Invest With the Masters

Scraping together enough coin to win the annual luncheon auction with Warren Buffett is probably beyond most investors' means. With the proceeds going to charity, this year's winning bidder forked over $2.63 million for the privilege.

Feast or famine
While we likely can't afford to break bread with the greats, we can peek at their stock ideas through their SEC filings. Here, we'll pore over some of the top investors' reports to see which stocks they've chosen as their best investments. We'll then check in with Motley Fool CAPS members to learn whether they agree.

First, a few caveats ...

• There's a delay between when the stocks were bought and when these investors filed their paperwork, so they might have sold out since.

• These legends may be hot investors now, but that can change in an instant. Bill Miller was a wunderkind after beating the market 15 years in a row. Then he went cold for three. He came back in 2009, but we don't know what 2010 will bring.

Contrary to popular opinion
So, do some further research, but in the meantime, let's take a look again at famed investor Kenneth Fisher, of Fisher Asset Management, the son of another legend Phillip Fisher but an investment prodigy himself. We looked at his trades this past August so let's see where he's gone since then.

Company: Fisher Asset Management
No. of Stocks Owned: 524
Top 5 Holdings: iMCSI Emerging Markets Index Fund, Baidu.com, Siemens, Occidental Petroleum, BASF
Top Sectors: health care, technology, consumer services

Like a number of the investing legends we've looked at, Fisher has a fairly diversified portfolio. Though he's added a number of new stocks, most of his top holdings have been constant, the one difference from the last time we looked is that Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) has dropped lower on the list. So let's look closer at a few of his other choices below.

Sources: GuruFocus and Motley Fool CAPS.

Price is what you pay
Almost two years ago the Fool's Jim Mueller identified banking concern BB&T as one of the best bargains of the decade. At the time, financial stocks were in the gutter, and many investors turned their backs on them. Jim was ahead of even some of the investing legends we've highlighted here who only this year started getting back into financial stocks in a big way.

One of the rationales for investing in BB&T was that it hadn't mortgaged its future nearly so much as others like bankrupt Ambac Financial had, or MBIA (NYSE: MBI) did in housing. With BB&T's stock double what it was when Jim just about nailed its nadir, the bank's CEO is looking to raise its dividend 15%, and he wants to be the first big bank to do so next year.

CAPS member sk8terman predicted last month the bank would raise its dividend:

Best regional bank, look for dividend boost very soon. Just reversed and is starting to break out. 2011 will be the year of the regional banks with major consolidation at bargain prices.

Tuning in to growth
Had Howard Stern not re-signed with Sirius XM Radio, it could have been a serious misstep for Fisher as the shock jock remains a top draw for the satellite radio champ. Yet, it's possible Fisher is a Stern fan and realized that these are antics he pulls every time his contract is up for renewal.

Even though Liberty Capital still owns a huge chunk of Sirius stock that hangs there for all to ponder, CAPS All-Star HollywoodDan says Sirius has made it over the hump and should improve from here:

Great CEO, dominant monopoly, improving financials. Merger should lower content acquisition costs. It will be standard in all cars and a great addition to mobile devices.

Dig, baby, dig!
Latin America is high on almost every investor's list of places to invest, and although Fisher owns preferred shares of Brazil's mining giant Vale, the potential for greater growth adheres to its common stock as well.

According to analysts, steel demand is expected to rise over 5% in 2011, which will spur demand in iron ore, allowing Vale, Rio Tinto (NYSE: RIO), and BHP Billiton (NYSE: BHP) to enjoy the increase higher prices will bring. Metal prices are already in record territory, and even with China trying to throw cold water on its economy, there doesn't seem to be much in store for the pressure that's building.

CAPS investor rjs157 views an investment in Vale as one in which all the trends are coming together in one place:

Brazilian metals and mining...play on emerging markets...company exports to several growing emerging market nations...go long

Value is what you get
Become an investing legend yourself by starting your own research on these stocks on Motley Fool CAPS. Read a company's financial reports, scrutinize key data and charts, and examine the comments your fellow investors have made, all from a stock's CAPS page.

Sign up today for the completely free service, and tell us whether these stocks are as good a value as these investing legends think they are.