Chandler Properties Blog

Here’s a link to an interview Becky Quick of CNBC did with Warren Buffett today.  The video is about 10 minutes and covers his view on the current economy, what he was doing the weekend that Lehman Brothers failed, and what key economic indicators he looks at to determine the health of the economy.

 A couple interesting points I got from the interview were as follows:

1.  Becky asked him what he looked at to determine how the economy was doing.  He responded that he looks at the daily results of a lot of the businesses that Berkshire owns.  He also looks at the Fed’s balance sheet, etc.  When Becky followed up and asked him what one report he would want to get if he were stranded on a desert island and had to gauge the economy.  I thought he gave an insightful answer.  He said train freight car loadings and truck tonnage moved.  That’s pretty interesting.  I guess that gives him a good understanding of how much goods are getting sold/produced at any given time.

2.  He also spoke about the economy.  He basically said things had leveled out, but there had been no bounce.  He seemed to be somewhat lukewarm on his answer.  He felt things were much better than a year ago, but not back to normal.

I always enjoy hearing Buffett’s take on financial matters.  If you want to watch the full interview, here is the link.

 http://www.cnbc.com/id/32873440/

A Shameless Plug
Ok, it’s not exactly getting published, but CNBC did ask for readers to send in their opinion about whether we thought Buffett had lost his touch.  I sent in a couple lines and a photo of Dad, Warren, Charlie, and me.  Out of 2,000 submissions, about 20 or 30 got published in the “Warren Buffett Watch” blog on CNBC.  Check out my picture and comments in the attached link.  Warning the pictures of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger are cardboard cutouts that were placed in the convention hall of last year’s Berkshire Hathaway Shareholder meeting.  I have yet to meet Buffett in person.  Maybe one day?

The Link to the CNBC Article
http://www.cnbc.com/id/28342496/page/3/

A Little History
For those of you who don’t know, I’m a huge Buffett fan.  Buffett has been investing the same way for the last 50 years.  He buys companies that have an intrinsic value that is greater than the current market value.  He’s recently been on a buying spree and even posted an article in the New York Times entitled, “Buy American. I Am.” In the article he talks about why he is bullish on the long-term health of the American economy.  He also says, now is a great time to buy American companies since they the stock market has declined and great companies are selling at cheap prices.   This is classic Buffett; being fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful.