Manny Friedman is the CEO of EJF Capital, a firm he co-founded in 2005 that manages $9 billion with a focus on the financial services industry. Manny started EJF after his retirement from Friedman, Billings, Ramsey Group, Inc., a company he co-founded in 1989 and served as Co-Chairman and Co-Chief Executive Officer.  Our conversation looks back at Manny’s lifelong passion for investing, the globalization of markets, and the financial crisis, and then looks forward at the newly created economic opportunity zones, long-term impact of government stimulus, stranded assets created by technological change, regulation, and philanthropy. Learn More Discuss show and Read the Transcript Join Ted's mailing list at CapitalAllocatorsPodcast.com Join the Capital Allocators Forum Write a review on iTunes Follow Ted on twitter at @tseides For more episodes go to CapitalAllocatorsPodcast.com/Podcast

Tom Russo is the Managing Member of Gardner Russo & Gardner.  Tom and I sat down in Episode 16 to discuss his background and investment strategy in what was one of the most popular episodes on the show.  He oversees $13B in a global value strategy focused on family-operated public companies. Our second conversation is a two-part episode for this week and next.  First, we talk solely about his holding in Berkshire Hathaway, a stock he first bought 38 years ago. The conversation covers Tom’s initial purchase of Berkshire, company meetings, reaffirming his thesis and search for disconfirming information, the genius of Warren Buffett, research on Mitek, cross-fertilization of Berkshire’s CEOs, the subdivisions of insurance, public market investments and regulated businesses, valuation, compensation, Berkshire after Warren, and Tom’s sell discipline. We close with a teaser for next week’s episode, as Tom reveals the name of the first significant stock he’s bought for his clients in eight years. Learn More   Discuss show and Read the Transcript   Join Ted's mailing list at CapitalAllocatorsPodcast.com   Join the Capital Allocators Forum   Write a review on iTunes   Follow Ted on twitter at @tseides   For more episodes go to CapitalAllocatorsPodcast.com/Podcast