importance of margin of safety

Hello friends, in today’s article, we see The Dhandho Investor:- Chapter 12, this chapter is all about the margin of safety while you invest in the stock market. so let’s understand this concept in the author’s words.

Previous Chapter 11

Dhandho 401: Margin of Safety – Always

In this chapter, the author refers the Benjamin graham’s book, the intelligent investor, the key idea of investing, and also the importance of the Margin of Safety. the author also gives examples of Warren Buffett’s investments.

so let’s understand it

the author says, ” Mr. Buffett hosts business school students from over 30 universities every year. The schools represent a wide range from Harvard and Yale to the University of Tennessee and Texas A&M.

the students get to ask him questions on almost any subject for over an hour before heading out to have lunch with Mr. Buffett at his favorite Steakhouse.

virtually every group asks Mr. Buffett for Book Recommendations. Mr. Buffett’s Consistent Best Book recommendation for several decades has been Benjamin Graham the “Intelligent Investor”

As he stated to students from Columbia Business in Omaha, Nebraska On March 24, 2006

The Intelligent Investor is still the best book on Investing, it has only three ideas you read need

• Chapter 8 – the Mr. Market analogy. Make the Stock Market Serve you. the C section of the Wall Street Journal is my business broker it quotes me prices every day that I can take or leave and there are no called strikes.
• A stock is a piece of a business. Never forget that you are buying a business that has an underlying value based on how much cash goes in and out.
• Chapter 20 – Margin of Safety, Make sure that you are buying a business for way less than you think it is conservatively worth.

— Warren Buffett

Graham’s perspective on the importance of the margin of safety seems pretty straightforward and simple. recall that Einstein’s five ascending levels of intellect were ” Smart, Intelligent, Brilliant, Generous, simple.”

When we buy an asset for substantially less than what it’s with, we reduce downside, risk, Graham’s Genious Was that he fixated on these two joint Realities.

1. The bigger the discount to intrinsic value the lower the risk.
2. the bigger the discount to intrinsic value, the higher the return.

Then the author talks about, papa Patel and Manilal and Branson’s Dhandho with Margin of safety

the author says, ” Papa Patel, & Manilal have likely never heard of Benjamin-Graham. Branson too has likely never read any of Graham’s books.

Their Dhandho journeys have always been all about the Minimization of risk. They’ve always fixated on the seemingly bizarre notion of ” the lower the risk, the higher the rewards.” (The Dhandho Investor:- Chapter 12)

Most of the top-ranked business schools around the world do not understand the fundamentals of margin of safety or Dhandho. for them, low risk and low returns go together as do high risk and high returns.

Over a lifetime, we all encounter scores, of low-risk, high-return bets. they exist in all facets of life. Business schools should be educating their students on how to seek out and exploit these opportunities.”

then the author gives, the example of Margin of Safety

the author says, ” One of the most vivid examples of margin of safety at work in the equity markets is Warren Buffett.

Observations about his purchase of the Washington Post in 1973.

We bought all of our { Washington Post ( WPC)} holding in Mid-1973 at a price of not more than one-fourth of the then per-share business value of the enterprise.

Calculating the price/value ratio required no unusual insights, most security analysts media, brokers, and media executives would have estimated WPC’s intrinsic business value at $400 to $500 million just as we did, and if $100 million stock market valuation was published daily for all to see.

Our Advantage, rather, was attitude; we had learned from Ben Graham that the key to successful investing was the purchase of shares in good businesses when market prices were at a large discount from underlying business values.

— Through 1973, and 1974, WPC continued to do fine as a business, and its intrinsic value grew. Nevertheless, by year-end 1974 our WPC holding showed a loss of about 25% with a market value of $8 million against our cost of $106 million. (The Dhandho Investor:- Chapter 12)

What we had bought ridiculously cheap a year earlier had become a good bit cheaper as the market, in its infinite wisdom, marked WPC stock down to well below 20 cents in the dollar of intrinsic value.

….. Warren Buffett

then author explains, how warren Buffett, gets this company at discounted prices

the author says, ” As inside, Mr. Buffett hasn’t sold a single share a Washington Post over the past 30 years of holding the stock.

that’s original $10.6 million dollar investment is now worth over $1.3 billion over 124 times the original investment. the Washinton post pays a modest dividend, now paid by the past to Berkshire Every year, exceeding the Amount Mr. Buffett paid for the stock in the first place.

