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- [00:00]
A
Hello everyone, and welcome to Investing by the Books, a podcast by Red Eye. I'm your host, Eddie Palmian, and in this episode we have the great pleasure of sharing an exclusive interview by our friend Christian Billinger. Christian is heading his family office, Billinger Ver Waldning, and has done a number of interviews on this podcast. For example, episode eight with Lawrence Cunningham and number 55 with Edward Chancellor. This time, Christian sits down for a conversation with Tom Russo. Tom Russo is a respected global value investor based in the US where he is the managing member of Gardner, Russo and Quinn. Tom has over 40 years of track record as a professional investor. He was an early international investor and he is known for his focus on consumer goods and companies with the capacity to reinvest and the capacity to suffer. For this episode, Tom brings up two classic Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits by Phil Fisher and Richer, Wiser, Happier by by William Green. Here comes our conversation with Tom Russo.
- [01:09]
B
Okay, Tom, great to have you back on the show. We spoke, I think on, I think we spoke about five years ago or so on investing by the books. We've obviously spoken since then and met since then.
- [01:20]
C
Yes.
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B
But not in a sort of formal capacity. But thanks for coming back on.
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C
Yes.
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B
And look, we'll cover a number of topics as they relate to your way of investing in the current environment, etc. But it is investing by the books. And for that purpose, I think you've picked a couple of books that we can sort of relate this conversation to. One of them being Richer, Wiser, Happier by William Green. Right.
- [01:48]
C
Yes.
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B
And the other one being Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits by Phil Fisher.
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C
Yes.
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B
You just want to, by the way, I, I'm, you know, I, I share your, your sort of admiration for those two.
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C
Yes.
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B
Wonderful books. You just want to give a brief sort of introduction.
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C
Yes.
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B
To the significance of those titles, you know, in, in, in. Because they're quite different books. Williams book, of course, is more of a sort of collection of portraits.
- [02:17]
C
Yes.
- [02:18]
B
Of great investors. And, and I guess Phil Fisher's book is more of a toolkit for the type of investor you are. So you just want to share a few thoughts around that.
- [02:29]
C
Well, I think the Phil Fisher book first stands apart from the common investment theology of the day. Not far from Palo Alto was his base and the, the investment theories at Palo Alto Stanford largely were modern portfolio theory. And Phil Fisher stood for scuttlebutt investing. And we so admire that. Get up and go out and meet the companies, kick the tires, talk to management, get a sense of the owners and how the owners relate to management and do they give the managers protection to allow the managers to make the investments that could profit the shareholders. And that has nothing to do with Greek letters. Greek letters is the reference you'd make if you're thinking about alpha and beta, delta and gamma, which trillions of dollars are invested based upon movements in what you could call the scoreboard of investing. The play that's on the screen or your ticker tape drives investment decisions, whereas scuttlebutt investing, you're looking for that eureka moment which says well, they're completely sold out and they have enough business in front of them for the next 10 years. And with ascending margins because of absorption. And then you want to come in and you want to make a very firm commitment and then patiently watch it mature. It couldn't be more different than what the growth group that now the group that William focuses on in terms of investors. If you fast forward to today, they have the choice of any number of ways they want to invest and each one of them comes about with a specific style which works for them. And the mandate for all of the participants is just stick to what you do. That that was a lesson of a third book called John Trains the Money Master. And he profiled four decades ago the then equivalents of Williams book today. And his only point was you could do any one of those as lay investors. Just find out what you're good at and then stick to it. Because in Wall street bears make money and bulls make money, but pigs lose. And the piggish instinct of having to participate in everything means that you end up not well served in anything.
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B
Yeah.
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C
So that's why now William's book, he introduces the whole, the whole joy of being part of this extraordinary fellowship. You really feel his respect for attention and esteem for the people who he writes about. And each of them have a vastly different approach. I happen to find his discussions about Nomad to be really interesting because they put some dimension on how Amazon broke free from the pack and how it assured its advance by making sure that they give back to the market market some of the absorption related gains in operating margin that accompanied the rapid top line growth. But they knew they had to reinvest back into the engine of that growth if they're going to have another episode. And they wanted to have endless episodes doubling every six months or something. And to get that you have to feed the beast. And he understood that the manager from Nomad and then nobody more so than Bill Miller understood that and hence had such an enormous involvement with that company. So I think there's a human element of investing and I think that William picked up on that nicely. And then the math of compounding is at the heart of most of the people followed by William, but not all. And there are some event driven but the majority of investors I think follow the same mission as do we.
- [07:07]
B
And of course, thank you. I think that's a wonderful summary, Tom. And of course in William's book you feature in the chapter on Nomad where I think he goes back to your description of yourself as a farmer as opposed to a hunter, which we can get back to. But, but so clearly I think he and many others also see you in that sort of, in that group of investors, the patient long term compounder. I guess before we get into your philosophy and the current market environment, et cetera, maybe just let's take the opportunity and just say a few words about Omaha this year because as you mentioned, you just come back from there and this being the first year with Warren not being on stage, how did you sort of, how was your experience? I know you spoke at a couple of events. The Value X. Yeah. Event and the Value Investor Conference.
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C
Yes.
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B
Did you, did you still sort of feel that it was just as worthwhile as in years past? Will you carry on returning?
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C
Well, you just can't imagine how grateful I was as my colleagues were to have a chance to size up the people who are going to be impacting and delivering the returns that we need and expect from Berkshire over time. And it's as simple as one of the participants at Bob Miles conference was the head of Jen Re, who I understand, I haven't seen the write up yet, but I understand will be the successor Tajit. And it was, it was not, it was not anticipated or, or sort of presaged at the annual meeting. But we certainly at the meeting then allowing him to speak publicly like they did at the Bob Miles conference means that we have a, we have a sense more of a sense of the person and at the end of the day so much of what, what drives Berkshire's results over time has been this adherence to understanding whether they're agency costs which we can describe and discuss or whether you're, you're going to get a fair deal by, by the company in whose hands you've entrusted your money. And a wonderful, you know, and it happens the cues are always available but you have to be there to see them. In this case, someone asked the head of genre if someone came along with a big pot of gold and wanted to hire him away, would he leave and without really a second delay said no because he had spent most of his time talking about the work he was doing on the culture of genre over time. And he said no, I would sort of say why not? He went like this, which was, you know, it's in the heart. It's in the heart. There's a commitment here and it would take a lot more than that pot of gold and probably you won't get me. And that's really wonderful. Now at the same time, he talked about his willingness to really drive change at General Re, not to change the policy that they adhere to, which is to write when no one else can write and stay quiet when everyone else is noisy. And so not changing that. But there's a whole host of things that they were in the midst of changing and spoke about.
