Going to Value Investing Congress

I will be attending this year’s Value Investing Congress in New York City on October 6th and 7th. Thanks goes out to the organizers of this conference for sponsoring my registration. I am really excited about this opportunity to meet fellow value investors and to hear the current investment ideas of several leading professional investors.

This is the first time that I will be attending a public event on value investing. If you ever wanted to meet the mysterious blogger behind Fat Pitch Financials or the creator of Value Investing News, this event is your opportunity to meet me. I will try to make myself available during breaks, lunch and at the cocktail reception at the end of the day on October 6th.

You can recognize me from my image on my Twitter account. Just sign up for Twitter and then follow FatPitch to keep up with my whereabouts during the conference. In addition to posting my moves and observations on Twitter, I also plan on blogging from the Value Investing Congress if all goes well. I still need to get a better laptop before I head off to New York or I will be stuck using my old PocketPC.

I heard from Todd Sullivan of Value Plays that he will also be at Value Investing Congress NYC. I look forward to meeting Todd, one of the most active value investing bloggers that I know. I also just noticed that Jeff Matthews is a speaker on day 2 of the conference, so it appears that at least 3 bloggers will be at this event. I wonder if any other bloggers will also be attending. If a few other value bloggers make it to the conference or are in New York City during the event, maybe we can pull together some sort of meetup of our own. Please contact me if you are attending this meeting.

I just noticed that the agenda for Value Investing Conference NYC 2008 has been posted. It looks like on day 1 the speakers include the following:

• John Schwartz and Whitney Tilson of Schwartz Tilson Information presenting the Opening Remarks
• Mohnish Pabrai of Pabrai Investment Funds presenting The Dhando Investor: Interesting Times; Interesting Opportunities
• Bill Ackman of Pershing Square, LP presenting Remarks and Q&A
• John Burbank of Passport Capital presenting The American Perspective
• Jeffrey Schwarz of Metropolitan Capital Advisors, Inc. presenting “Taking What the Defense Gives You” – How watching the NFL helped make me a contrarian investor
• J. Carlo Cannell of Cannell Capital LLC presents Selling Short: Controversial Black Magic
• David Einhorn of Greenlight Capital presents Dangerous Public Displays of Sanity
• Thomas Russo of Gardner, Russo and Gardner presents Global Value Equity Investing
• Alexander Roepers of Atlantic Investment Management presents Constructive Shareholder Activism

The lineup of speakers on the first day is pretty amazing. I’m most looking forward to hearing Mohnish Pabrai and David Einhorn speak. I’ve read both of Pabrai’s books, so I particularly interested in hearing him talk. Day 2 of the conference looks equally promising. The speakers include the following:

• Boykin Curry of Eagle Capital presenting Time Arbitrage
• Kian Ghazi of Hawkshaw Capital Management presenting Investing With Conviction
• Leon Cooperman of Omega Advisors, Inc. presenting The Investment Climate and Some All Weather Stocks
• Aaron Edelheit of Sabre Value Management presenting Small Cap Diamonds in a Rough Market
• David Nierenberg of D3 Family Funds presenting Tech is not Dreck: Unlocking Shareholder Value in the Tech Wreck
• Jeff Matthews of Ram Partners LP presenting Evaluating GE: What Would Warren Do?
• Whitney Tilson & Glenn Tongue of T2 Partners presenting How to Profit From the Credit Crunch

As I’m sure you know, I’m very interested in arbitrage, so I’ll be listening carefully to Boykin Curry’s presentation. I’m also pretty excited to hear what fellow blogger, Jeff Matthews, will have to say.

In the meantime, I’ll be researching the backgrounds of many of the speakers in preparation for the Value Investing Congress. I’ll share my notes with you here as time permits. Let us know if you will be attending this year’s New York Value Investing Congress in the comments section below.