Thursday, September 13, 2007

Consuelo Mack WealthTrack: September 7, 2007; Whitney Tilson, Jason Zweig, Hersh Cohen

JASON ZWEIG: I don't know that I'm fearful about the outlook for the markets, so much that I'm worried that investors don't really understand their own fears. I think that's the biggest issue here. The way the human brain works, it takes only 1200ths of a second, that's basically a third the length of the time it takes you to blink your eye, for people to register fear, consciously or unconsciously. The sight, the sound, the smell, red colors, arrows pointing downward, stock tickers, and charts going like this. People become fearful, and in the grip of fear, they cannot be rational. They cannot make a logical decision. And even unconscious fear can skew you're judgment and lead you to do something rash that you would never do in a calm moment.

WHITNEY TILSON: We haven't sold any Berkshire, and we continue to buy it and recommend it. It’s the only stock that’s been in their portfolio in almost nine years that we’ve been managing money professionally. So we are big fans, but recently, I'll echo exactly what Hersh said; generally speaking, stick with blue chip companies, strong balance sheets that can crank out growth even in a declining economy, that have a tail wind. Berkshire Hathaway qualifies, McDonald's, one of our top holdings, qualifies. And our largest position is now Target (TGT). It falls into the general category of very high quality, blue chip stocks, and every value guy owns some of them today, be it, Buffett has been buying Burlington Northern, and Johnson & Johnson, and Microsoft. So we think there are a lot of high quality 80-cent dollars out there. But we only own ones where we think there is a catalyst. As I mentioned before, I don't want to own 80-cent dollars --

CONSUELO MACK: And quickly the catalyst for Target is?

WHITNEY TILSON: Like Kraft, a very high quality activist involved, Pershing Square owns nearly 10% of the company. We're close to the situation, and we think there are some ways that Target can unlock some value, and Pershing Square has a great track record also.


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