For nearly four decades, the Netherlands enjoyed remarkable price stability. Between 1983 and 2022, inflation rarely made headlines, surpassing 3% in only four years, with a peak of 4.5% in 2002. This era of predictable prices came to an abrupt end in 2022, when inflation surged to a striking 10%, thrusting the topic back into …
Continue reading Inflation Misunderstood: More Than Just Rising Prices
In this article, I want to shed some light on the financial statements of Berkshire Hathaway. Berkshire is a company that can best be described as a diverse collection of businesses, consisting of a large insurance segment, wholly-owned subsidiaries in a variety of industries such as retail and manufacturing, partly-owned businesses in the form of …
Continue reading Berkshire Hathaway: from GAAP to Economic Reality
In the investment management industry, success isn't just about picking the right stocks—it's about partnering with the right investors. The importance of this relationship becomes particularly evident during market downturns, when investment philosophies are truly tested. The Critical Role of Investor Alignment When markets decline and uncertainty rises, many investors naturally feel uneasy about their …
Continue reading The Investor-Manager Match: Why Compatible Capital is the Key to Long-Term Success
I have always regarded Nestlé as a high quality company. They have a broad portfolio of high quality brands like Nespresso and a significant stake (20,1% as of this writing) in L'Oréal, which is a high quality company in its own right. That's why I was perplexed when I read the following in the 2024-half-year-report: …
Continue reading Nestlé’s Recent Destruction of Shareholder Value
Preface Recently my siblings from the States were visiting Amsterdam. While chatting we inevitably landed on the topic of investing. They were interested in the topic, but didn't know much about it yet. So I promised them to write a letter where I explain what investing is, in the simplest and clearest possible way. Article …
Continue reading The Fundamentals of Investing in Companies: for beginners
What is value? Value is a multifaceted concept that encompasses anything that improves someone’s life. This improvement can be objective, such as food for survival, or subjective, like a Pokémon card triggering a nostalgic feeling. Each individual perceives the value of a given service or good differently. In a market, the average perceived value among …
Over the past few years I've spent a lot of time on both investing and weight lifting. It occurred to me that consistency is key to succeeding in any one of them. Both require sacrifice and in both cases the results are not directly observable. Both disciplines require delayed gratification. Delayed gratification is forgoing short …
Continue reading The Fundamental Difference in Results: Investing vs. Weight Lifting
The average Joe's life will typically consist of working a median income job for 40 years or so, until retirement age which is currently 67. Al tough it is highly likely that this will be higher by the time I will get to retirement age (I'm 28 while writing this). So, what does this have …
Continue reading Why the average Joe should invest (in stocks)
Roman Esseveld 