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B
So it sounds like you and others got a much better insight into the businesses of Berkshire, of course, which is different than years past, of course, where there's been much more philosophizing big ideas. Yes. But you know, hopefully that means. Yeah, hopefully that means that it's relevant in a different sense going forward as well.
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C
It's so, it's so true. And people so often polarize sort of a. A business question versus social chat. Yeah. As, as though there's something, there's something sort of high grade about one, but not the other. This and that. And they miss, they miss the fact that Mr. Buffett arrives at the meeting with some important points to make.
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B
Yeah.
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C
And he'd like to make those points. And if little Billy from Nebraska asks Warren who will win the Super Bowl, Warren will fairly fast say, I just don't know. And then he'll say, however, but I can tell you who won't win. And that's the big three networks because it's been a long time since they've had the kind of grip on the talent of the players and on the team owners by how much they command from them to be over the air that the erosion of that lock that's been taking place ever since ESPN started to broadcast a pay for service continues. And the business of sports is evolving and facing more pressure. And as the power shifts towards the talent and towards the owners, and that's the message. And I furiously scribble that down. And my perception of what's going on in that important industry has now been affirmed and changed by Ward's answer.
- [12:50]
B
So clearly, even in what seems like a non business related question, I guess Warren would always try to sort of convey a message as it relates to Berkshire and the portfolio of businesses.
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C
He delivers way more than he's asked to deliver or expected to. And it delights every time it happens. You just go, that's it. That's the one. Because it's not a direct answer, but it's an expression of the judgment of a person who's watched that industry unfold since the first broadcast.
- [13:23]
B
Yeah, thank you for that talk. Look, maybe we can sort of say a few words about the current market environment and especially as it relates to, you know, consumer goods investing, which is still a very significant part of what you do and what you have done for over 40 years. So I guess if we look at the current environment, Tom, and it's been a difficult few years for consumer goods investors, broadly speaking, partly because of entire segments of the market having a difficult time. And there's company specific issues when you look at some of these businesses, like in the case of Nestle or Estee Lauder or a Diageo, etc. But do you think there are any parallels historically from your long career? You know, have we seen this before, the kind of skepticism that a lot of investors.
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C
Yes.
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B
Seem to express when it comes to consumer goods companies?
- [14:31]
C
Yeah.
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B
I appreciate that's a very broad sort of church, Right.
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C
Yes.
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B
Now we. That could include anything from staples to discretionary and spirits to cosmetics and. But you know, if you look back to the late 90s, early 2000s, for instance, Tom, does this, does this feel similar to that or does it feel very different and unique? How do you feel?
- [14:50]
C
No, no, there's elements, there's elements that are both. There are elements that are both. And the ones that are unique, the ones that are different, the ones that are threatening, the ones that are disruptive, all the adjectives are properly donated to that area. Really? Really. At some level, almost all get right back to at this current version. AI. Yeah. It's the disruptiveness coupled with the capacity to deliver disruptively and then the desire for, especially for young and young consumers to forge their own, that it's. In some ways it's a perfect storm if you're selling, oh, I don't know, Fanta or something that, you know, was the sort of drink that might have been loyally followed for generations within families. And suddenly, you know, the, the youngster saw on Facebook a vignette about someone who pulled up Tang or something other than Fanta, and he said, boy, that might be interesting. Off he goes and we'll stay the course for a while, but not forever. Not forever, I think. So the first thing Is technology has been very disruptive. It's disruptive in terms of image making, it's disruptive in terms of delivering where you buy. It's disrupted by what do people do with the information about what you bought, where you bought it to, what they're going to next pitch to you. So the advertising efficacy has gone way up and all of those things contribute. I think the important thing to make sure that you keep in mind is what is the purpose of the brands, as people worry about the loss of brands to private label. And it's quite simply that it's not just a chocolate bar with cake and interior, because a lot of people can do that. It's the Kit Kat bar and, you know, it's the. And it's that Kit Kat loyalty. I actually ended up early on in my career owning, on behalf of our investors, 21% of Weetabix.
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B
Yeah.
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C
Now, my wife's English and so I watched her go through these peculiar rituals to try to consume something that tastes horrid and, and to do it, you know, sort of every. Every day, every day, every day. And, and somewhere in the back of her mind has been impregnated a belief that if you have your two Weetabixes stacked or side by side, because there's a whole field of debate over which is which, you'll have the energy to get yourself through the day. And so, you know, scuttlebutt, investing. When I traveled to England, research trips, I will ask anyone I run into, you know, do you eat Weetabix? Did you once. Did you stop? Why'd you stop? Are you going to come back? You know, today? The going to come back is built upon the practice in England that consumers are now dipping Weetabix into milk chocolate and coming up with their own. So, you know, here, here it goes. Anyways, so Weetabix to all other tastes around the world doesn't satisfy them at all. I did hear from one investment committee who, who was, I think the shares weren't doing well for a period of time and they were upset and of course nobody knew what it was. That makes it harder. But one of the people on the committee said it's a funny British thing. He said it's a cereal, but doesn't taste very well. He thought that they could use it for cleaning up North Sea oil spills because it absorbs every liquid within range. And we just, we just, you know, watch the business stay focused on delivering to the consumer what they wanted. And, and, and, you know, they, they had A meager competitor and it was a beautiful business. The family ultimately sold it to Lion Capital, an LBO firm in London. And it was compounded for our portfolio at a more than sufficient level to add value. And we were delighted for it. I think ultimately brands, as you go up and down the network of users, really stand for one thing and that's the ability for the consumer to tell other people who they are by what they have and what they choose to eat, drink, smoke. And those sense of identity means a lot. And so you may see someone walking down the street with a. I had this happen, actually. I went to a client's home and his lawn care professional came up and he had a tattoo on Harley Davidson here and a Jack Daniels tattoo here and he had something else in his haircut. And I said, oh, do you have a motorcycle? He said, yeah, how'd you know? Well, I mean he was, he was literally a walking billboard for Harley Davidson.
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B
But do you think this skepticism, so that sort of speaks to the power underlying long term power of brands? Do you think the skepticism that a lot of investors express today around the sort of incumbents, you know, the large listed players, whether it's Nestle and packaged foods, or whether it's, you know, Brown Foreman in spirits or whether it's Estate Lauder in cosmetics. Clearly, you know, in some cases we've seen very significant de ratings now and you could argue that some of that is because things got a bit overdone during the pandemic, etc. But yes, you know, which of the sort of concerns that surround these names, which of the concerns do you share? Where do you feel that maybe things are a little bit different this time, say compared to the late 90s?
