characteristics of the investment options available. But that’s not what people do. Research shows that people’s lifetime investment decisions are heavily anchored to the experiences they had with different investments in their own generation. 

For example, Investor Tren Griffin wrote that he gained a lot of muscle memory that resulted from the Internet bubble. "There is no way you can fully convey in words the experience of being in the lead car as an investor in that roller coaster. Looking at the cycle after the fact is nothing like looking ahead and not knowing what will happen next. The experience still impacts the way I think and act today."

200 years of human progress (Link)

What we see or read every day skews our perception of the world and makes us believe things are getting worse and worse every day. Threatening negative news passes much more easily through our mental filters then the good news. Another problem is good news or positive progress is gradual and won’t make for good headlines.

The truth is things are unquestionably getting better over time. To help understand the transformation in living conditions here is a visualization from Our World in Data. This chart shows how the lives of 100 people would have changed over the last 200 years if they lived through this transformative period of the modern world.

In 1820, 94% (94 of 100 people) of people in the world lived in extreme poverty. Today, that number is close to 10% (10 of 100 people). Another example – In 1820 only 12% (12 of 100 people) could read. Today that number is over 85% (85 of 100 people).

Does 2019 look similar to 1999? 

A recent report by Empirical reviews Q1 2019 and highlights supporting data that suggests we could be entering the “New” New Economy Era. Factor returns for Q1 2019 look eerily similar to those in the 18 month run up to the peak in March of 2000 – with the following characteristics outperforming meaningfully:

1) Highest revenue growth

2) Most expensive based on forward P/E

3) Most expensive based on FCF Yield

4) Highest share dilution

5) Highest arbitrage risk

An increasing percentage of Russell 2000 companies are unprofitable.

Which categories of active managers have beaten benchmarks? (Link)

A recent study published by Fidelity shows active management beats passive in 12 of 18 investment categories (one category tied).

Investor psychology

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.
_________________

200 years of human progress (Link)
What we see or read every day skews our perception of the world and makes us believe things are getting worse and worse every day. Threatening negative news passes much more easily through our mental filters then the good news. Another problem is good news or positive progress is gradual and won’t make for good headlines.

The truth is things are unquestionably getting better over time. To help understand the transformation in living conditions here is a visualization from Our World in Data. This chart shows how the lives of 100 people would have changed over the last 200 years if they lived through this transformative period of the modern world.

In 1820, 94% (94 of 100 people) of people in the world lived in extreme poverty. Today, that number is close to 10% (10 of 100 people). Another example – In 1820 only 12% (12 of 100 people) could read. Today that number is over 85% (85 of 100 people). 

You have to live it to believe it (Link)
Seeing the world around you may not be good enough to understand how it works. You have to actually experience it to learn how to operate in it. MIT scientists tested two of cats. The two cats grew up seeing the same thing. But one actually experienced real world conditions while the other merely viewed it. Once the two cats were both brought back to normal conditions the cat who only watched leaped towards the steep ledge and fell straight off. It also failed to blink when an object accelerated towards its face. It couldn’t associate visual objects with what their bodies were supposed to do. The cat that experienced the real world was normal and the other was effectively blind. 

One of the most important topics in business and investing is whether all of us are, in some ways, like these blind cats. Sure, we’ve read about the Great Depression. But most of us didn’t live through it. Can we actually learn lessons from it that make us better when investing? 

In theory, people should make investment decisions based on their goals and the characteristics of the investment options available. But that’s not what people do. Research shows that people’s lifetime investment decisions are heavily anchored to the experiences they had with different investments in their own generation. 

For example, Investor Tren Griffin wrote that he gained a lot of muscle memory that resulted from the Internet bubble. "There is no way you can fully convey in words the experience of being in the lead car as an investor in that roller coaster. Looking at the cycle after the fact is nothing like looking ahead and not knowing what will happen next. The experience still impacts the way I think and act today."

This week we celebrated Kris’s fifth and Teddy’s first anniversary!

Wednesday reads

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.
_________________

How one discount supermarket transformed the way Britain shops (Link) (Listen)
In 1990, a strange new German family-owned grocery chain named Aldi entered the UK market. It only stocked 600 basic items, all at very low prices. This would have shocked the average shopper in Britain who was accustomed to thousands of products and brands, vast fridges and aisles piled high with fresh fruit and vegetables. Most people were confident Aldi would fail in the UK, where there was discernible snobbery about discount stores. 

