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The week's question
In March 2025, in the thread "Re: OT, out", Umm asked the members: "Do you think it is because America is made up of magical soil that makes businesses based in America magically profitable?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
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Stocks A to Z / Stocks B / Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A)
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Author: tedthedog ⎊  😊 😞
Number: of 22351 
Subject: OT-ish: Japan
Date: 07/01/24 12:16 PM
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No. of Recommendations: 15
We know that WEB has taken an interest in certain Japanese companies. This article makes an interesting general point about Japanese companies.
alphaarchitect.com - Japanese companies

Some snippets:

"the 500 largest Japanese companies grew earnings per share by 5.8x since 2010, while the 500 largest U.S. companies grew earnings by 3.2x."

"the price-to-earnings (P/E) and price-to book (P/B) ratios of U.S. stocks have risen dramatically since 2010. U.S. companies became 2x as expensive on bottom-line, per-share earnings and 4x as expensive on book value, while those of large Japanese companies have been basically flat."

"Another sign of financial strength is the percentage of EBIT devoted to interest expense. In the U.S. the percentage fell from 16.1% to 12.9%. Japanese companies did much better, lowering the ratio from 20.5% to just 3.4%."

The Nikkei is available to U.S. investors via ETFs (that is information, not a recommendation).
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This community has written 21,861 posts about Berkshire Hathaway. The article-length ones it recommended most:
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Summary of 2Q 2026 · 55 recs · 2026
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