- [21:14]
C
Yes. Well, you can't imagine just how disruptive it is. One of the things that we have to remind investors is that we are global. We're global. And you know, Professor Jack McDonald at Stanford Business School was an early proponent of investing globally along with Templeton. And his, his idea was There, you know, 4% of the population lives in the US of the world and the other 96 are hungry and they need clothes and all that stuff. And so to increase your odds, you probably want to make sure you don't just ignore them because it's difficult to settle foreign currency trades in the US banks back in the day. And so I took his encouragement in fashioning our business from the very start with Weetabix and with Guinness and with Grandma and with Heineken and Nestle and believe that that's A portfolio that surely over the prior 50 years had made people fortunes. And my investment approach is really to focus more on what will be, will continue versus you know, the real disruptive investors who are looking really, they're really looking for what, what is is target and then what will become is what they will do if they can get in charge of that. And they would have a very different agenda, ours far more incrementalist. I'd say over the past four years they, our portfolio companies probably have under, under delivered in top line growth. And that goes right back that Nomad story where you know, unless you feed that top line growth it you won't get the margin expansion that can help you advertise and defend your brand share. And so I think there's been some self inflicted pain and I think you know, Covid, Covid meant that a whole generation of consumers weren't trained to have the social lubricant. If you use the Jack Daniels example that gathering at pubs or you know, alone create the, the habit and, and, and the practice. And so you know it's a, it's a, it's a business that needs to be communicated back to with new, with new products and, and, and packaging.
- [23:46]
B
And it sounds, yeah, sounds Tom, like sorry to interrupt you but it sounds like you're saying, you know, generally speaking it's more a case of maybe mismanagement is too strong a word but under investment and you know, the sort of normalization post Covid, et cetera as opposed to you know, fundamental shifts in consumer behavior. Is that right?
- [24:08]
C
It's so difficult. I mean can you imagine you're the head of Nestle, you have these wonderful businesses and something somewhere shows up with a vegetable burger and you have to figure out what to do. And the chances are if you're not really careful with your money that you might buy such an entity on the promise of everything that might happen someday possibly and be left with very little to show for it. And if you kind of keep your head down and keep hawking the products that you've develop that customer relationship with and go to new markets around the world because they're emerging and their populations are growing. Historically has been some GDP growth. Who knows what global GDP growth will look like as we enter into this novel era. Actually more than entered in, but it will be interesting. So I think I, I think that the consumer can, can reacquaint themselves. Brands do have a second act and, and so the third factor is just technology. It makes it so much easier to, to get a message to someone. The, the groups that you get to join, you know, in this case maybe even virtual groups. But, but the, but the feeling of being relevant by virtue of what you choose to buy to a vast group of people who share an influencers pitch, not Madison Avenue's pitch has made it harder I think. But I don't doubt that KitKat for example, which was sort of as a product going sideways for quite a long time. It's, it's now tapped into the Formula one race scene to create a new buzz and the business is showing a lift, a meaningful lift that they hadn't seen. So alternative forms of communications. The association now it costs a lot of, to get on the back of a fast moving vehicle but it has reaffirmed the relevance of the brand. And I think you're starting to see some moves across these portfolios. I mean just put a point finger on it. You have AB InBev created a mini furor a couple of days ago by saying business is surprisingly good. The trade was way understocked as a result of years of trying to work through inventory levels and balance sheet issues. But just as they now near the World cup they have found a renewed interest on the part of the network to load up and all the way up to the retail and, and it, it clocked a strong reporting quarter and shares were up 10% on the print. And, and then you know all others in the spirits industry had a little rethink and, and and so I think, I think you probably had some short covering which were profoundly one way and, and we'll see. It's, it's a difficult time. The, the industry has to I think maintain its, its reverence at the highest end while inviting consumers in. And, and what happens now is that when you invite a consumer in it's in something called a buckyball or something which is, which doesn't resemble even a bottle and then, and then it doesn't migrate up. Historically it was you, you had the right to start with a red label and then if you did okay, you got a black label, then if you do really blue label and you get the green label and you got you know, 2500 bottle crystal or something. Yeah. And you know that progression was, was sort of invested in and people are, are more promiscuous so they bought.
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B
It seems to me also Tom, that there's a discrepancy when I look at the sort of headlines and the noise around say alcohol consumption or other aspects of consumer goods sort of consumer behavior. There seems to be a discrepancy between actual behavior and the headlines. And I think you've said in the past on occasion that consumers talk lean but eat fat.
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C
That's true.
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B
Along those lines.
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C
No, that's exactly right.
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B
Do you see that in the current environment? Where do you, where do you sort of find that there are real misperceptions around?
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C
I think, I think the issue there would be GLP1. You know, that's it. I think there are 30 million people who have become 30% less overweight.
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B
Yeah.
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C
And, and, and who I understand have, have diminished appetite for that which had gotten them where they had gone. And so you know, if, if you're, if you're vending a lot, a lot of products that are vulnerable to the appetite suppressant effect of GLP1, you've got a factor you have to deal with. Now mind you, GLP1 has some adverse consequences relating to proteins and peptides, I think. And so guess what nest he's making. Take home frozen peptide protein bars and sound horrible. But you know, it's an effort to try to recover something that, that is now deficient because of the shift of everyone to one to one side of the boat as opposed to the other. Yeah, that's the most profound one that I've seen.
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B
Okay, so that may be a slight, you know, present a slightly different scenario
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C
to
- [30:43]
B
what it's been in the past. Can we just talk about, I mean it sort of relates to what we've discussed now, Tom, the fact that many of these consumer goods companies have had a difficult time over the last three or five years as a consumer goods focused investor.
- [31:00]
C
Yes.
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B
You know, I look back to say the late 90s again, you know, many investors with that kind of focus went through a difficult time in terms of performance.
- [31:11]
C
Yes.
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B
Could you just share a few thoughts around how do you deal with emotionally, how do you deal with periods like that? You know, you've been there before and you've come out of it and that's just the sort of the natural cycle of the market, I guess. But you know, how do you have conviction when you, when you're in the middle of a storm like that that things will, things will somehow be right again?
