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Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: James Clarke who wrote (3723)	4/8/1998 4:42:00 PM
From: Daniel Chisholm	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 78516

...because the valuable assets were on the balance sheet at cost 50 years ago. OK, I've seen mention of finding companies with assets that substantially exceed their balance sheet value (usually real estate) My question is, how does one ferret out balance sheets that could stand a bit more scrutiny, and then how does one essentially "audit" the balance sheet in order to mark up/down such assets? Is this the sort of thing that is only practical in limited "special situations" (e.g., personal familiarity with the company and its assets)? For example, how could I have dug up St. Joe, since don't live in Florida? If someone had told me a year ago that there is great hidden value in this company (but gave me no more information than that), how could I have done my homework and been able to confirm or deny that? What sort of clues help steer you toward undiscovered value plays? - Daniel P.S. It has been suggested to me that Inco may be a very solid long term value play. I would like to get a good solid understanding of Inco, and must admit that I am somewhat stumped on how to proceed. Hidden assets? Hidden liabilities? Quality of assets, earnings, etc? Has anyone dug up anything here?

To: James Clarke who wrote (3723)	4/10/1998 11:20:00 AM
From: Wright Sullivan	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 78516

James: Here's a good interview with Rummell, along with related links on St. Joe Corp. (SJP): tdo.com tdo.com tdo.com Nothing earthshaking here, but it sheds some light on SJP's moves in recent months. Two other large land holding stocks, similar in some ways to SJP: 1) TRC (Tejon Ranch), which owns a ton of land just North of Los Angeles. Martin Whitman (of TAVFX) is very fond of TRC. Has anyone on the value thread looked at TRC lately? 2)TPL (Texas Pacific Land Trust). I know virtually nothing about TPL but am going to look into it. Also, does anyone have any comments on FLA (Florida East Coast RR, 54% owned by SJP)? They are a good RR and own lots of Florida real estate. To all: Keep up the good work on this thread.