Munger's Daily Journal upcoming meeting; The Fund That Does a Lot by Doing Nothing; Top 10 companies versus past decades; Question No. 6 to ask before you marry someone; Scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef
1) Charlie Munger's Daily Journal annual meeting will take place on Wednesday, February 12 at The Center at Cathedral Plaza, 555 W. Temple Street in downtown Los Angeles.
It starts at 10 a.m. with brief formalities and then Charlie will take questions from the 1,000-plus people in the audience for a couple of hours.
Munger is brilliant – always full of incredible insight and wisdom – so it's well worth the trip. Don't put this off, as he turns 96 on January 1 (though he's still razor-sharp)!
It's open to the public – you do not have to be a Berkshire or Daily Journal shareholder to attend.
If you come, please join me at the lunch and reception I'm hosting immediately afterward at a nearby location (to be determined). A free meal, good company, and stimulating conversation... what's not to like? Click here to register.
By the way... you can do this as a day trip (with no redeye) from New York City. I'm on the 5:40 a.m. JetBlue flight from JFK that lands at LAX just after 9 a.m., and there are a number of afternoon flights back.
2) I had never heard of this fund, but there are some great lessons in this Wall Street Journal article: The Fund That Does a Lot by Doing Nothing.
I've done the analysis and found – sickeningly – that I would have made a lot more money for my investors over the nearly 20 years I ran a hedge fund had I simply frozen my portfolio at pretty much any point in time. Excerpt:
Rip van Winkle, who took a drink from the wrong keg and spent the next 20 years snoring, was a newbie at sleeping. Let me tell you about a mutual fund that bought a few stocks 84 years ago and hasn't moved a muscle ever since.
The fund, known today as Voya Corporate Leaders Trust, was launched Nov. 18, 1935, with its hands tied. It would hold the identical number of shares in each of its 30 stocks. It could never buy new holdings or sell out of its existing ones unless a company went bankrupt, underwent a merger or became "inadvisable" to keep. Corporate Leaders became a portfolio frozen in time.
Crazy?
Not at all.
Corporate Leaders is so old, nobody seems to know its performance back to 1935. Between the beginning of 1970 and Nov. 30, 2019, the fund gained an average of 11.1% annually, according to Morningstar Inc.; the S&P 500 returned 10.5% annually over the same period. Corporate Leaders ranks 16th among the 62 U.S. stock funds that have been around since 1970. That's a stellar result for a fund that doesn't even have a portfolio manager.
3) A fascinating look at the 10 companies with the highest market cap today versus 10, 20, 30, and 40 years ago. What a credit to Microsoft (MSFT) that it was on top 20 years ago, fell to fifth place a decade ago, and is now back on top...
4) Question No. 6 to ask before you marry someone:
Does he or she like to do fun things and have a zest for life? Is he or she a happy and optimistic person? Does he or she have a good sense of humor and make you laugh?
There are so many people who look great on paper – they're nice, went to a good school, have a solid job, etc. – but are just, well... boring. You don't want to be married to someone like that, unless that's what you're looking for...
5) I checked off one of the things on my lifetime bucket list today: I went scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef – three times! (My wife and daughters snorkeled above me.) We saw tons of fish, lots of beautiful coral, a shark, ray, and two turtles.
Here are some pictures (I posted more on Facebook) and I've posted two short video clips of the shark and turtles I saw here.
Best regards,
Whitney