Buffett/Berkshire - general news

[Spooky]

On 10/28/2025 at 2:12 PM, Pellom said:

"Berkshire's out of touch" is usually the sign of a market top. We'll see. 

 

Yes indeed! Almost always a good buying opportunity when the narrative is Warren is washed up.

[Spooky]

On 10/27/2025 at 9:08 PM, ValueMaven said:

'Are they even in the game' -- I am laughing so hard at this.  No mention of OXY deal at all from these clowns. This is epic honestly

 

 

 

Y'all know what this means! Very bullish for Berkshire haha  

[73 Reds]

17 minutes ago, Spooky said:

 

Y'all know what this means! Very bullish for Berkshire haha  

Yes, indeed.  But hope it goes (much) lower - its been quite some time since it has been super tempting to add.  Those who say size is an impediment don't recognize that being the biggest, smartest and most successful operation is never a long term disadvantage.  

[Hektor]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-10-30/buffett-hands-off-annual-letter-to-successor-abel-wsj-reports

 

Buffett Hands Off Annual Letter to Successor Abel, WSJ Reports

 

Warren Buffett will skip writing Berkshire Hathaway Inc.’s widely read annual letter in February, handing the duty to his successor, Vice Chairman Greg Abel, according to the Wall Street Journal.

 

The 95-year-old billionaire will still publish a Thanksgiving letter on Nov. 10 addressed to his children and shareholders, the newspaper reported, citing Buffett’s assistant.

 

The famed investor also reportedly won’t take questions at his firm’s annual meeting in May — a fixture of the gathering that brings thousands of people to Omaha, Nebraska.

[MungerWunger]

End of an era

[Pellom]

I doubt this is happening, but I hope he is writing a memoir or at the very least committing to paper some of his non-Berkshire related ideas/memories. I'm sure he is happy to let the annual letters speak for themselves, but one can dream. 

[Munger_Disciple]

WSJ article on Berkshire:

https://www.wsj.com/finance/stocks/berkshires-new-normal-no-buffett-shareholder-letter-and-no-buffett-premium-b53c2edd?st=o34SuL&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

 

Nothing new but Buffett's assistant (re)confirmed that Greg would be writing the 2025 annual letter. She also said Buffett would be publishing a Thanksgiving letter on Nov 10, addressed to his children & shareholders, similar to the one he wrote last year. 

[John Hjorth]

Berkshire Hathaway - Press Release [October 29^th 2025] : Information Regarding Third Quarter Earnings Release

 

Quote

Omaha, NE (BRK.A; BRK.B) – Berkshire Hathaway Inc.’s third quarter earnings release and its quarterly report on Form 10-Q will be posted on the Internet on Saturday, November 1, 2025, at approximately 7:00 a.m. Central time where it can be accessed at www.berkshirehathaway.com.  

 

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If the Bloomberg story above mentioned by @Hektor is correct, this will be the penultimate Berkshire Hathaway reporting with Warren Buffett as Chairman.

 

If that is really a fact, it feels strange to think about, or will there from time to time be a Berkshire related or personal quip from Mr. Buffett via the Berkshire Hathaway website, apart from tthe Thanksgiving Letter this mentioned above  in @Munger_Disciples post.

 

-I'm pretty confident he'll not go full throttle Substack, Seeking Alpha, LinkedIn, X, <something unmentionable here>, Politico, Medium or Reddit! 

Edited November 1, 2025 by John Hjorth
Fixed spelling

[gfp]

 

 

Here come the bogus headlines from the journalists who skip the liabilities section..

 

[backtothebeach]

Record cash, record operating earnings (+investment gains of B$17.3). Lowest P/BV in 2 years. Not a bad setup...

2025 Q3
Book Value
BH SE in Mio.	698,155
A share equ Q end	1,438,223
BV per A	485,429
BV per B	323.62
current B share price	477.54
Mcap	1,030,214
P/BV	1.476
Cash
cash & equiv.	72,156
treasury bills	305,367
cash railroad	4,150
payable for treasuries	-23,241
CASH	358,432
Cash % of Market Cap	34.8%
Operating Earnings
Insurance underwriting	2,369
Insurance investment	3,181
BNSF	1,449
BHE	1489
Pilot
MSR	3,616
non-controlled businesses
other	1,381
Operating Earnings	13,485

[backtothebeach]

1 hour ago, gfp said:

 

 

Here come the bogus headlines from the journalists who skip the liabilities section..

