These 2 Stocks Are Undervalued

• Report this Comment On February 13, 2012, at 7:05 PM, 3Fairfield wrote:

  Hi, Guys, Newbie here, so just learning, but I am interested in specialty insurance stocks and mid-caps and caught your reference to MKL and of course Berkshire.

  I seem to see MKL glowingly mentioned often on blogs and in the news and I know it's a good company. Indeed it appears that the company retains some kind of glamour in the media that other insurance stocks don't have.

  I am not a v.good numbers cruncher yet, but I did give a glance to some basic ratios and graphs from MKL and other companies in the specialty/ P&C insurance sector that look pretty good, so is it possible for one of you to explain why MKL is exceptional compared to say, White Mountain or American Financial Group, for example? Fairfax or Berkley are two others that come to mind.

  I understand that Gaynor, the MKL portfolio mgr., is v. good, but there are other managers who are talented too.

  I am thinking that MKL does a good job of marketing their stock and telling their 'story' to analysts and investors and the other companies are quieter in going about their business. But there must be more...?

  I know just a little about these companies--a close relative was involved in insurance litigation and has worked for most all of them in the past and we have stock in a few but maybe we should be more focused in our choices?

  Thanks. J.

• Report this Comment On February 17, 2012, at 4:33 PM, Thuddd wrote:

  Markel has been beaten by the Nasdaq, Dow, and S&P500 indexes for the last 1,3 and 5 year periods.

  I bought in 2008, based partly on the Fools recommendation that MKL was the best stock in the world. At that point, it was down about $175 from the 2007 high. It's now about $35 higher than that initial buy. The obligatory 160 point drop in February, 2009 was part my ownership experience, so being stable is not a big sell.

  It's not the best stock in the world.

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