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If you’re trying to build wealth, your first six figures in savings is a huge milestone. That’s according to the late billionaire Charlie Munger.
“It’s a b—-, but you gotta do it,” Munger told investors at an annual Berkshire Hathaway meeting two decades ago (1).
“I don’t care what you have to do,” he continued. “If it means walking everywhere and not eating anything that wasn’t purchased with a coupon, find a way to get your hands on $100,000. After that, you can ease off the gas a little bit.”
Munger’s six-figure fixation might seem a bit arbitrary at first, but his reason behind it was actually simple: Six figures are where the real power of compounding is unlocked. Once you cross this critical threshold, your money earns more money at a meaningful scale.
But not everybody agrees. Some financial advice gurus are saying there’s freedom to be had with numbers as low as $20,000.
Financial YouTuber Nischa Shah explains that once you’ve saved just 20 grand, you can begin taking advantage of the power of compound interest in your investments. More importantly, you can stop being driven by fear — and not have to take the first job you’re offered or stay in a role you hate because you lack other options.
“Compound interest is one of the most powerful forces in finance,” she said (2). “And once you hit 20K, you’ll see exactly what it means. Your money doesn’t just sit there anymore. It starts earning returns. And then those returns start earning their own returns.”
In her words, “It’s like planting a tree that grows even more trees for you.”
Either way, whether the magic number is five or six figures, it’s clear the experts agree on one thing: When it comes to investing in your financial future, compound interest is the best friend to your savings.
Here’s why maximizing savings with compound interest unlocks your wealth potential — and what you can do to hit your goal and discover financial freedom.
Munger’s $100,000 benchmark has math on its side. But in reality, most families struggle to set aside six figures as they battle stagnant wages and rapidly rising costs of living.
To put this in perspective, the national savings rate, or amount of disposable income left over after accounts are settled, was just 3.5% in November 2025, which is the latest month that data is available, as of February 2026 (3).
What is more alarming is that 21% of Americans have no emergency savings at all, and 37% say they would struggle to cover an unexpected $400 bill, according to a 2024 survey of 1,192 Americans from Empower (4).
In other words, many families don’t have a safety net.
The dearth of savings is particularly acute for younger Americans. According to 2026 data from Empower, the median net worth of Americans in their 20s is just $6,600, and those numbers only climb to $23,093 for those in their 30s and $68,698 for those in their 40s (5).
That’s much less than Munger’s benchmark.
That’s why it’s important to remember that your personal finances could start changing at a much lower threshold. If you’re young or lack savings, just getting to $20,000 could really help shift your thinking.
A lack of cash available immediately can limit your flexibility. In this situation, your top priority has to be survival, which means you don’t have the opportunity to leave your job in pursuit of a better one, take time off to get educated or take on investments with significant risk.
Simply put, you have little to no wriggle room, and that has real consequences on the way you think and process the world around you.
According to a survey of Vanguard customers, people with no emergency fund spend nearly twice as much time thinking about money issues every week than those with at least $2,000 in in the bank (6).
That’s why a high-yield account like the Wealthfront Cash Account can be a great place to grow your emergency fund, offering both competitive interest rates and easy access to your cash when you need it.
A Wealthfront Cash Account currently offers a base variable APY of 3.30%, and new clients can get a 0.75% boost during their first three months on up to $150,000 for a total APY of 4.05%. That’s 10 times the national deposit rate, according to the FDIC’s January report.
With no minimum balances or account fees, as well as 24/7 withdrawals and free domestic wire transfers, your funds remain accessible at all times. Plus, Wealthfront Cash Account balances of up to $8 million are insured by the FDIC through program banks.
Boosting your savings can certainly fatten your wallet, but they have profound implications for your mental health, too.
The same Vanguard study also found that going from no savings to $2,000 in savings improved financial well-being by 21% (6). Indeed, those who progressed further and saved up three to six months of living expenses in an emergency fund saw another 13% bump in well-being.
Put another way, it’s good for your health to have an emergency fund.
But scraping together an emergency fund might not seem easy at first. American households spent roughly $78,535 per year in 2024, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (7). That means a $20,000 emergency fund should cover just over three months of living expenses for the typical family.
Once you hit this benchmark, though, you won’t need to focus as much on surviving and can start focusing on growth and investments instead. You can also start to think about taking some time off work to invest in education or pursue a better-paying job.
The question is, how do you get to that benchmark?
It could be as easy as setting up a budget. A quick daily check-in of your accounts can show you exactly where your money is going — and find new ways you can save.
However, if managing a budget feels overwhelming to you, apps like Rocket Money can simplify the process.
Rocket Money can easily flag recurring subscriptions, upcoming bills and unusual charges by pulling in transactions from all your linked accounts.
This can help you cut unnecessary costs, and then you can manually redirect savings straight into your retirement fund. No spreadsheets, no guesswork, no stress. Small habits like this can make a big difference over time.