 

 

Will they ever learn? 

[backtothebeach]

Book value up 4.5% in the quarter, just like Markel.

[John Hjorth]

Q : Is the old man actually doing something for his salary by now?

 

A : Cash flow statement first nine months :

 

 

So, rolling 413 billion USD of T-bills, net buying further 31 billion USD, gross buying for 444 billion USD in nine months, up quite some compared to P/Y period!

Edited November 1, 2025 by John Hjorth

[Charlie]

Berkshire Operating Profits Rose 33% in Third Quarter. There Were No Stock Buybacks.

 

https://www.barrons.com/articles/berkshire-hathaway-earnings-stock-price-warren-buffett-9c6c7949?mod=stockoverview

 

P/B 1,4757

 

Cheers! 

Edited November 1, 2025 by Charlie

[gfp]

Didn't see any direct disclosure on price paid for Bell Labs acquisition but it looks like Goodwill increased $339 million for business acquisitions.  Hard to know what other small bolt-on acquisitions during the quarter might be in there but I assume most of that would have come from Bell Labs.  They definitely paid cash, not stock, and there isn't anything in the cash flow statement for business acquisitions.  Must be lumped in with "other" or "equity purchases"

[Masterofnone]

1 hour ago, backtothebeach said:

Record cash, record operating earnings (+investment gains of B$17.3). Lowest P/BV in 2 years. Not a bad setup...

2025 Q3
Book Value
BH SE in Mio.	698,155
A share equ Q end	1,438,223
BV per A	485,429
BV per B	323.62
current B share price	477.54
Mcap	1,030,214
P/BV	1.476
Cash
cash & equiv.	72,156
treasury bills	305,367
cash railroad	4,150
payable for treasuries	-23,241
CASH	358,432
Cash % of Market Cap	34.8%
Operating Earnings
Insurance underwriting	2,369
Insurance investment	3,181
BNSF	1,449
BHE	1489
Pilot
MSR	3,616
non-controlled businesses
other	1,381
Operating Earnings	13,485

 

 

But not yet a "great" setup. No buy-backs declares that. There were long stretches of ~1.3 x book. Not to say it wasn't a solid quarter.

[John Hjorth]

And all kinds of new media reports about Berkshires earnings now or down, even from sites like SA, as like for I don't now for how many years! [also, ref. above]  It's likely never coming to an end ... - I simply don't read them anymore, I read here, unless if there is somebody here on CofB&F mentioning something anywhere worthy spending time on for some specific reason.

 

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Insurance float now at USD 176 B and still growing, up USD 5 since YE2024.

Edited November 1, 2025 by John Hjorth

[aws]

Weirdly, I noticed the A share count is higher than it was on the last 10-Q. It went from 519,193 to 523,010. The total outstanding between A and B is exactly the same, so I guess they incorrectly recorded some conversions in the last report that they had to undo.  

[John Hjorth]

Good catch, @aws!,

 

From the frontpage of the 2025Q3 10-Q :

 

From the frontpage of the 2025Q2 10-Q :

 

 

For the A, 523,010 - 519,193 = 3,817,

For the B, 1,378,545,639 - 1,372,820,139 = 5,725,500,

 

and

 

3,817 x 1,500 = 5,725,500, which I like @aws think is equal to QED, I personally can't come up with other IRL explanation than that provided by @aws.

Edited November 1, 2025 by John Hjorth

[gfp]

Yeah, the July 21st figures seem to be a clerical error.  June 30 figure (right after Warren did his big conversion for the year) seems to have been correct.  Sept. 30 and Oct. 20th look correct as well.

 

 

[Munger_Disciple]

1 hour ago, aws said:

Weirdly, I noticed the A share count is higher than it was on the last 10-Q. It went from 519,193 to 523,010. The total outstanding between A and B is exactly the same, so I guess they incorrectly recorded some conversions in the last report that they had to undo.  

 

I think you are right. I believe they corrected them in the third quarter 10-Q. If you look at page 19 of Q2's 10-Q, you will see the correct A & B share figures as of 6/30/25 (A: 531,469 and B: 1,360,131,639).

 

Interestingly, A share equivalents are correct everywhere. It's just that they had the wrong A & B figures on the first page of Q2's 10-Q.

