The opportunity to buy a great business at an overly pessimistic price comes along rarely. American Express is one of those businesses and today irrational investors ran from the company driving the price down.

The New York Times has an interactive graphic that visually conveys the impact the current market crisis has had on the financial sector. It has market cap scaled regions for two time periods, September 12, 2008 and October 9, 2007. It would be interesting to have a similar chart by a value metric, such as book value.

Free cash flow (FCF) is king. Profits are great, but they don't count for much in the long-run if a company is not generating FCF.

On CNBC last week, Buffett revealed he is buying more stock in either American Express or Wells Fargo. Here is the argument for the former.

Warren Buffett tells CNBC's Becky Quick that he has been adding recently to one of the two stakes Berkshire Hathaway already has in a pair of financial stocks: American Express and Wells Fargo.

interesting stuff

Taking a look at some bargains I see floating around right now, from mechanical contractors to media.

Whitney Tilson and Andy Kilpatrick talk about Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway on CNBC.

"The value stocks favored by Tweedy, Browne haven't done very well lately. But if you are a true believer in value, that's all the more reason to be buying those stocks now."

Your humble editor is skeptical that this latest financial rally will turn out to be anything of substance… except another shorting opportunity when the time is right.

Mohnish Pabrai discusses his upcoming lunch with Warren Buffett, rates, fuel costs, India, and more.

Warren Buffett knows great businesses, and he's generous enough to share his wisdom through his letters to shareholders. By using the Magic Formula, we automatically find the good businesses from the poor ones.

The 30 stocks in the Dow Jones Industrials are trading for 82% of Morningstar.com's estimated fair value, which makes the Dow an undervalued 5-star market. Eleven of the 30 industrials are undervalued 5-star stocks, according to Morningstar.

In the eyes of many, the Oracle of Omaha -- whose Berkshire Hathaway holding company owns or has major stakes in many iconic brands, including Fruit of the Loom, Kraft Foods and Johnson & Johnson -- looks like a brand investor...

Vitaliy Katsenelson shares his professional research on American Express. There is also a link to his presentation regarding Joseph A. Bank.