Rocket Money’s intuitive app offers a variety of free and premium tools. Free features include subscription tracking, bill reminders and budgeting basics, while premium features — like automated savings, net worth tracking, customizable dashboards and more — make it easier to stay on top of your retirement contributions and overall financial goals.
Once you’ve set up a budget, it’s also worth assessing how you’re spending money. As Munger suggested, you might consider cutting back where you can.
For instance, you might find in your budget that you have monthly expenditures that should be reassessed and trimmed down.
That doesn’t have to mean sinking to an untenable living standard, though.
Most people look to cutting down on subscriptions like Netflix or DoorDash, or going out less. While these are smart options, you could also consider looking to other ways to save on essential expenses, such as reducing your cell phone bill and car insurance.
Sometimes, you have to go shopping around for the best deals.
OfficialCarInsurance.com lets you instantly sort through policies from car insurance providers in your area, including trusted names like Progressive, GEICO and Allstate. With rates as low as $29 per month, you can find coverage that suits your needs and potentially save you hundreds of dollars per year.
To get started, fill in some basic information, and OfficialCarInsurance.com will provide a list of the top insurers in your area within minutes.
Ultimately, even after setting up your savings and reducing expenses, it is always a good idea to keep things in perspective.
After all, for anyone starting from scratch, getting to the $100,000 milestone can offer breathing room — but it can also be such an overwhelming number that you never even start. Although it would be great to have $100,000 invested in growing assets, even $20,000 can unlock noticeable growth.
Here’s why.
The S&P 500 has delivered a compounded annual growth rate of 10% since 1957 (8). Socking away the first $20,000 you don’t need for other savings goals into a low-cost index fund that tracks this index, then adding $1,000 per month, could get you to the $100,000 threshold in just under five years if the market remains at historic, favorable levels.
However, if you were to have sold off your investments in a year like 2022, when the S&P was down nearly 20% year-over-year, you could end up losing a lot of money — investing always carries risk (9).
And that’s why it’s crucial you have a long-term outlook — like Munger and Warren Buffett — when it comes to investing so that you can ride out any stock market volatility.
Speaking of market volatility, it’s also important to diversify your investments so that you aren’t over-indexed in any one stock or market. But finding the right stock picks can be tricky, and top-shelf advisor services often have asset under management (AUM) fees, which are charged as a percentage of the portfolio’s total value.
How it works is simple: When you make a purchase on a linked credit or debit card, Acorns automatically rounds up to the nearest dollar, and the excess is placed into a smart investment portfolio.
Let’s say you purchase a doughnut for $2.30. Before you’re done licking the sugar off your fingers, Acorns will round the amount to $3.00 and invest the 70-cent difference for you. Just $2.50 worth of daily round-ups add up to $900 per year — and that’s before your savings earn money in the market. This could give you the boost you need to reach that $20,000 benchmark.
Plus, if you sign up now and set up a recurring investment of at least $5, you can get a $20 bonus investment.
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The Globe and Mail (1); @nischa (2); Bureau of Economic Analysis (3); Empower (4), (5); Vanguard (6); Bureau of Labor Statistics (7); Business Insider (8); CNBC (9)
This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.
Warren Buffett closed his career with a $351 million New York Times investment, backing one of the last thriving newspaper businesses in a digital era. Daniel Suchnik/WireImage
It’s only fitting that one of Warren Buffett’s final investments before retirement circles back to the business that first taught him how to make money. In the last quarter of 2025, Berkshire Hathaway bought a $351 million stake (more than 5.1 million shares) in The New York Times Company, according to a regulatory filing this week. The bet speaks to longstanding ties between the newspaper industry and Buffett, who worked as a paperboy in the 1940s.
Today, Berkshire is known for its long-term investments in insurance, energy and tech. But it was once a prominent media investor before Buffett retreated as digital advertising upended the business. But The New York Times has emerged as one of the industry’s rare success stories. The company added 450,000 new digital subscribers during the October-December quarter and lifted quarterly revenue by more than 10 percent year over year to $802 million. Last year, the company made $344 million in profit.
Buffett, 95, officially stepped down as Berkshire’s CEO at the end of 2025, handing the reins to his successor, Greg Abel. In many ways, the new stake is a nod to Buffett’s roots. As a teenager living in Washington, D.C., he woke before 5 a.m. to deliver copies of papers, including The Washington Post. His route included six senators and a Supreme Court justice. Showing early signs of the dealmaker he would become, Buffett expanded his territory, eventually delivering some 500,000 papers. The hustle was so lucrative that he filed his first federal income tax return at age 14 after earning more than $500 in 1944.
His affection for newspapers carried into his tenure at Berkshire, where he invested heavily in media companies such as The Washington Post and even established an annual newspaper-tossing contest at Berkshire’s shareholder meeting.
Warren Buffett takes part in a newspaper-throwing contest during the annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting in 2015. Photo by Hannes Breusted/picture alliance via Getty Images
But that love affair frayed as the internet eroded newspapers’ advertising dominance. At a 2010 Berkshire conference, Buffett remarked that it “blows your mind” how quickly the business had unraveled.
