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Seth Klarman is nobody’s idea of a fast-buck, quick-change investor. Since helping to found Boston-based Baupost Group in 1982 with $27 million pooled from four families, he has emulated prototypical value-investment role models like Warren Buffett and the late Benjamin Graham. He buys underpriced equities and securities of bankrupt or distressed companies and usually steers clear of leverage and shorting, though last year he made very profitable investments in credit protection and recorded his best-ever annual return (52 percent).

Pzena Investment Management prides itself on spotting good value, but its reputation is at stake after a negative performance across its strategies. Its funds have reported a substantial dip in performance over the year to the end of May, according to its website.

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Morningstar talks with Bill Miller, chairman and CIO of Legg Mason Capital Management.

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Zhao Danyang won the Glide Foundation’s auction for lunch with Warren Buffett. The lunch auction is always an interesting thing to watch because of the eclectic groups of people who bid. The 2007 lunch, which actually took place a couple days ago, was won by value investors Mohnish Pabrai (Pabrai Funds) and Guy Spier (Aquamarine Capital Management).

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A lunch date with billionaire investor Warren Buffett was sold to a Chinese hedge-fund manager yesterday for more than $2.1 million during an online auction, more than tripling last year's record of $650,100.

Zhao Danyang, who manages the Pureheart China Growth Investment Fund in Shenzhen, won the auction by bidding $2,110,100, said Denise Lamott, a spokeswoman for Glide Foundation. Glide, a San Francisco charity, will receive all proceeds from the auction.

Jim Rogers, who in April 2006 correctly predicted oil would reach $100 a barrel and gold $1,000 an ounce, told investors not to ``give up'' on Chinese shares after the country's stock index fell almost 50 percent this year.

'Start buying when others say `never again', Rogers, 65, said today at an investor conference in Nanjing. There is ``much money to be made'' from investments in Chinese stocks, he said.

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Mutual-fund manager Jean-Marie Eveillard is a veteran buyer of value stocks, and when he surveys the global investment landscape nowadays, years of experience make him a cautious shopper.

"This is the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression," Eveillard, who runs First Eagle Overseas Fund  (SGOVX) , said in a recent telephone interview. Unlike many of his peers, Eveillard does not believe the storm is over. "The transition to a better economy may take quite a while and be quite painful," he said.

The market may be down and volatile, but there are still opportunities for those seeking value across all sectors, including financials, a panel of senior equity analysts from Morningstar Inc. said Wednesday at the Chicago-based research firm’s annual conference.

“The question is whether there are individual banks or regional banks that could be looked at,” said Josh Peters, equity income strategist. “Are these banks going to get through this with an enhanced competitive position?”

Warren Buffett, chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway, sees some opportunities for investing in the subprime mortgage business, he told Reuters in an interview. Buffett said Berkshire Hathaway had already made some subprime investments through its Clayton Homes manufactured housing unit.

"We have bought some subprime paper in the open market, as people have wanted to sell portfolios," he said of the investments Clayton Homes has made to date.