Edit: Looks like @gfp beat me to it 

Edited November 1, 2025 by Munger_Disciple

[gfp]

One thing Berkshire has been doing lately is removing some of the excess capital from the Insurance subsidiaries and distributing it up to the holding company level.  It started with BNSF being distributed out of Nico up to BH parent and I figured that made sense - bulkheads and such.  Plus insurance regulators were not giving Nico capital credit for anything close to BNSF's economic value.  They essentially valued BNSF at book value from the acquisition price plus income minus cash out distributions.

 

Then last year Berkshire took a bunch of capital out of the insurance companies but it seemed plausible that it was just related to paying cash taxes for the Apple sales and stuff like that.  But you can clearly see the capital building up at the holding company level ->

 

 

 

 

----

 

 

Edited November 1, 2025 by gfp

[Hsmpanl]

50 minutes ago, gfp said:

One thing Berkshire has been doing lately is removing some of the excess capital from the Insurance subsidiaries and distributing it up to the holding company level.  It started with BNSF being distributed out of Nico up to BH parent and I figured that made sense - bulkheads and such.  Plus insurance regulators were not giving Nico capital credit for anything close to BNSF's economic value.  They essentially valued BNSF at book value from the acquisition price plus income minus cash out distributions.

 

Then last year Berkshire took a bunch of capital out of the insurance companies but it seemed plausible that it was just related to paying cash taxes for the Apple sales and stuff like that.  But you can clearly see the capital building up at the holding company level ->

 

 

 

 

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This is super interesting... Think they have something in the works or just the additional bulwarks and added flexibility for future acquisitions?

[John Hjorth]

3 hours ago, Munger_Disciple said:

I think you are right. I believe they corrected them in the third quarter 10-Q. If you look at page 19 of Q2's 10-Q, you will see the correct A & B share figures as of 6/30/25 (A: 531,469 and B: 1,360,131,639).

 

Interestingly, A share equivalents are correct everywhere. It's just that they had the wrong A & B figures on the first page of Q2's 10-Q.

Edit: Looks like @gfp beat me to it 

 

No worries @Munger_Disciple,

 

It does not harm to get - here, four different - approaches to the same thing, it's ensures everone reading the topic are on the same frequency about this. 

 

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In elementary school, when my math teacher was standing in the classroom with the back against his mathematics sprouts, writing with his piece of chalk of the blackboard, wiggling with his butt, repeating something, he was mutterering to us : 'Repetition is the path to learning'. [Needless to say, everyone was studying the movements of his butt instead af reading what he was writing. ]

Edited November 1, 2025 by John Hjorth

[John Hjorth]

1 hour ago, Hsmpanl said:

This is super interesting... Think they have something in the works or just the additional bulwarks and added flexibility for future acquisitions?

 

It for sure is, @Hsmpanl, and thanks @gfp,

 

The net financial position of Berkshire Hathaway, the parent, was actually by a Berkshire Hathaway yardstick, YE2023 close to zero [Cash and cash equivalents USD 5.566 bllion +[plus] Short-term investments in U.S. Teasurybills USD 16.140 million -[minus] Notes payable and other borrowings USD 18,781 million =[equals] USD 2.925 million.

 

The corresponding number at YE2024, calculated similar way, is USD 74.951 million.

 

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Then we have to remember that Berkshire Hathaway Finance Company [, or is it 'Corporation'?][BHFC]. - the internal bank at group level - is quarantied by Berkshire Hathaway, the parent. Berkshire Hathaway 2025Q3 10-Q, p. 19 :

 

Quote

... Borrowings of BHFC, a wholly-owned finance subsidiary of Berkshire, consist of senior unsecured notes used to fund manufactured home loans originated or acquired and equipment held for lease of certain subsidiaries. BHFC borrowings are fully and unconditionally guaranteed by Berkshire. Berkshire also guarantees certain debt of other subsidiaries, aggregating approximately $1.7 billion at September 30, 2025. Generally, Berkshire’s guarantee of a subsidiary’s debt obligation is an absolute, unconditional and irrevocable guarantee for the full and prompt payment when due of all payment obligations. ...

 

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Reminds me a bit of Fairfax Financial Holdings having parent company cash etc. in a separate line in the group balance sheet, signalling Holding company level strength, agility, flexibility and ability to act if new opportunities show themselves.

Edited November 1, 2025 by John Hjorth