Buffett/Berkshire - general news

[backtothebeach]

48 minutes ago, bizaro86 said:

Ok, but if we're buying things outside the circle of competence and/or without a margin of safety, what's even the point?

 

Find people or give more money to people (Ted?) with a different/wider circle of competence than Warren?

 

I did not say buy without margin of safety, just swing at slightly less fat pitches, too.

 

Anyway, they'll do what they'll do, our guesswork does not change a thing.

[LC]

Another option is internal reinvestment, which I think was partly why Greg was made CEO. 

[Gamecock-YT]

[DooDiligence]

Edited December 17, 2025 by DooDiligence

[Mephistopheles]

Why did Buffett sell Apple and BofA? Both in his circle of competence obviously, and at least in Apple's case, seems to have a massive moat that isn't going anywhere. Why sell and pay taxes when you have hundreds of billions sitting around? Meanwhile he has a "forever holding" in Coke and of course all the wholly owned businesses. Very silly move.

[Spooky]

5 hours ago, Mephistopheles said:

Why did Buffett sell Apple and BofA? Both in his circle of competence obviously, and at least in Apple's case, seems to have a massive moat that isn't going anywhere. Why sell and pay taxes when you have hundreds of billions sitting around? Meanwhile he has a "forever holding" in Coke and of course all the wholly owned businesses. Very silly move.

 

Munger did say selling some Apple was probably a mistake.

[benchmark]

3 hours ago, Spooky said:

 

Munger did say selling some Apple was probably a mistake.

Also, selling WFC out is a mistake in my book.

[Whensthepaintdry?]

Does anyone else find it pretty funny that behind the scenes Munger had invested in Elon Musk?

Edited December 18, 2025 by Whensthepaintdry?

[73 Reds]

8 hours ago, benchmark said:

Also, selling WFC out is a mistake in my book.

Monday morning quarterbacks get paid what they're worth.  Meanwhile the starting quarterback is giving away his billions.    

[Mephistopheles]

10 hours ago, benchmark said:

Also, selling WFC out is a mistake in my book.

One of my proudest moments as an investor - buying WFC in the $20s knowing that Buffett was selling.

[Mephistopheles]

2 hours ago, Whensthepaintdry? said:

Does anyone else find it pretty funny that behind the scenes Munger had invested in Elon Musk?

Really? What’re the deets, I can’t seem to find the story.

[sundin]

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/12/warren-buffett-retirement/685294/

[marazul]

31 minutes ago, sundin said:

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/12/warren-buffett-retirement/685294/

 

Thank you for the link. This line was surprising coming from Klarman, at least for me: While I’ve never been to a Berkshire annual meeting and have never owned the stock, I did have lunch with Buffett at Gorat’s (a steakhouse, his choice) on my one trip to see him in Omaha 17 years ago."

[Spooky]

21 hours ago, Mephistopheles said:

Why did Buffett sell Apple and BofA?

 

For BoA my hunch is that Buffett was pissed about how they managed their interest rate exposure back when the Fed raised interest rates - they were caught swimming naked when the tide ran out.

[ValueMaven]

4 hours ago, marazul said:

 

Thank you for the link. This line was surprising coming from Klarman, at least for me: While I’ve never been to a Berkshire annual meeting and have never owned the stock, I did have lunch with Buffett at Gorat’s (a steakhouse, his choice) on my one trip to see him in Omaha 17 years ago."

 

Looks like it is blocked behind a paywall?

[yesman182]

59 minutes ago, ValueMaven said:

 

Looks like it is blocked behind a paywall?

https://archive.is/Qnxi9

Edited December 18, 2025 by yesman182

[Whensthepaintdry?]

@Mephistopheles it was in the recent Li Lu interview posted above. I have heard it somewhere else before, but can’t remember where right now. 

[oscarazocar]

15 minutes ago, Whensthepaintdry? said:

@Mephistopheles it was in the recent Li Lu interview posted above. I have heard it somewhere else before, but can’t remember where right now. 

 

My bet would be that is a sloppy translation and what they write as "Musk persuaded Charlie to invest with him" is actually "Musk tried to persuade Charlie to invest with him."  The interview is translated from Chinese and there is a lot of rough translation in there.  For instance, "The first time I had a long conversation with Charlie was on Thanksgiving Day in 2003. We talked for four or five hours, and then we officially became partners. It has been 20 years since he passed away."

 

https://moiglobal.com/wp-content/uploads/li-lu-on-charlie-munger-202412.pdf

[benchmark]

11 hours ago, 73 Reds said:

Monday morning quarterbacks get paid what they're worth.  Meanwhile the starting quarterback is giving away his billions.    

I bought plenty of WFC  from the $30s to $20s, and lots of calls during that time  Too bad that I had to sell some of calls earlier this year, as I don't have enough capital to exercise them all. 

[Intelligent_Investor]

Berkshire's biggest problem over the last decade and a half has been the "fed put". Warren's biggest opportunity for deploying massive amounts of capital went away and the phone calls dried up because there was a bigger fish out there with unlimited capacity for investment in times of crisis. Now the gold rain never comes. 

[mistakenpoint]

On 12/17/2025 at 2:14 PM, Mephistopheles said:

Why did Buffett sell Apple and BofA? Both in his circle of competence obviously, and at least in Apple's case, seems to have a massive moat that isn't going anywhere. Why sell and pay taxes when you have hundreds of billions sitting around? Meanwhile he has a "forever holding" in Coke and of course all the wholly owned businesses. Very silly move.

I think these moves are meant to prepare Abel for the CEO role. Buffett has said that Greg will be responsible for capital allocation. If Buffett were in Greg’s position, he wouldn’t want large legacy positions from a prior CEO hanging over his head. Historically, when Berkshire acquires insurance businesses, Buffett almost always liquidates the existing investment portfolio and starts fresh. He appears to be applying the same principle here, clearing out outsized positions so Abel can step into the role with a relatively clean slate.

[UK]

On 12/19/2025 at 4:58 PM, Intelligent_Investor said:

Berkshire's biggest problem over the last decade and a half has been the "fed put". Warren's biggest opportunity for deploying massive amounts of capital went away and the phone calls dried up because there was a bigger fish out there with unlimited capacity for investment in times of crisis. Now the gold rain never comes. 

 

It was! But how many more times/puts one has to go through, in order finally to adjust and live with this likely staying new reallity?

 

Edited December 22, 2025 by UK

[alpha]

 

Howard was helping evacuate civilians in Ukraine recently:

 

https://kyivindependent.com/philanthropist-howard-buffett-travels-to-kupiansk-suburb-in-kharkiv-oblast-to-help-evacuate-civilians/

[Parsad]

End of an era!  Cheers!

 

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/warren-buffett-retirement-berkshire-hathaway-120100926.html

[Xerxes]

Next few working days before retirement, Buffett is going to walk the office shake people hands, offer to exchange personal Gmail and ask them to connect to his LinkedIn.