- [31:36]
C
Yeah, no, I think, I think we have Heineken as a great example. It is, is, is still meaningfully under owned in terms of, even compared to its, its beverage alcohol world counterparts. It's family controlled and they, they kind of travel to their own tune. And example was several years ago their, their largest, their equally sized competitor in Brazil put itself up for sale and well, Wall street got behind it and they were hawking it aggressively. And they went to Heineken and they looked at it and they had a business in Brazil and they knew the business that was for sale. They sort of had a sense of, of where it fit. And sure enough, someone else, Kieran won the lucky buyer award and paid $5 billion to it. Heineken reputation with the sell side diminished because they didn't do what they were told to do. Five years later it was a different story when Kieran came back to Brazil with what was left of that business and offered it for sale. And Heineken, you know, clamored to get the book. They were discouraged or even thinking about it by the same sell side folks who drove them to a $5 billion offer. And so they bought it back for 700 million. And that sort of, you know, the, the management team would have hit all sorts of performance bonuses if they had done the deal. The Wall street wouldn't savage the stock and risk their jobs and the standard would have played out. But in this case, Heineken is $4 billion better off as they now go into the investments that will really make them terrific returns. So Brazil, the merger took place. Heineken green bottle is its largest market in the world, is Brazil. It is the leader in that market. And so that whole story, chapter and verse of the family control was really essential there. Now, looking forward, they have, they have a 66% market share in India, where the consumption is only 2 liters of beer per capita per year. It's 28 or 30. In China, China has a joint venture with Snowy Beer at the premium end. They're driving premium growth. Heineken even, even during the massive troubles that the consumer in Japan's having, Heineken brands have been up straight through there. And even, even now, Amstel year over year, sales were up 100%. Small but, but growing in a nice direction. And in both cases I run the risk of a childhood fantasy, which is as a child, you say if you could only sell a wriggly stick of chewing gum to everyone in China, you could retire phenomenally rich. We follow that mantra. We haven't had a great success at it. But in the case of China and India both in beer, each country will have more than 20 million new entrants into the legal drinking age this year. And for most of the next five years, by virtue of the birth and the aging of the population, we haven't seen the arrival of that. We've seen a tremendous amount of investment being made, which is doing nothing but suppressing results, reported results in the search for more intrinsic value. And that's really what we look for.
- [35:34]
B
Can I follow up on that, Tom?
- [35:35]
C
Sure.
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B
The idea of capacity to suffer and being very long term about the way you invest.
- [35:41]
C
Yes,
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B
I love the concept, but my question is how much capacity to suffer and as an investor in these companies, how long can you wait? So two examples that come to mind are, one is Heineken, which we've just discussed. I look at share price performance over the last 10 years. You know, I think Heineken holding is effectively trading where it was a decade ago.
- [36:08]
C
Yeah.
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B
And the other one, and look, I know there's all kinds of industry shifts, et cetera going on, but. And the other one I think can think of is international premium spirits in China, which for decades has been an expectation that, you know, it's been a long low single digit percentage of the overall market. Because Baiji has had a such a grip on, on the Chinese market.
- [36:31]
C
Yes.
- [36:32]
B
And some companies like Perno has, have very sort of patiently invested in that market. But even, even if you have the capacity to suffer, 10 and 20 and 30 years is a long time. So.
- [36:45]
C
Yes.
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B
How do you sort of assess that? You know, when do you think, you know, long term is sort of too long term. When, when do you lose your patience with, with some of these investments, you know.
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C
Yeah. Well, the one thing that helps is you can always leave. You're committed to an investment, but with time you have to make the hard decisions and it's often made for you by virtue of something else is more attractive. And patience, where it's thin and then you. Charlie Munger has an expression, you know, never give your partner a reason to look elsewhere for satisfaction. And you know, at that moment, failure to deliver over a very long period of time invites the question of whether you really understand it as well as you thought. And so we, I believe an enormous amount of the under, under delivery and under promise of the beverage alcohol industry, which we have investments in, has just been sort of poor strategic choices. The products. There's been a belief in the industry held by the industry that in order to gain market share, the brand owners over, over retail, they have to have a reason why the retailer has to buy what they have and the reason that they believe it is so as if they have a bourbon, a brandy, a champagne and a vodka. If you have those four portfolio holdings in your own distribution, then you can use the clout of your premium scotch whiskey to drive vodka or gin. Business that you would otherwise not get. I'm, I'm quite convinced. And you can just see what happened with Braun Foreman. That's a great story. They stuck to their knitting and having a horrible experience where they did what is a nasty thing to do, which was at the point at which bourbon was given castaway status in the 1980s, 1986. Because. Because they were being supplanted by California Cooler and all sorts of Alco Pops, just like today. And their response was let's bet the ranch on the enduring virtue of alcohol pop. And almost when the paint still was wet on the signature page of the deal, that business went away, leaving Broad Pharma with half a billion dollar charge and a commitment to take all of the free cash flow that existed from the mature US business and deploy it globally in support of growth of Jack. And over the next 30 years, it moved from 300,000 cases internationally of Jack Daniels to almost 15 million. And that was absolutely spectacular. On top of that, they, they premiumized their portfolio by, by inventing a brand called Woodford Reserve.
- [40:19]
B
Yeah.
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C
Which has grown from nothing to two, two plus million. Highly premium price. Now if, if we had just taken everything that they did with bourbon and, and sort of let the rest of the moves fall away, that would have been a spectacular investment. They did exactly what they know and the, and the reason why it works so well for them is their family control. And there was a perception that they were invincibly independent. That was pierced recently by, by Sazerac who, who offered to buy them. So you have Fireball at $2 a fifth, buying the parent company of Woodford Reserve at $60 a fifth and just, just a function of, I think, you know, sticking, sticking to what you do well through a downturn and just be very, very careful not to try to borrow someone else's brand equity because you just paid too much. And the businesses now struggle because they're leveraged.
- [41:30]
B
Yeah. To, to the, to what you just said, Tom. I think the best performing of the listed spirits groups, I think over the last 20 years has probably been Campari. And they've, they've been very focused.
- [41:40]
C
Right.
- [41:40]
B
They've stuck, they've stuck to. Yes, you know, the sort of bitters and imperatives.
- [41:45]
C
Yeah.
- [41:45]
B
They've done incredibly well on the back of that. Spectacular. We touched on this previously. But the example of Diageo's new CEO now saying they will sort of double down, if that's the right word on RTDs, should presumably make us a little bit sort of uncomfortable.