In the 1990s Aldi focused on building slowly and steadily and remained in the Midlands and the north of England, where store rents were cheaper, and the customers less affluent.  Aldi is a private company, with no shareholders other than Karl Albrecht’s family to answer to, so they could afford to take their time. Staying privately owned allowed Aldi to be unburdened by the short-term pressures for profits faced by its publicly traded rivals. 

Up until 2008, Aldi was still considered a niche UK retailer, locked out of the mainstream market. This all changed when the great financial crisis hit in late 2008. Inflation rose above 5%. Companies laid off staff. Household incomes were squeezed and the big grocery chains in the UK actually raised their prices in line with inflation to try to maintain their profit margins. People were forced to try discounters like Aldi. 

For Aldi, the timing was perfect, as it was just reaching critical mass in the UK. It had about 400 stores, and an established network of manufacturers delivering products that were not only low-price, but also of reasonable quality.  This new phase of rapid growth was inevitable, and Aldi’s managers believed the financial crash brought it on sooner than expected.

Today, Aldi is still growing and is now UK’s fifth largest retailer with over 7.5% market share. Aldi also has 12% of the market in Australia and 2% in the US with plans to raise its number of stores in the US from 1,800 to 2,500 by 2022, which would make it the third-biggest chain in the US by store count, after Walmart and Kroger.

Activist investors help push Japan towards shareholder capitalism $(Link)
The story of Ms. Murakami taking on the business establishment in Japan is remarkable. Her father Yoshiaki Murakami, a well-known bureaucrat turned activist investor, taught her the value of money by making her bet on the cost of dinner. Today Ms. Murakami runs C&I Holdings, a family fund that enables her to influence how Japanese executives run their companies. Her approach is uncompromising. “Whether I am female or young, I still hold the same number of shares and I can exercise them.” Activist investors like Ms. Murakami are helping to accelerate change in Japan’s corporate culture.

Business in Japan has long been an old boys club defended by yes-men with up to half of listed firms shares in the hands of friendly shareholders (mostly banks and insurance firms who tend to support managers). Change in Japan’s corporate culture will not happen overnight but Japan’s current prime minister, Shinzo Abe has enacted new laws as part of his economic-growth strategy to challenge hoary boardroom practices, with the aim of promoting American-style shareholder capitalism. This transformation in Japan is occurring just as US politicians such as Elizabeth Warren argue for a model that looks decidedly Japanese.

Monday charts

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.
_________________

Does 2019 look similar to 1999? 
A recent report by Empirical reviews Q1 2019 and highlights supporting data that suggests we could be entering the “New” New Economy Era. Factor returns for Q1 2019 look eerily similar to those in the 18 month run up to the peak in March of 2000 – with the following characteristics outperforming meaningfully:
1) Highest revenue growth
2) Most expensive based on forward P/E
3) Most expensive based on FCF Yield
4) Highest share dilution
5) Highest arbitrage risk

An increasing percentage of Russell 2000 companies are unprofitable.

Which categories of active managers have beaten benchmarks? (Link)

A recent study published by Fidelity shows active management beats passive in 12 of 18 investment categories (one category tied).

Weekend catch-up

Your weekend edge - catch up with this week's readings:

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.

_________________

Fees vs. Fines (Link)

Is market volatility a fee or a fine? Fees are something you pay for admission to get something worthwhile in return. Fines are punishment for doing something wrong. It sounds trivial, but thinking of volatility or drawdowns as fees instead of fines is an important part of developing the kind of mindset that lets you stick around long enough for compounding to work.

A reason market declines hurt and scare so many investors off is because they think of them as fines. The natural response for anyone who watches their wealth decline is to avoid future fines or market declines.

But if you view volatility as a fee, things look different. Returns are never free. They demand you pay a price, like any other product. And since market returns can be not just great but sensational over time, the fee is high. Declines, crashes, panics, manias, recessions, depressions.

The trick is convincing yourself that the fee is worth it. That, is the only way to deal with volatility; not just putting up with it, but realizing that it’s an admission fee worth paying.

