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Tonight we received the quarterly filings for Cascade Investment LLC, which shows the personal investments of Bill Gates. While the investment vehicle listed many unique holdings out there that were much the same as before, there are much more interesting things to look at besides his now greatly-diminished role at Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT). Cascade’s now holds 33.895 million shares of Canadian National Railways Co. (NYSE: CNI) with a stake worth some $1.627 Billion as of June 30, 2008. many of his other holdings look the same as before which you can see in this filing versus what we noted last quarter.
Daily Archives: August 14, 2008
Bill Gates: Now Garbage Man & Gringo Investor (MSFT, CNI, TV, FMX, RSG, WMI, AW)
Buffett & Berkshire Hathaway Holdings A-G (AXP, BUD, BAC, BNI, KMX, KO, CMCSA, CDCO, COST, GCI, GE, GSK)
So far there are some changes seen in the holdings of Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A). We have consolidated these into groups and this group is from A to G, and this is for the quarter ended on June 30, 2008:
- American Express Co. (NYSE: AXP) over 151.6 million shares.
- Anheuser Busch Cos. Inc. (NYSE: BUD) taken to under 15 million shares from over 35 million shares on last report
- Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) 9.1 million shares
- Burlington Northern Santa Fe (NYSE: BNI) 63,785,418 shares
- Carmax Inc. (NYSE: KMX) 21.3 million shares
- Coca Cola (NYSE: KO) roughly 200 million shares
- Comcast (NASDAQ: CMCSA) 12 million shares
- Comdisco Holdings (CDCO) over 1.5 million shares
- Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ: COST) 5.254 million shares
- Gannett Co. (NYSE: GCI) 3.447 million shares
- General Electric Corp. (NYSE: GE) 7.777 million shares
- GlaxoSmithkline (NYSE: GSK) 1.51 million shares
We have also broken the other Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway holdings in two groups:
Jon C. Ogg
August 14, 2008
Buffett & Berkshire Hathaway Holdings H to S (HD, IR, IRM, JNJ, KFT, LOW, MTB, MCO, NKE, NSC, NRG, PG, SNY, STI)
These are more of Warren Buffett’s and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) holdings as of June 30, 2008:
- Home Depot Inc. (NYSE: HD) 4,181,000 shares
- Ingersoll-Rand (NYSE: IR) 5,636,600 shares
- Iron Mountain (NYSE: IRM) 3,372,200 shares
- Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) listed about 61.75 million shares in multiple lots
- Kraft Foods (NYSE: KFT) listed about 138.3 million shares in multiple lots
- Lowes Companies (NYSE: LOW) 7 million shares
- M&T Bank Corp. (NYSE: MTB) 6.71 million shares
- Moody’s (NYSE: MCO) 48 million shares
- Nike Inc. (NYSE: NKE) 7.641 million shares
- Norfolk Southern (NYSE: NSC) 1.933 million shares
- NRG Energy (NYSE: NRG) 3.238 million shares
- Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) more than 105.8 million shares
- Sanofi Aventis (NYSE: SNY) more than 3.9 million shares
- Sun Trust Bank (NYSE: STI) more than 3.2 million shares
We have also broken the other Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway holdings in two groups:
Jon C. Ogg
August 14, 2008
Buffett & Berkshire Hathaway Holdings T to Z (TMK, USB, USG, UNP, UPS, WBC, WMT, WPO, WFC, WLP, WSC)
These are the last of Warren Buffett’s and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) holdings as of June 30, 2008:
- Torchmark Corp. (NYSE: TMK) more than 3.51 million shares in multiple lots
- US Bancorp (NYSE: USB) more than 68 million shares in multiple lots
- USG Corp. (NYSE: USG) 17.07 million shares
- Union Pacific Corp. (NYSE: UNP) 8.9 million shares
- United Parcel Service (NYSE: UPS) 1.429 million shares
- WABCO Holdings (NYSE: WBC) 2.7 million shares
- Wal-Mart Stores inc. (NYSE: WMT) over 19.9 million shares in multiple lots
- Washington Post (NYSE: WPO) over 1.72 million shares in multiple lots
- Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) over 290 million shares in multiple lots
- Wellpoint Inc. (NYSE: WLP) 4.8 million shares
- Wesco Financial Corp. (NYSE: WSC) 5.7 million shares
We have also pulled out the other Buffett & Berkshire holdings in two separate groups:
Those grouped as A to G
Those grouped as H to S
Jon C. Ogg
August 14, 2008
The 52-Week Low Club (AKNS, AEP, CCRT, EIX, GGP, LYTS, PMII, SPRD)
Today was an interesting ride in the 52-week low club after we have seen very volatile markets. While oil fell $1.00 and while the S&P, NASDAQ, and DJIA were up most of the day, there were plenty of stocks gracing the 52-week lows:
- Akeena Solar, Inc. (AKNS)… down in sympathy with others, more speculative name in solar.