- [42:05]
C
I personally don't think there's much brand equity. Ultimately it's portable, it's sweet and it, it, you know it's, it gets you socially lubricated and, and so the other, the other product line that's given bright future by forecasts is mocktails. Yeah. Alcohol, free spirits. And I, I can't see a real role to play. I think it, you may have a different thought on it but in any event, I mean the, the real story of the decade has been the march of, of Jack Daniels as a result of the spending that they had the prior 15 years to, to open up markets, absorb the losses that accompanied being less than a hundred thousand cases in the market. And then as those markets grew into that volume the margin that starts to expand going forward. And that's really where they were with Jack by opening up that distribution and then the cash flow went to underwrite the costs of developing and promoting Woodford. And all of that was internal.
- [43:31]
B
And so clearly if you go back 40 years, Brown Forman had a lot of. It was a very US centric business.
- [43:37]
C
Yes.
- [43:37]
B
And there was a lot of white space internationally. But if you look at these large listed groups today, whether it's in packaged foods or spirits or cosmetics, they're already relatively global.
- [43:48]
C
Yes.
- [43:48]
B
Do you feel there's still very significant sort of space to reinvest internationally for these groups?
- [43:54]
C
Well, it's very good question. I remember when we, when we went to visit Unilever in, in Indonesia and, and if you get outside the cities a house next door to your house may very well be the, the neighborhood market. It's in, it's in as under distinguished a facility as, as just the next house over with a whole whole facing of. Of the key and largely only the key brands now that, that shopkeeper if it's in India for example and they're in the center city near, near some of the projects that, that what is it? The proprietor serves as a lender. So child runs across the street, grabs a Fanta, comes running back home and as he leaves the guy checks it off and then you know that helps the, that provides a financing support and, and the child gets what the child wants. And, and, and there's, there's typically one company owns the outlet and but through the relationship with a retailer. And so it's, those are extremely hard markets to penetrate by outsiders. What's less hard is to get a moped once you've prospered a little bit and go out of town to the large new super center which didn't exist before. Yeah. And suddenly now you have, you have face to face competition and you have promotion. And there will be winners and there will be those who lose share from at the very start being the only one in town. Warren. Warren has made clear that his goal in finding business invested is that they're the only game in town with great insurance offerings. At the moment when things seem most dire and you have to find a place to go for insurance, you have to in some ways go to Berkshire, where the character is such that they won't litigate you before trying to pay you less. Or where they may have hypothecated their capital in support of a private credit offering with 10 extra basis points, but heavily leveraged. So they see through where they need to go to get value for their money. They also recognize that the money they'll campaign over is extremely high because it's in some cases it's price inelastic demand. And that's really at the heart of everything that we strive to get. And that's why the brands have that. They carve that out in the category they serve if they're really effective. I think our poster child for that business is Martin Marietta Materials, which is a regionally specified, relatively small service area that you can service by bringing crushed stone into a work site. And that business has been one of the real greats because you raise prices just a little bit and have it drop right to the bottom line. Nothing changes other than price and the consumer has nowhere else to go. So they have to sort of in some ways take it. And, and the job for the quarries is not to be overly greedy because then they could trigger sort of Armageddon with the zoning of new competitive quarries in a marketplace at which point you sort of have your revenue per unit. But they're smart enough not to do that casually.
- [47:59]
B
On the, on that point, Tom, I know you have, especially in recent years, made a few investments or, or more investments outside of your sort of traditional domain. Right. So you know, you just mentioned. Well, actually that's a long standing holding. But, but if I look at Alphabet.
- [48:14]
C
Yes.
- [48:14]
B
Eurofins, which is more recent. Sunbelt, which, which used to be ashted, I think.
- [48:19]
C
Yes, exactly, yeah.
- [48:20]
B
Are these, are these holdings sort of purely driven by bottom ups, company specific considerations, or are they in any part an attempt or ambition to sort of diversify your portfolio away from the traditional consumer goods space that you focused on?
- [48:41]
C
I think you touched upon it a couple of times. It just has become so hard to drive revenue growth in those large and more mature markets and those large and more mature categories in those markets. And so you'll find, you know, it's all of those have really I think express the quality of my partner Timothy Quinn, who's the portfolio manager of Sempervig Partners which is the investment that we hold forth from 1983 to the present as the model portfolio. He's the portfolio manager along with Christopher Russo and and then a bench of Columbia University trained deep research talent as our, as our R D and our research team. And they just opened up the aperture a little bit. Now the aperture that was opened up that had a scent of technology really starts with a belief that I shared with my trade, my portfolio manager about the value of the information that a billing network has. If ever they were going to be allowed to take advantage of it, you really wanted to be there. And so it came public, it became a hedge fund darling. It went straight to the moon and then dropped 90%. All along the way they were growing their units of network charges at a double digit level and they did it while showing an operating margin that was lower than visas. And the reason for that was not properly kind of expressed but it was because they were making so many more investments in alternative payment systems that they burdened their income statement with far more than what these was prepared to do. And that was just an election to make sure that they didn't get sideswiped by a startup provider. And so they went through a series of defensive moves but by and large they were full throttle to take advantage of the technology enhancements of the product in terms of payments. So today if you go into the subway in New York City, you're going to swipe your card and you'll be paid up in full within seconds. No cash, no anything. These payment cards on fobs penetration has been phenomenal and their top line growth was, was maintained and the global growth was explosive and the shares have responded. That was probably the first kind of technology enabled and enhanced investment. Then followed not that far later with the collapse of Netflix. Now Netflix is about as far from removed with sort of how we carry ourselves. It has one thing which obviously turns out to be so critical in our mind which is that it was family controlled and founder led for periods of time. And, and they were, they were unfairly penalized in 22 when the shares dropped by almost 90% because they were looking at the possibility of first time ever churn at a sort of meager and modest 0.3%. So yes, it showed up. No, it wasn't very Material. Yes, the market thought it was and yes, the market went down 90%. Timothy, it turns out had been sort of watching and of course we've always had investments in media, in Scripps Media and central newspapers and Comcast. So what the difference there is with Netflix, you know, it became more about technology in terms of the investor's mind than it did from our perspective, which is this. Can they convince the consumers that there's nowhere else they can go other than Netflix to get all day parts for all viewers so that you turn it on, you've got yourself, you've got yourself a, a full screen of choices. And they, you know, they were spending twice as much of the top five competitors in terms of programming they were introducing. This is all at the time that the shares had dropped 90% they were introducing advertising, they were, they're charging people for their partners usage and they're growing internationally like a, like a brush fire. And, and all of that based on sort of a quarterly miss on churn. We researched it deeply at the time and came away convinced that they did enjoy the standing of the one place where you can, the only place you can get it all. And so there's no adequate substitute. And so the business started to come back. The market recognized it and the shares sort of recovered extraordinary amount and it's continued to this day. Now along the way, you might be curious, how do we handle something like that? Well, we did let shares go as they doubled and tripled. The business was growing in value at a sharp pace. The market discount was closing. And so we did what we call rebalancing where the higher position, closer to intrinsic value is carved back a bit and then there's something where the opposite's taking place. In that case it could be Parano Ricard and, and, and it has hit an air pocket. Distance undervalued is great and, and some capital flows and with, with rebalancing we get more, we, we end up with more capital capital on the investment that is more undervalued.