Easy money

Since 2009 there have been numerous headlines telling us that the easy money had been made. Avoiding this market noise and staying invested through the drawdowns was hard. Only in hindsight does it look easy.

Jamie Dimon's 2018 letter to shareholders (Link)

Jamie Dimon released his annual letter to shareholders sharing his insights on some critical issues currently churning in the United States. Jamie speaks up for capitalism, stock buybacks and big business.

"There is no question that capitalism has been the most successful economic system the world has ever seen. It has helped lift billions of people out of poverty, and it has helped enhance the wealth, health and education of people around the world. Capitalism enables competition, innovation and choice."

"We much prefer to use our capital to grow than to buy back stock. We believe buying back stock should be considered only when either we cannot invest (sometimes as a result of regulatory policies) or we are generating excess capital that we do not expect to use in the next few years. Buybacks should not be done at the expense of investing appropriately in our company."

The rise in internal collaboration at Berkshire $(Link) 

Executives at Berkshire subsidiary companies now gather regularly to share strategies and best practices.

“Even though we’re in different industries and have different business models, there’s so much that connects us,” said Mary Rhinehart, CEO of Berkshire’s building-products maker Johns Manville. “Why wouldn’t we take advantage of the talent across the Berkshire Hathaway organization?”

Buffet explains how collaboration among Berkshire companies is largely voluntary. “The best cooperation is voluntary. That’s not a change in the culture, though. It’s sort of a sign of the culture. It really is people thinking like owners and exercising, in a sense, their independence.”

Apprenticeships vs. Business School (Link)

Enrollment in two-year, full-time MBA programs in the U.S. fell by more than one-third from 2010 to 2016 and in 2018, applications to business schools in the U.S dropped 7% from the previous year.

The rapid rate of technological change, a booming job market, and the digitization of education are chipping away at the traditional graduate-level business program. To meet today’s business needs, startups and massive companies alike are increasingly hiring technologists, developers, and engineers in place of the MBA graduates they may have preferentially hired in the past.

With disruption to the advanced business education system already here, some business schools are applying notes from their own innovation classes to brace for change. We’ve seen schools with smaller MBA programs shut their doors in favor of advanced degrees with more specialization. Over the past decade, enrollment in specialized graduate business programs doubled.

Apprenticeship models are reemerging as an effective way to train tomorrow's leaders.

How the world’s biggest brewer killed the craft beer buzz (Link)

Craft beer was born in the mid-1960s, when an heir to the Maytag appliance fortune bought a San Francisco brewery called Anchor and began marketing a full-flavored, malty beer as its flagship. Today, there are 7,000 small, independent breweries in the the U.S, the most since pre-Prohibition days. You might think, based on this, that the people have spoken; that Small Beer has won.

You would be wrong. For the past decade, Big Beer has been systematically buying up the craft breweries they couldn’t beat, and Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI) has led the way.

ABI’s acquired craft brands tend be pretty good at making “liquid” that drinkers want, but ABI is really good at the rest. ABI’s “go-to market” machine is a marvel that gives it remarkable influence over how and where its brands are sold  and whether other brewers’ stuff is sold at all. ABI can box out rivals from retail shelves, tap towers, even entire stadium concessions.

How Lino Saputo Jr. built a global dairy empire and stood up to Big Milk (Link)

Saputo Inc. has little name recognition outside of Quebec (the company spends very little on marketing), but it has quietly grown into one of Canada’s top international success stories. With 62 plants on 5 continents and expected sales of more than $13 billion this year, 70% of which come from outside Canada, it is among the largest dairy processors in the world. 

When Saputo's CEO thrust himself into the NAFTA trade fight last summer, breaking ranks with Canada’s powerful dairy lobby to side with American farmers, it was revealing: Saputo Inc. may be a creature of Canada’s dairy cartel, having benefited early on from the protectionism it entails, but its CEO is an insider more than willing to stand on the outside. Canadian dairy farmers, he told reporters last June, “want their cake, and they want to eat it too. You can’t hold onto your milk-supply-managed system and have a class of milk competing with world markets at the same time.”

For close to 50 years, Canada's supply-managed dairy industry, which shields farmers from international competition through a mix of quotas, tariffs and price controls, has defied every effort at reform. The election of Donald Trump changed everything. Trump quickly drew a large bullseye on Canadian dairy, repeatedly flaying the country for “what they've done to our dairy farm workers".

