Be kinde to folk. This changeth the whole habitat.
- Manlobbi
Stocks A to Z / Stocks M / Markel (MKL)
No. of Recommendations: 2
Market seems to be over-reacting. increased my position by 30pct today
No. of Recommendations: 1
Book value per share 1553. At 1780, P/B =1.15.
They have been buying back a lot of shares. So should be able to buy back more.
Good discussion in the earnings call.
No. of Recommendations: 1
No. of Recommendations: 4
With respect, the earnings call sounded like more CYA. Q1 was a mega clunker.
I wish these guys could string together more than 2-3 quarters without crapping the bed. I'm nauseous from the relentless ups and downs.
Tom Gaynor needs to put down the MKL 'spirit king' megaphone and focus. The rah, rah, rah schtick was cute at first, now it is annoying. Reminds me of Ballmer at Microsoft working himself into a sweat rallying the troops while his leadership results conjured one of the longest periods of dead money in history.
Managing a portfolio of 128 positions? Really...? 128?! His biggest position (idea) is BRK at 12'ish% of the portfolio. His next (idea) is GOOG at 6'ish%. The remaining 126 are noisy teeny tiny ideas. Just buy the index Tom, and focus your time on insurance risk. Our results will improve.
They wont give hard numbers on "Ventures", buybacks are meh, and no divvy.
Apologies but these results really got me up on the wrong side of bed...
I've had a rather outsized position with MKL since 2012, patiently waiting.
No. of Recommendations: 1
The portfolio has mostly recovered from the end of quarter figure - I'd guess.
No. of Recommendations: 4
Gaynor has outperformed S&P by almost 2% a year over the last 10 years.
The 1Q results showed they have made significant progress in fixing their underwriting performance.
The operating earnings loss is entirely due to unrealized losses in the equity portfolio. Equity markets were down in March due to Iran war, and have fully recovered in April. If the earnings were a current snapshot, instead of March 31, there would be no loss and book value too would be higher. Based on current book and share price, PB would be well below 1.2. Buying back lots of stock with free cash flow and excess capital would be exemplary capital allocation.
