While it may be oversimplified, I think of the conglomerate discount here as similar to "a basket of options is worth more than an option on a basket" in the sense that, unless one takes substantial effort (short Apple and some of the other large holdings to hedge) to back out some of what is in the basket, you're stuck with what's in the basket of Brk. A lot of what is in that isn't readily offset, and the people who are willing and able to make a lot of those evaluations will find themselves better served putting together their "basket of options" from the individual companies out there. For those of us willing to take the basket, the lower volatility is an positive, but we're not being paid a percentage of performance without losing money on the downside. That takes an enormous amount of demand out of the market for the shares, but at a fairly static proportion; the discount ought to be fairly stable and price track performance. I may also be way off, but it's a story that would fit the stable ongoing discount.

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