Manual Entry MOS Calculator for Microsoft Excel

[ejx]

Justin:

I am a long time, but not expert, user of Excel and a long time, and even less expert, investor. In reading your posts about some of the difficulties that you have encountered in getting and keeping the MOS calculators up and running, I had a thought which you might want to consider.

First, I don't want any of the comments I make to be regarded as a criticism of any person or any of the activities that have been undertaken to produce such an awesome tool. I am guessing that the major difficulties are associated with web enquiries (about which I know nothing) and the likelihood that free data sources are likely to change things from time to time. I fear that those remarkable individuals who have been so free with their time in creating the spreadsheet may lose their enthusiasm if they feel obligated to perform surgery every few days to keep it operational. Also, it is most unfair for those run-of-mill members such as myself to expect (or at least hopee for) so much and contribute so little. I suspect that some members find the spreadsheet most useful in calculating the growth rate based on BVPS, the sticker price, and the MOS. For someone like me, I don't find the calculations too difficult but it is very time consuming to look up the data points and the spreadsheet when operational is a marvelous time saver.

I have only the vaguest hope that my suggestion has, on balance, much merit so I will not feel badly if it is disregarded out of hand. Even if it has merit, the result will not even approach the goals that may be within reach if the current difficulties can be overcome by the efforts you appear to be making. In short, I hope that an alternative strategy such as that suggested below will not suggest that the more ambitious efforts should be abandoned.

What I have in mind is soliciting the cooperation of the members to supply some minimum number of data points for only one or perhaps a few stocks. Members who know nothing about Excel could presumably look up the agreed-upon numbers from an agreed-upon source such as MSN or perhaps even SEC filings. Phil's book describes how to find most of the essential numbers on MSN and I am guessing that most of the members have access to his book. The results could then be emailed in a standard format or in some way made available to the spreadsheet authors so as to eliminate the web inquiries by accessing the data base instead. I suspect that the burden placed on the volunteer members should be relatively meagre. If the amount of time required is perceived to be excessive, there may not be enough volunteers to produce a very useful data base and even if there are a great number of enthusiastic volunteers, their enthusiasm may wane over time if the amount of time required is greater than anticipated. I would imagine that most members have a watch list of at least a few stocks that they are already researching so it shouldn't me too much of a burden to supply data for one or two of them.

I have not given a lot of thought to this (which may be obvious) and there are a lot of potential problems. If riding herd on a dozen volunteer Excel contributors is a problem, imagine the difficulties involved in attempting to mpnotpr 1000 (say) volunteer data contributors. In order to get some kind of reliability in the data reporting, it might be necessary to have two (or perhaps even more) volunteers for each stock. It might even be desirable to get them to cooperate via email with each other to resolve discrepancies in their report before it is submitted for the data base. It might be necessary to prepare a 'how-to' manual for the volunteers to guarantee that all are following some standard. It might be desirable to require that a stock pass some minimal screen even before it becomes a candidate for the data base. For example, there are a ton of potentially great buys that are currently not even close to passing a Rule#1 screen.

[Gunnski]

I'll do my MOS by hand. Thanks.....

[npg]

Originally Posted by Gunnski

I'll do my MOS by hand. Thanks.....

Indeed.

Any tool will give you a good starting point but only take an investor up to a certain point where he still needs to outweigh and analyse the probabilites of his bet succeeding.

That's right. I said it. It's a BET. Acknowledging this is a very powerful insight. I am pretty sure that WB would agree with this. Effectively, we are dealing with Bayesian logic here. Getting the philosophy right on how to define the goal poasts for this bet is what matters.

The calculations outlined in Phil's book ---as well as the 3 tools give you--- is a shift in the probabilites of an event occurring. However, assuming this as a 'fait accompli' will only lead to disapointments and frustrations.

Taking a few steps aside on what is going on in market theory, one could conclude that this is a battle of philosophies and viewpoints, and so far Buffy and Mungy (soz lads), are leading the pack and beat the casino.