- [55:17]
B
I just ask you a follow up there Tom, because if we, if we sort of relate that to Phil Fisher's book, I think he says there's almost no good reason to sell a great business.
- [55:26]
C
Yes.
- [55:27]
B
And I think that became a mantra after the financial crisis because a lot of investors who, who sort of did very well for a decade seem to follow that kind of philosophy.
- [55:39]
C
Yes.
- [55:39]
B
Clearly the idea that you trim some of these positions is slightly, you know, that suggests a slightly different view. Do you have concerns around, you know, if you sell these winners that you sort of reduce the, the overall quality of the portfolio companies or how do you think around that?
- [55:58]
C
Oh, that's a good question. You know, if we were, if we were saying if you, if you don't stop investing in Waymo, we're going to sell your stock. The message to Google Management, or if you don't quit putting money into that stupid cloud. You put $25 billion into the cloud business and you have nothing to show for it. They said maybe, and they said we just as soon stayed the course. And you might have forgot to read it, but the IPO documents say that there'll be multiple classes of stock so that we can never get dislodged from our. What do they call it, moonshots, that they call it those investments because we believe so deeply in our capacity, you know, that that wasn't the case with us. We're ecstatic with it. And, and the move was relatively modest. It's one at 1%, plus or minus. And, and yet it's what, what reduces the exposure at ever higher prices as the business is growing at ever higher rates. But it then pulls forth exposure to something that is, we think, improperly dismissed by markets. But you're absolutely right about that. And the other time we sell is if the moves seem designed to satisfy near term objectives at the expense of the long term, that's where the farmer comes in, you know, so our job is to plant seeds and watch them vigorously to make sure that they take and they get protection. And then, you know, more later is how we think about that when it
- [57:46]
B
comes to that idea, Tom, of being a farmer as opposed to a hunter, which, you know, William refers to in his book.
- [57:52]
C
Yes.
- [57:55]
B
How do you determine? Well, there are two parts of my question. One is, does that introduce a certain element of risk? Because you're the payoff, you're pushing the payoff further out into the future. And a lot of things can happen in the meantime. Right. If you're investing for a payoff in five or 10 years time. And I guess the second one is, and I think you've said in the past, Tom, that the capacity to suffer doesn't mean you have to suffer. How do you determine? You know, how do you determine who's a good steward.
- [58:28]
C
Yeah.
- [58:29]
B
And who's a bad steward?
- [58:31]
C
I would observe that with Adelphia and Comcast, you know, it was a visit to the headquarters. Now, just as an aside, much like Phil Fisher said, never sell. Charlie Munger has been famous for having said, never meet with management because they're going to lie to you in any case and they're better at it in their field than you are at detecting it. And so never meet with management and of course most of the time you never want to. But when making a practice of it, you're rewarded for doing it. And so in the case of Adelphia small cable company just down the road from a large cable company called Comcast, the Adelphia family was milking the company at a personal level. They were, they were giving office decoration contracts annually to redo the entire, the entire office complex on a regular basis. Well, that's, that's because they had an interest. This concept of favoring decisions that favor your interest is something that we're seeing more of these days and it's very off putting. It's very dangerous when companies do it because it's hard to smoke it out with accounting tricks as they are.
- [60:06]
B
And in the case of Johan Ruppert, the chairman and controlling shareholder Richemont, Tom, I know you've, you're a big fan of him in terms of being a great steward of capital. Would you mind giving us a few thoughts on why you think he's such a good steward of capital? What sort of marks him out as a, as a very good capital allocator?
- [60:29]
C
Yeah, perfectly good question. Especially in the case of Johan. Johan is family controlled, he's, he's a former banker, he, he understands finance brilliantly. And I remember, you know, and then you just watch him operate. I, I was with him at one, one year, close to the first of the year and he came bursting into the office Furious with Stella McCartney who said she would no longer represent Chloe, I think it was, unless you could fly to and from the US on the Concorde. And he's, and she said Tom Ford gets to do that, so I want to, I want the same. And his response was rubbish. You'll be just fine if you, if you, you know, fly coach or like the rest of us. And so it was just, it was just the way he, he treated the Capitol and the requests on it, that's one thing. So you know, relatively disciplined in terms of spending. Second preference for buying for building rather than buying a preference for that. And so there's a great example in Moscow of two buildings that were mirror images of each other and they were high epoch, beautiful, gorgeous buildings in bad disrepair. One of them, they, they both had been in bad disrepair except the, the owner fixed up one elegantly and the other one was still a mess and they offered a fantastically cheap price for Johan to take the beautifully expensively restored building. And he ran the numbers, he said, no thanks, we'll buy the junk, we'll buy the dump. And the idea was that he knew that if he took the, the sort of, I call it, sucker bait of a low entry offer, that at some point, you know, when he's all established and that's the Cartier building and all of this, and that he loses the ability to walk away from it. And that is something that he, he just, he just didn't want to burden the company with. And so he chose to take the expensive, the, the more expensive route for the long term payback that he would enjoy. You know, years 20, 20 and beyond till eternity in the case of Cartier, he'll receive all, all the rent and all the glory. And, and so that was now I, I was with him. It happened to be over that, that sort of couple of days worth of vignettes. But I suppose every day like that is, is so with, with Johan and he has, he has big appetites and big passions and I, and you know, as best I can tell, they are properly shared with owners equally. So, and that's really what you want. You want a fair deal by, by the person who's allocating capital.
- [64:06]
B
So Tom, when we spoke about five or seven years ago and we discussed your research process, I think you said at the time you didn't use any expert networks, for instance, and you're very selective in your use of sell side research. And I think that goes all the way back to your time at Sequoia Fund where you never really saw sell side analysts and it was all internally generated. There are so many tools now in terms of generative AI and search and the likes. Would you mind sharing a few thoughts as to how your process might have changed? Do you use any of these tools today? Has the process changed in the last five, six, seven years?