Boone Pickens Down $2 Billion In July?
According to Reuters and The New York Post, T. Boone Pickens’ BP Capital hedge fund was down 35% in July. The fund manages $7 billion.
Of course, that loss is probably only on paper.
Pickens could get himself in trouble on oil prices. He is bullish enough to be promoting wind energy as an alternative, preaching to anyone who will listen. In the meantime crude has fallen from $143 to $117, not good for any fund betting long.
I don’t think it’ll drop below $100," Pickens told Reuters in a telephone interview. "I would say $110 is where it might go, something like that."
If he is down a couple of billion on a bad position in oil, he better hope not.
Douglas A. McIntyre
Market Shrugs Off Major Outage At Netflix (NFLX) (BBI)
To hear it from CNBC, you would have thought the world had come to an end for Netflix (NFLX).
"It started this morning with an email apology from online movie rental powerhouse Netflix, confirming to its 8.4 million users that the company was suffering a shipping and distribution outage," writes CNBC’s Jim Goldman on the network’s Web site "I called the company this morning to get more information and spokesman Steve Swasey was candid, forthcoming and easily accessible; hallmarks of good damage control when a company is under the gun. As soon as I got off the phone with him, I went on the air and broke this story."
Newspaper Sector: Stock Relief By Goring Ranks (GCI)
If there is a single industry that would be in jeopardy today even if the economy turns, it is the newspaper business. Gannett Co. Inc. (NYSE: GCI) is one of the few newspaper and print media operations that isn’t hovering near multi-year lows. But that being said, its stock is down almost 60% from its 52-week highs of $49.75 and down over 75% from its highs over the last five years. But the company may have found something good to do, at least as long as you aren’t an employee.
Jim Cramer Takes On Martha Stewart (MSO)
On today’s Olympics-shortened and rescheduled MAD MONEY on CNBC at 1:30 PM EST, Jim Cramer actually hosted Martha Stewart, founder of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc. (NYSE: MSO).
It’s probably no surprise, but Cramer and Martha were both bullish on the company and the brand. She said the damage has been repaired, advertisers are back, and the brand stayed strong. She also noted that the company has so many brands that people do not even think of it.
New Prius Changes May Have Risks For Toyota (TM)
Have you tried going into a Toyota dealership to buy a new or used Toyota Prius over the last 12 to 18 months? If you said yes, then you know you can’t really get one unless you put your name on the list long ago. Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) landed itself with a huge winner in its hybrid sales. Many comment that the Prius isn’t that pretty to look at or that they think it is "Too ECO" which was a quote from a salesman at a dealership. But now the Prius climbed passed that image. In fact, it’s gone so far now that owning a Prius is now cool. Regardless of which side of the fence you are on about green and envionmental cars, the Prius is one of the few hybrid cars that buyers who drive 8,000 to 12,000 miles per year can be certain that they are going to get their money’s worth in premium paid versus fuel cost savings over time.
Nelson Peltz: Bought Hansen, Dumped Starbucks (HANS, SBUX, PFCB, HNZ, WEN, TUX)
We just got to take a look at the JUNE 30 holdings of Nelson Peltz via an SEC filing of his TRIAN FUND MANAGEMENT GROUP. If you look throughout full filing you’ll see that he has other holdings other than food and restaurants, but Wall Street generally looks to Peltz for his interest and activities in restaurant and/or food companies as he’s been involved in. Below are the select stock holdings we have identified:
US Air Raising Cash (LCC)
We are seeing something a bit unusual considering the current climate for airline stocks. US Airways Group, Inc. (NYSE: LCC) has announced today that it will sell 19 million shares of common stock in a secondary offering via Merrill Lynch & Co.
24/7 Wall St. Day-Trading Alerts (PMII) (PMI)
One of the most significant spikes in volume today is the move of Power Medical Interventions (PMII). The stock is down about 40% at 10.50 AM on weak earnings.
VSInvestor.com is also covering the PMI Group (PMI) which is up over 50%
The website has data on several other day-trading opportunities which have come up this morning.
You Can Sell The House, Under Replacement Value
Existing home sales rose in Q2 over Q1, but this is on major price cuts according to the latest report from the National Association of Realtors. This says that one-quarter of cities (35 out of 150 cities) showed some improvements in price, but there were drops in 115 cities with the largest drops coming from select areas in California, Arizona, Las Vegas, and Florida.
The major sales gains seen in certain states coincided with major pricedrops. In fact, the report even shows that fire-sales are driving thenumbers. High foreclosure areas are seeing homes selling BELOWREPLACEMENT COST values.
CBS (CBS): A Chance To Spin-Off CNET
A chance like this only comes along rarely. CBS (CBS), which is trading at just above $17, down from a 52-week high of $32.97, could spin-off CNET. The large collection of tech websites has found new success under the CBS umbrella.
CNET.com posted a 22% increase in unique visitors over July 2007, pointing to early success of its beta release, which launched in June and officially launches later this month.
Energy Watch Part II: Refining Woes Remain (WNR, ALJ, DK, TSO, VLO, XOM, CVX, COP)
It’s no secret the oil refining margins have been dropping like a rock for the past few quarters. When pump prices began to approach a US-wide average of about $4/gallon, US drivers started changing their habits.The latest numbers indicate miles driven dropped by 12.2 billion miles, almost 5%, in June. That translates into millions of gallons of gasoline that were either not refined or were not sold. This decrease has hit refiners hard.
The award for largest drop in value goes to Western Refining (NYSE:WNR), down nearly 84% from a 52-week high of $55.72 to close yesterday at $9.23. Next on the list are two refiners that are majority-owned by Isreali parents: Alon USA Energy Inc (NYSE:ALJ) fell by almost 72%, from a high of $41.25 to $10.49; and Delek US Holdings (NYSE:DK) dropped by 69%, from $28.34 to $8.64. Tesoro (NYSE:TSO) fell by 64%, from $65.98 to $18.43, and Valero (NYSE:VLO) fell by nearly 50%, from $75.75 to $34.79.
Slow Housing Equals Slow Lawn Mower Market (BGG, TTC)
Shares of Briggs & Stratton Corp. (NYSE: BGG) are trading down about 10% pre-market this morning after the company said that high materials costs and slower sales were affecting its financial performance. This company makes lawn mowers and other outdoor equipment for lawns and gardens. Slow housing sales and a weak economy are keeping consumers from spending as much.
The Smell of Stagflation
This morning is going to be a disappointment for some who were hoping that inflation was going to be much less hot than estimates. The July number for annualized CPI showed +5.6% inflation, which may be the highest number in more than 15 years after food rose 0.9% and energy rose 4%. Throw these in with a slowing and slowing economy and you have one key word coming more and more evident: STAGFLATION.
Top Pre-Market Analyst Upgrades (BIOF, CSX, CYH, PSYS, SLH, UHS)
These are some of the top analyst upgrades and positive calls we are seeing in trading early this Thursday morning:
- Biofuel Energy (BIOF) Raised to Hold at Citigroup.
- CSX Corp. (CSX) Raised to Buy at UBS.
- Community Health Systems (CYH) Started as Outperform at Baird.
- Psychiatric Solutions (PSYS) Started as Outperform at Baird.
- Solera Holdings (SLH) Started as Buy at SunTrust.
- Universal Health Services UHS) started as Outperform at Baird.
Jon C. Ogg
August 14, 2008
Brokerage Firms Again Downgrading Each Other (C, GD, GS, JEF, KBW, LEH, MS, NCC, SGR)
These are some of the top analyst downgrades or negative calls we are seeing this morning, and you’ll notice that brokerage firm stocks are again the targets of many downgrades:
- Citigroup (C) Cut To Underperform From Neutral at Merrill Lynch.
- General Dynamics (GD) Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan.
- Goldman Sachs (GS) Cut to Underperform from Buy at Merrill Lynch.
- Jefferies (JEF) Cut to Sell at B of A.
- Keefe Bruyette & Woods (KBW) Cut to Sell at B of A.
- Lehman (LEH) Cut to Underperform from Hold at Merrill Lynch.
- LSI Industries (LYTS) Cut to Underperform at Baird.
- McDermott (MDR) Cut to Hold at Citigroup.
- Morgan Stanley (MS) Cut to Neutral from Buy at Merrill Lynch.
- National City (NCC) Cut to Neutral from Buy at Ladenburg Thalmann.
- Shaw Group (SGR) Cut to Sell at Citigroup.
Obviously there are a few calls thrown in here that aren’t brokerage firms or investment banking firms, but the brokers are back to killing each other again for the third day this week.
Jon C. Ogg
August 14, 2008
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