Saputo has no regrets about breaking with the dairy lobby on the issue, calling their arguments “propaganda”. For a company like Saputo that wants to continue to grow they have to think about markets outside of Canada.

Friday reads

Get the Edge - Click here to view an archive of investment education, daily musings, book recommendations and more.
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Apprenticeships vs. Business School  (Link)
Enrollment in two-year, full-time MBA programs in the U.S. fell by more than one-third from 2010 to 2016 and in 2018, applications to business schools in the U.S dropped 7% from the previous year.

The rapid rate of technological change, a booming job market, and the digitization of education are chipping away at the traditional graduate-level business program. To meet today’s business needs, startups and massive companies alike are increasingly hiring technologists, developers, and engineers in place of the MBA graduates they may have preferentially hired in the past.

With disruption to the advanced business education system already here, some business schools are applying notes from their own innovation classes to brace for change. We’ve seen schools with smaller MBA programs shut their doors in favor of advanced degrees with more specialization. Over the past decade, enrollment in specialized graduate business programs doubled.

Apprenticeship models are reemerging as an effective way to train tomorrow's leaders.

How world’s biggest brewer killed the craft beer buzz (Link)
Craft beer was born in the mid-1960s, when an heir to the Maytag appliance fortune bought a San Francisco brewery called Anchor and began marketing a full-flavored, malty beer as its flagship. Today, there are 7,000 small, independent breweries in the the U.S, the most since pre-Prohibition days. You might think, based on this, that the people have spoken; that Small Beer has won.

You would be wrong. For the past decade, Big Beer has been systematically buying up the craft breweries they couldn’t beat, and Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI) has led the way.

ABI’s acquired craft brands tend be pretty good at making “liquid” that drinkers want, but ABI is really good at the rest. ABI’s “go-to market” machine is a marvel that gives it remarkable influence over how and where its brands are sold  and whether other brewers’ stuff is sold at all. ABI can box out rivals from retail shelves, tap towers, even entire stadium concessions.

How Lino Saputo Jr. built a global dairy empire and stood up to Big Milk (Link)

Saputo Inc. has little name recognition outside of Quebec (the company spends very little on marketing), but it has quietly grown into one of Canada’s top international success stories. With 62 plants on 5 continents and expected sales of more than $13 billion this year, 70% of which come from outside Canada, it is among the largest dairy processors in the world. 

When Saputo's CEO thrust himself into the NAFTA trade fight last summer, breaking ranks with Canada’s powerful dairy lobby to side with American farmers, it was revealing: Saputo Inc. may be a creature of Canada’s dairy cartel, having benefited early on from the protectionism it entails, but its CEO is an insider more than willing to stand on the outside. Canadian dairy farmers, he told reporters last June, “want their cake, and they want to eat it too. You can’t hold onto your milk-supply-managed system and have a class of milk competing with world markets at the same time.”

For close to 50 years, Canada's supply-managed dairy industry, which shields farmers from international competition through a mix of quotas, tariffs and price controls, has defied every effort at reform. The election of Donald Trump changed everything. Trump quickly drew a large bullseye on Canadian dairy, repeatedly flaying the country for “what they've done to our dairy farm workers".

Saputo has no regrets about breaking with the dairy lobby on the issue, calling their arguments “propaganda”. For a company like Saputo that wants to continue to grow they have to think about markets outside of Canada. 

Staying invested

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Fees vs. Fines (Link)
Is market volatility a fee or a fine? Fees are something you pay for admission to get something worthwhile in return. Fines are punishment for doing something wrong. It sounds trivial, but thinking of volatility or drawdowns as fees instead of fines is an important part of developing the kind of mindset that lets you stick around long enough for compounding to work.

A reason market declines hurt and scare so many investors off is because they think of them as fines. The natural response for anyone who watches their wealth decline is to avoid future fines or market declines.

But if you view volatility as a fee, things look different. Returns are never free. They demand you pay a price, like any other product. And since market returns can be not just great but sensational over time, the fee is high. Declines, crashes, panics, manias, recessions, depressions.

The trick is convincing yourself that the fee is worth it. That, is the only way to deal with volatility; not just putting up with it, but realizing that it’s an admission fee worth paying.