- [64:50]
C
Yes, I think we definitely have. Voltaire said that he values most highly people who ask good questions more than people who give good answers. And I think the AI world is all about questioning the rewards will be owned by those who can frame the right question to get the fastest and the most actionable and the most rewarding outcomes. And so we think that those platforms are acceptable, they're permissible and would not venture if there are any doubt on that. We have, I think, think we have associations with Tegus and a couple of other providers and it's gotten to the point now where it's a pretty Routine investigation as to their process. And then I think we have benefited from the easy way it allows us to simply get public comments that have been made by decision makers of companies that we, that we are looking at or investing in where, where what they really offer us is the, is the ability to hear the head of, of, of Uber relatively new industry for us. No, in fact nobody really has had a presence. We end up now with both Uber and DoorDash. So it, and, and there's a blend between more or less international, more or less grocery, more or less restaurants and, and so in each case celebrated CEOs in the case of DoorDash founder, CEO and boy is he ever smart about allocating capital. And so you can hear about how he went forth at some point in a merger creating investment phase where he had the ability to do a global, a global reset of their, of their knowledge based on, on, on what they learned about, about the way that each company express what they were investing and how much in what in a public, in a forum that was sanitized. And so you know, those are, those are very valuable. There are lectures before associations that the businesses that we don't participate in, we can listen to those. So generally speaking very, very much aware of, of the stringent relationship between what you're allowed to have for non material, non public information. So I think we do a good job of that and I think that we do a really good job picking up on most of what is really the big bones of investment through our own research.
- [68:02]
B
So Tom, I know you spoke at the Value Investor Conference in Omaha recently which was a tribute to Charlie Munger. And one of the lessons you learned from Charlie was to ask the right questions. And so I wanted to ask you, when you go into a company meeting and when you research a business before investing, can you share some of the questions that you always ask a management team before you commit?
- [68:28]
C
Well, one thing I would definitely it's all very tiered. Your question should relate to what's on the mind of the person you're speaking to. And what's likely on the mind but not welcome is obviously earnings per share next quarter. And I will not even grace the subject because we're out 20 years and it just absolutely doesn't matter except for it may trigger a sell off, in which case we may find ourselves able to start to look at something we've long coveted but couldn't participate in because of valuation. And if we assess the 20th year still to be unaffected, a quarterly move, maybe an invitation to take advantage of that. So you have this notion of, for the president or the CEO of a company, my question is almost invariably how much can you profitably redirect back into this business to accelerate top line growth? And then what would be the, the channels through which that investment would most likely develop? That's, that's a broad question. The next level of question will be something what in the world are you finding to do with the powers that you are conferred using AI? What questions do you ask and what results have arisen? Those are pretty high order questions. And much like little Billy from Arkansas who asked Warren who'll win the Super Bowl? I mean, you know, any question I ask, even businesses we're really quite close to, you know, isn't going to be this the most important thing that they confront? That's, that's private confidential stuff that they guard as they should. But, but the broader question allows them to share with us what they think is important and appropriate.
- [70:40]
B
Can you share some thoughts on how much attention you pay to the supply versus demand side of the equation? And that would be what many investors call the capital cycle. So before you commit to a business or an industry, how much do you look at the dynamics in terms of production capacity, et cetera?
- [71:01]
C
I'm almost macro worried about the fragility that might be revealed from excess leverage that's coming as a result of private funds and all the rest. And so clearly wanting to know about flow funds is very important because huge, huge waves of funds, trillions of dollars have, have moved about and, and into, into the, the least regulated, the least reviewed and the highest levered pockets. That's one thing. And then think about AI and the hundreds of billions of dollars that Oracle has committed for what is it, 400 billion? I think that's right. And, and, and, and just right across. But when, when Google, who shares we own, announces what they, they've committed to, you have, you have the kind of, the, the benefit of knowing that they've made the investments all along the way that, that reveals in the process what they're going to invest in. Likely the, the best, the best of the breed, you know, anthropic, for example, instead of, instead of something that's, that that's more prone to stumble. And so you know, it's, it's the full stack of spending that has taken place over time with Google that influences the likelihood that the most recent capital flows that they take can pay off, even though up until now they may be only showing losses.
- [72:57]
B
And in terms of how much emphasis you put on Each of those two, would you be able to, you know, put a rough number on how much you focus on supply on the one hand and demand on the other?
- [73:10]
C
Probably, probably more on the latter than the former. 60, 40, let's say. Yeah, and, but, but the, but, but the willingness to spend is, is at the heart of, of what we think management who have the capacity to suffer can deliver that in turn, full, full potential returns from that which they start with if they have the ability to spend the right amount, increases the odds that they'll succeed at what they're doing if there's a risk in the project that it could delay or could disrupt plans. But I'd say all of that doesn't matter if the brands are mistaken. And I'd say that's really the story of the spirits industry. It's that massive amounts of capital traded hands in return for someone else's goodwill, which turned out to be bad will in so many of these highly prized acquisitions. And so you build a portfolio full of sort of secondary quality brands and forego your cash to do so. And I think you've been set back twice. Lack of knowledge about the brand, which is the 40%, but really the 60% is to send money after that stuff and that you can't recover.
- [74:54]
B
So one of the industries you've been invested in historically is the spirits business. And clearly, you know, as we're talking about the capital cycle, I think it's highly relevant in that industry and especially in some segments. So if you look at bourbon, for instance, over the last 5, 10, 15, 20 years, there's been very significant ups and downs and you've seen lots of capital going into and coming out of that industry. So do you want to share a few thoughts around that? I know, you know, you've been a long standing investor in Brown Forman, for instance. Do you have any thoughts as to where we are in that cycle today?
- [75:34]
C
So I mean, clearly Brown Farming has cut back its production this year by I think maybe 400,000 barrels. Jim Beam shut down a million barrels this year. So the big ones. And I think that's why you ended up with the announcement from AB when they said the marketplace is, you know, is dry, there's not that much around and we're seeing huge rebound in orders because if we look out over the World cup, we see a thirsty event and we don't have much in stock and suddenly that has moved on in the spirits industry. You're absolutely right, Christian. You have the, you have the bourbon. As you know, most, most Visible in, in history, they often refer to these as lakes. If there's the lake of vodka or there's a lake of Scotch or a lake of bourbon, I think, I think there's, I don't think there's a lake of Scotch. I think Scotch has been sort of de. Emphasized in a fairly, in a fairly meaningful way in terms of the forecasts. And bourbon, because it was doing well for so long, has the disadvantage of having had a lot of new cash come in about three years ago, which means that right about now those banks are looking for their loan back and the distillers are looking to see how much they have to discount what they're sending back.