Why was the Washinton Post Trading at such a large discount to intrinsic value in 1973/1974?

Mr. Buffett goes on to offer an explanation. Most institutional investors in early 1970, on the other hand, regarded business value as only mirror relevance when they were deciding the prices at which they would buy or sell.

this now seems hard to believe however these institutions were then under the spell of academics at prestigious business schools who were preaching a newly fashioned theory;

the stock market was totally efficient and therefore calculations of business value and even thought, itself, were of no importance in investment activities.

Warren Buffett says, ” We are enormously indebted to those academics what could be more advantageous in an intellectual contest – whether it be a bridge, chess, or stock selection than have opponents who have been taught that thinking is a waste of energy?”

Over the past 20 years, there hasn’t been much change in the thinking of institutional investors with regard to market efficiency as stated by charlie Munger when speaking at the 2004 Wesco annual meeting.

Charlie Munger:- Very few people have adopted our approach… maybe two percent of people will come into our corner of the tent, and the rest of the ninety-eight percent will believe what they’re been told ( p.g. that markets are totally efficient.)

It is instructive to note that Mr. Buffett bought his Washinton post stake at a 75% discount to intrinsic value.

As Benjamin Graham told Senator Fulbright, all discounts, to intrinsic value eventually lose.

Mr. Buffett knew that this gap was likely to close in a few years, whenever I make investments, I assume that the Gap is highly likely to close in three years or less. (The Dhandho Investor:- Chapter 12)

My own experience as a professional investor over the past seven years has been that the vast majority of gaps close in under 18 months.

Mr. Buffett has his Washinton Post stake for about $6.15 per share in $25 per share. let’s assume that the Washington Post got to at least 90% of its intrinsic value increased by a modest 10% a year.

So, in 1976, the business would be worth over $33.28 per share ( $25 * 1.1 * 1.1* 1.1), and 90% of that is about $30. If a person bought the Stock in 1973 and sold it in 1976, the annualized return would be about 70% a year. Let’s the kelly Formula and this one, let’s assume the following conservative odds.

Odds of making 4 times or better return in three years – 80%

Odds of making 2 times to 4 times or better return in three years  – 15%

Odds of Breakeven to 2 times – 4%

Odds of a Total loss  – 1%

In this case, the Kelly formula suggests that an investor bet 98.7% of the available bankroll on this mouthwatering opportunity.

At the time, Berkshire Hathaway had a total market capitalization of about $60 million.

Available cash was likely a small fraction of this member. I’d estimate that Mr. Buffett likely used well over 25% of hrs available bankroll on this bet.”

then author explains, Graham’s Fixation on the Margin of Safety

author says, ” Graham’s fixation on the Margin of Safety is understandable. Minimizing downside risk while maximizing the upside is a powerful concept. It is the reason Mr. Buffett has a net worth of over $40 Billion. he got there by taking minimal risk while always maximizing returns.

Most of the time, assets trade hands at or above their intrinsic value. the key, however, is to wait patiently for that super-fast pitch down the center. (The Dhandho Investor:- Chapter 12)

it is during times of extreme distress and pessimism that rationality goes out the window and prices of certain assets go well below their underlying intrinsic value.

Extreme Distress can be caused by macro-events like 9/11 or the Cuban Missile Crisis. or they can be company-specific- for example, Tyco’s Stock Price collapse during the Dennis Kozlowski Corruption Scandal. We can not predict which asset classes are likely to get distressed next. however, if we only focus on a single asset class of Stocks, that encompasses thousands of businesses.

Virtually every week, specific businesses that trade on public markets see their prices collapse. At other times it might be an entire sector that gets written off. More rarely it might be an entire market sells off due to a macro-shock like 9/11

Papa Patel, Manilal, Branson, Graham, Munger, and Buffett have always fixated on a large Margin of Safety and gone to great lengths to seek out low-risk, high-return bets.

it is truly a fortunes’ Formula.”

So this is all about the Dhandho Investor Chapter 12.

[Read more…] about The Dhandho Investor:- Chapter 12