Subject: Re: BRK Annual Meeting Observations
“As a random example, Costco was trading under $50 for roughly 8-9 months.“

That stings Jim. A 15 bagger error of omission. Call it a $10 billion investment x 15. When Charlie Munger was telling him daily it’s a buy.

I loved Buffett’s joke about him and Charlie on the plane that was hijacked. Charlie endless lamenting the virtues of Costco. Hijacker asks Warren if he has any last wishes: yes kill me first.

Warren said no to Costco because it was a retailer and retailers are difficult businesses. Maybe it was Warren that was the abominable no man all these years. That’s certainly going to cause some missed opportunities but of course as you have pointed out before, avoiding the losses was probably the secret ingredient.

As it turned out, Warren avoided Alibaba another “God damn retailer”. So maybe it one each for Warren and Charlie.

If Berkshire now had $150 billion in Costco we would be wondering if he should lighten up at 50 times earnings, for a retailer.

The Costco error of omission shows how difficult investing is even for the person who is the best ever to play the game. It reminds me how the incredible bull run we have been on for a very long time has made probably all of us to some degree believe we are good investors. We will see what the investing Gods have to say about that over the next 20 years…