- [77:16]
B
So one of the books we're discussing today is Phil Fisher's book. And I think Buffett early in his career tried to explain his investment philosophy by saying he was about 15% Phil Fisher and 85% Ben Graham. I think that was in the early 90s. And clearly his way of investing has changed and evolved since then. But would you be able to put yourself somewhere on that spectrum, Tom, in terms of how much of Fisher and how much of Graham there is in your investment philosophy?
- [77:48]
C
I'm, I'm at least 50. 50. And in part, I don't recall maybe did you say it was Peter lynch, but you I think said that someone said that you wouldn't, you wouldn't sell a great business. No, no reason to ever sell a great business. That, that moves me a little closer to parity between Fisher and, and Graham. But you know, Graham, Graham is just so, it's just so difficult today because one of the things that happens is historically, you know, you, you go in, there's a liquidating estate, everything was clear, you paid the money, you got your interest and you went off and sold it. You moved on to the next thing. Think of all the claims that spring to life when businesses die. You have environmental cleanup, you have health care litigation liabilities. And, and so you know, it, the, the, the, the clean nature of that bankruptcy oriented investing is, is, is diminished I think as society societal claims are increasingly demanding in, in that moment. Yeah. And then it, the other problem is it's not scalable. Now I'll say all this stuff but you know, we could have bought Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae some, you know, single digit multiple and they, they, they've had a remarkable recovery and that's kind of a quasi middle zone, but it was statistically cheap. And now we're looking for businesses that have franchise values and that explain why consumers can't do without their products or construction companies can't do without their bricks or their stone, but they can do without gypsum, which goes in the same property. So it's not universal.
- [80:06]
B
So, Tom, you've had a very long and distinguished career. I think you've been investing professionally for over 40 years now. And so could you, on the one hand, share some of the highlights of that, what's been the best part of investing over those 40 plus years? And also maybe could you share a few thoughts as to what do you expect and sort of look forward to over the next five and 10 years?
- [80:28]
C
Well, it's just been this extraordinary time as William talks about being able to associate with people who are by and large curious, ethical, principled, and in pursuit of sort of shared, you know, so shared adventure in some ways. And, and it's, you think about Bill Ruane and Warren. They had a trip each year to Lyford King and they were other points of call and they spent 10 days together with the topic being depreciation. Okay, why not? I mean, what, why not? Especially with people you really like and whose values you share. And so there's a camaraderie and collegiality I find is really rewarding. What's not to like about the hunt for value? It's hard, but Mr. Market helps. It helps it be at least partly doable. And so there, therein lies that notion of, of harvesting what you set down early on and, and staying with it. And, and that's, there's some, there's a cadence in life that comes about for having such purpose. And, you know, and then for me, it's part of this massive desire to put elements of life in the proper buckets. And the hunt for value means that you're hunting for information, you're reading voraciously and with a purpose. Those are the things that I, and then, you know, three meals a day, seven days a week, it's compensating and, You know, and you can impact lives. I mean, you can't imagine what it must be like for Warren to know there's a person who put $10,000 in something and it's now going to make Mount Sinai Medical School free for women.
- [83:03]
B
So at the Value Investor Conference in Omaha, I think you spoke about one of the other lessons you learned from Charlie, which is giving back. And I know, for instance, you've been involved with Columbia Business School for a long time. So one of, one of the things you've done There is the 5 by 5 by 5 student fund. Do you want to share a few sort of thoughts around that and other ways in which you've been giving back very generously?
- [83:31]
C
Well, I think my wife and I. So Jack McDonald had a closing slide on his class, his seminar, investment seminar, and it was have a folly. Have a folly. Charlie Munger has an expression, have a hobby. In Charlie's case, it was building. It was philanthropy and building, and it was the intersection of both. It's the Huntington Library in la. It would have been Dartmouth College, which is where my wife and I met. And it was where he was looking to build an 800 person dormitory. Didn't work. Finally, because there's too much granite in the soil, they couldn't get a place to build it, which is too bad. But so. And then when engaged in that process of building, he ends up coming up with this notion of circle of deserved trust. And so those were all the kind of points he made to me when I met him. Stanford Law School, when I had heard I was going to work for Sequoia Fund. He said, you'd like his person, but he said, you got to promise one thing, that you know, if. If it works and you succeed, you have to give it back. And so that was it. And in Stanford campus, all the buildings built by a guy named Arago. And he and Charlie struck each of those terms with a handshake, no contract in construction. So, and, and anyway, so Jack McDonald have a. Have a folly. Charlie have a hobby. For me, they're all with small letters. It's not like philanthropy with a capital P. We do what we can. And what would be the. Our academic institutions are where we tend to focus. So Columbia and Dartmouth and Stanford. Yeah. And Columbia has this extraordinary program called the Heilbrun center for Value Investing. And I'm on the board there, lucky to be so, because they're just so. They're just so respectful of the moniker that they enjoy, with Warren having been their illustrious alum. And the amount of energy that the school has as a result of its adjunct professorships is unrivaled. The study of investing is all about storytelling. And to have the stories told by none other than the participants is what you get at the Heilbron center for Value Investing. That's extraordinary. And so we support them. We did one thing there, which I was so honored that they allowed. It was the five by five by five, which was a program. And, you know, we'll see over time how stretching the holding period might increase the burden of knowledge up front to make sure that you have the capacity for the investment to project forward over time.
- [87:31]
B
So Tom, thank you for being so incredibly generous with your time today and also more generally for being so incredibly generous with the investment community in terms of educating and speaking at all kinds of conferences, etc. So thank you for that and look forward to speaking to you and seeing you soon.
- [87:52]
C
Every pleasure. Thanks so much. Bye.
- [87:57]
A
Thank you for listening to Investing by the Books, a podcast by Red Eye. Follow us on Twitter B reddi and email us at IB Podcast to improve. We'd love to hear your feedback so please rate and review us. Notice that the content in this podcast is not and shall not be construed as investment advice. This information is meant to be informative and for general purposes only. For full disclaimer visit redeye.ed se I'm your host Eddie Pomyan and until next time, I sincerely wish you the best of luck on your journey through life and investing.