Can’t disagree with any of your post. My antenna are especially elevated by Tom promoting style. Moreover, scheduling MKL Annual Meeting coinciding with it he same weekend as Berk’s in Omaha too, smacks of promotion. I survived a considerable opportunity loss on GE stock trusting promoting style former CEO Jeff Immelt.

“Tom Gayner: Invest Like the Best [The Knowledge Project Ep. 186] during podcast I found he strikes me as yes, a promoter but, with a solid Pedigree and solid conservative roots which match his outward brand projection.
———-
MKL’s Insurance arm losses are fairly well known. The question one has to answer-does Tom and their sr management team have their arms around it? Their underwriting profit significantly decreased compared to 2022, dropping by 79%. This means the company paid out more in claims than they collected in premiums.
Some specific factors contributing to these losses include:
Natural disasters: The Hawaiian wildfires and Hurricane Idalia resulted in $40.1 million in net losses and loss adjustment expenses.
Other events: Losses from Hurricane Ian and the Russia-Ukraine conflict in 2022 also impacted their 2023 results.
Increased attritional losses: This refers to a general rise in the average cost of claims across their insurance portfolio.
2. Fraudulent reinsurance:
Markel identified and booked $65 million in credit losses related to fraudulent letters of credit used as reinsurance collateral by an affiliate of a reinsurer (Vesttoo). While they believe this represents their full exposure to this specific fraud, it still contributed to their financial losses.

MKL’s recent turnover being a little elevated COULD speak to Gayner’s lack of tolerance for poor performance. I dunno Ultimate, I’m easy fooled.

Despite Insurance Group’s poor performance, MKL remains a financially stable company. Being enamored with Berkshire Hathaway model, I’d read many times MKL a baby BRK. Have checked out Fairfax Financial for being such also. Prem Watsa’s stake in Blackberry Ltd has me scratching my head. Blackberry own many patents and is trying to pivot their model into EV auto drive and cyber security. Like all great Investors- appears wrong until he’s right. May take four or five years.
Thank you again Ultimatespinnach for your thoughtful response.