Fairfax Vs. the Shorts

摘要

FAIRFAX FINANCIAL HOLD-ings Ltd. says it sees shares of struggling Overstock.com Inc. as a bargain. But it's pretty clear that there's more to Fairfax, interest in the online retailer than that. Since February, Fairfax, a Toronto insurer, has emerged as Overstock's biggest outside backer. With the addition of nearly a million shares in early May, Fairfax now owns 11.5 percent of Overstock, worth 50 million dollars. The latest buy gave Overstock a cash infusion it badly needed and fueled speculation about an alliance between its CEO, Patrick M. Byrne, a vociferous critic of short-sellers, and Fairfax CEO V. Prem Watsa, who has faced his own long battle against the shorts. Watsa, who during happier times in the early 1990s heard himself called "the Warren Buffett of the North," believes that Overstock's beaten-down shares now simply represent good value. But with roughly 3 million, or 18 percent, of Fairfax' own shares sold short, Watsa sympathizes with Byrne's pronouncements that short-sellers and certain research analysts have unfairly targeted Overstock. "We look at their experience and see similarities," says Watsa. "We don't know why this is happening to us."