And here is the shocking news. Yes, investing is a BET. But that doesn't mean you have to behave like a muppet. Also, since it is a bet an appreciation of basic statistics and probability theory will undoubtedly benefit the intelligent investor as demonstrated by Munger and Buffet.

To be fair, people give far too much credit but Buffet and overlook Munger. Charlies insights into how mindscapes and perception work is undeniably one of the most important catalysts in Berkshire's success (and generally a very intersting insight into all aspects of life). Asumming this to be the most likely case, it's a dreadful situation for Berk to plan ahead for the future. Not only does Berk has to look for a replacement for Buffet, but also for Munger. And now (Bayesian style), to complicate the matter even further, Berk would have to either find an individual able to replace the pair of them, or two (or more) individuals able to achieve such a fruitful partnership florishing at heights at least equal to the present yardstick to keep it's current status quo intact.

Interesting odds ;)

If you would be a prospective investor in Berk this is one of the lines of reasoning that you might most probably have to face if you want to take the long term view. How you evaluate any of the variables in this equation depends on your judgement, understanding and insight.

What I urge you to think about is to process the information Phil has given you in a similar manner. They are starting points which help you to work out the odds of an outcome. The most important factor however, is your judgement and insight.

No spreadsheet and graph can do this work with a reliably satisfactory and reproductible outcome to date.

Forget the formulas. Think about the business and the people involved!!!!!

[mta6]

First of all, a huge thanks for all of what you are doing.
Just one question i have - do you think you can make those 2 great Excel spreadsheet adapted to the data from ADVFN.com website?
I think many users in this community will be glade to have this kind of tool.

thanks

[petekoch]

Originally Posted by mta6

Just one question i have - do you think you can make those 2 great Excel spreadsheet adapted to the data from ADVFN.com website?

I'm tempted to bite. I'm not finding many longs out there, so creating such a spreadsheet looks like a nice diversion. But I just registered at ADVFN.com and its presentation of the financial statements is different from MSN's. Will take some adjusting. Could take weeks or months, depending upon my enthusiasm, the state of my attention span, altruism levels and sun spots.

Originally Posted by mta6

I think many users in this community will be glad to have this kind of tool.thanks

After just a quick look at the ADVFN data, I'm wondering what the advantage over the MSN data is? I know MSN occasionally changes its presentations/formats. Why do you think that ADVFN won't occasionally do the same? After all, it's free data.

How long has ADVFN been around? Will ADVFN, like many other sites, go to a 'pay only' format? Or will they even be around in a year or two? I'm pretty sure MSN and Yahoo will still be out there. I just (rather successfully, I think) duplicated Value Pro's website in a spreadsheet, just in case they tire of maintaining the site and pull the plug.

As much as I think I might like to tackle this, what's the upside? After all, getting the numbers is just a small part of the whole investment decision.

[petekoch]

OOOOPS !

I'm talking about at the Automatic spreadsheet. I don't use the manual entry version and have no plans to.

[petekoch]

After thinking about it for a while, I'll pass.

This looks more instructional and worthwhile pasttime.

Damodaran Online: Home Page for Aswath Damodaran

[Majik4]

I am hoping you can answer my question. Given some of your postings, you must have access to Phil's calculator or did at some point. I just finished reading his book, wanted to use his calculator to start paper trading and I can't get access. I have registered at Phil's website several times and fill out contact forms and no response whatsoever. Is access only granted to a select group of people.? I am confused. I thought it was free. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[dcarlson53]

It is available to any one when I first register it took me a couple of times before it work but that was because the email they sent to activate my user name and password was blocked you might check your settings

[dgriessmann]

Originally Posted by Mortimer

Does anyone have any experience with the excel spread sheet download at RULE1NUMBERS.COM? I'm just playing with the spread sheet set ups and came across it during a google search for more rule one stuff. Interested in some input.

I'd love to know if anyone has used this site as well. If so, is it worth it?