Easy money

Since 2009 there have been numerous headlines telling us that the easy money had been made. Avoiding this market noise and staying invested through the drawdowns was hard. Only in hindsight does it look easy.

CEO insights

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Jamie Dimon's 2018 letter to shareholders (Link)
Jamie Dimon released his annual letter to shareholders sharing his insights on some critical issues currently churning in the United States. Jamie speaks up for capitalism, stock buybacks and big business.

"There is no question that capitalism has been the most successful economic system the world has ever seen. It has helped lift billions of people out of poverty, and it has helped enhance the wealth, health and education of people around the world. Capitalism enables competition, innovation and choice."

"We much prefer to use our capital to grow than to buy back stock. We believe buying back stock should be considered only when either we cannot invest (sometimes as a result of regulatory policies) or we are generating excess capital that we do not expect to use in the next few years. Buybacks should not be done at the expense of investing appropriately in our company."

The rise in internal collaboration at Berkshire $(Link) 

Executives at Berkshire subsidiary companies now gather regularly to share strategies and best practices.

“Even though we’re in different industries and have different business models, there’s so much that connects us,” said Mary Rhinehart, CEO of Berkshire’s building-products maker Johns Manville. “Why wouldn’t we take advantage of the talent across the Berkshire Hathaway organization?”

Buffet explains how collaboration among Berkshire companies is largely voluntary. “The best cooperation is voluntary. That’s not a change in the culture, though. It’s sort of a sign of the culture. It really is people thinking like owners and exercising, in a sense, their independence.”

Weekend catch-up

Your weekend edge - catch up with this week's readings:

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This $358 billion pension fund bets on private equity (Link)
With everyone diving in to private equity, future returns may not be as attractive as in the past. Yet the $358 billion California Public Employees’ Retirement system fund (CalPERS) believes it has a competitive advantage. Today, CalPERS has nearly $28 billion, or 8% of assets, in private equity holdings and over the last 10 years, private equity was CalPERS best-performing asset, returning an average of 9% annually, compared with 6.7% on public stocks. CalPERS now believes it may be able to continue this success and on March 18 voted to funnel up to $20 billion more into private equity over the next 10 years.

CalPERS plans to partner with elite private-equity managers, that will make them their sole client. That way, CalPERS would have better control and more transparency to make better investment decisions. The chief investment officer (CIO) of CalPERS believes more private equity is needed to increase the fund's probability of success.

Private equity firms are flocking to Mexico? (Link)
In January of 2018, Mexican regulators eased restrictions on how Mexican pension funds invest their assets. This change allowed foreign private equity managers to tap into the $179 billion worth of pension fund assets for the first time in Mexico. Over the last year many of the world’s top private equity managers have quietly raised billions of dollars from Mexican pension funds.

Well-known names like BlackRock was one of the first foreign asset managers to expand into Mexico, raising $615 million for two funds. Blackstone Group has now also raised $695 million from Mexican pension funds for its first two local private equity funds.

The majority of private equity sales are now to other private equity firms (SBO)

German house prices are up only 8% (cumulative) since 1970

Germany’s mortgage market saw little growth in the past 18 years.
Germany's mortgage market was equivalent to 40.5% of GDP in 2017. This is not surprising as Germany has one of the lowest home ownership rates in Western Europe at 51.9%.

Looking at the Canadian mortgage market we see a different story. The Canadian mortgage market expanded from 39% of GDP in 2000 to over 68% of GDP in 2017.

It is their job to entertain. It is your job to ignore (Link)
Every day media outlets try to tell investors how the markets are doing. This question commands far too much attention given how little it actually matters in most people’s day-to-day lives. Since January 17, 2018 the Dow Jones Industrial Average has seen absolute daily changes add up to over 58,000 points.

Yet over this time, the index has gained less than 100 points.

Why outperforming can be so difficult (Link)

Most assume picking the big winners is the key to outperforming the market for a stock-picker, but it’s likely more important to avoid those distressed stocks that can be so damaging to performance. Since 1980, over 320 companies were removed from the S&P 500 for business distress reasons.

How many individual U.S. common stocks outperform the S&P 500 over rolling 10-year periods? On average 43%. You can see the number got as high as 70% in the 1980s and as low as 25% in the late 1990s.