He began pulling back soon after, stepping down from The Washington Post’s board in 2011. Berkshire, which was at one point the paper’s largest investor, swapped its 28 percent stake in Graham Holdings Co., the Post’s then-parent company, for a Miami television station in 2014. The move followed Jeff Bezos’ $250 million acquisition of the paper a year earlier.
By the end of the 2010s, Berkshire had exited the newspaper business entirely, selling a portfolio of 30 local publications to Lee Enterprises for $140 million in cash. The group included titles such as Buffalo News, the Omaha World-Herald and Tulsa World.
“The world was changed hugely, and it did it gradually,” Buffett said of the industry’s decline in a 2019 interview with Yahoo Finance. “It went from monopoly to franchise to competitive to… toast.” Even then, he predicted that major publishers such as The New York Times might endure. As for the rest: “They’re going to disappear.”
The New York Times has indeed thrived, in part thanks to an aggressive expansion into games, recipes and video. Others have struggled. Under Bezos’ ownership, The Washington Post has wrestled with declining advertising revenue and subscriptions. These troubles came to a head earlier this month, when roughly one-third of the newsroom was laid off, with cuts hitting sports, books, international and metro coverage particularly hard. The Los Angeles Times, owned by biotech entrepreneur Patrick Soon-Shiong, has faced similar turbulence, including a newsroom reduction of more than 20 percent in 2024.
Buffett’s vote of confidence has further buoyed The New York Times. Its stock surged to an all-time high this week after Berkshire disclosed its stake, capping a 12-month run in which shares climbed 57 percent.
Warren Buffett has retired as Berkshire Hathaway’s CEO, making way for his top deputy, Greg Abel.
Abel’s key challenges include deploying Berkshire’s huge cash pile and expanding his remit.
He also has to navigate making changes without harming Berkshire’s culture, close watchers say.
Warren Buffett has officially retired as Berkshire Hathaway’s CEO after six decades in charge. Close watchers say Greg Abel, who took the reins on New Year’s Day, faces three key challenges.
Abel’s biggest hurdle will be “finding a way to intelligently allocate” Berkshire’s vast and growing cash pile, Alex Morris, the author of “Buffett and Munger Unscripted” and the founder of investment research service TSOH, told Business Insider.
Berkshire’s trove of cash, Treasury bills, and other liquid assets recently breached $350 billion — a figure that exceeds the market values of Home Depot, Procter & Gamble, and General Electric.
Read more about the leadership transition underway at Berkshire Hathaway:
Abel could use Berkshire’s war chest to fund stock buybacks, acquire other businesses, or pay dividends to shareholders, Morris said.
Yet Buffett hasn’t found any of those to be fruitful avenues in recent years. Berkshire hasn’t repurchased shares in its past five reported quarters, only paid a dividend on one occasion under Buffett, in 1967, and has made few material acquisitions in the past 15 years.
As a business icon and legendary investor, Buffett was given “more of a pass” by Wall Street and Berkshire shareholders for hoarding cash than Abel is likely to receive, Morris said.
“Finding a solution here is challenging,” he continued, before suggesting Abel might consider a one-off special dividend.
Greg Abel (middle) took over as Berkshire Hathaway’s CEO on January 1.AP Images / Nati Harnik
Prior to becoming CEO, Abel headed up Berkshire’s non-insurance businesses, including Berkshire Hathaway Energy and the BNSF Railway.
Abel is recognized as a world-class operator, but that’s “fundamentally different from identifying accretive acquisitions in the public and private markets,” Luke Rahbari, the CEO of Equity Armor Investments, told Business Insider.
Buffett and his late business partner, Charlie Munger, designed Berkshire as a web of decentralized, autonomous subsidiaries, freeing them to spend much of their days reading corporate filings and searching for compelling investments.
“Greg Abel will not have the time to do this,” David Kass, a finance professor at the University of Maryland, told Business Insider.
Kass said the new boss will have a “full plate” overseeing Berkshire’s subsidiaries, including insurers such as Geico for the first time, managing its roughly $300 billion stock portfolio, and making major allocation decisions outside of the company including acquisitions and other deals.
Buffett and Munger built Berkshire’s culture around core values such as trust, honesty, patience, discipline, and long-term thinking.
They delegated “almost to the point of abdication,” they told shareholders in their Owner’s Manual. The company had nearly 400,000 employees at the end of 2024, but only 27 worked in its Omaha headquarters, per its latest annual report.
Abel is expected to be a more hands-on manager than Buffett. He’s already announced several leadership changes, including the appointment of Berkshire’s first general counsel and a new divisional president.
“The challenge will be institutionalizing the culture while professionalizing a headquarters that has historically been intentionally lean,” Rahbari said.
He added that Abel doesn’t have Buffett’s track record and will have to earn the trust awarded to his predecessor.
“Abel will have to navigate complex relationships with subsidiary management teams where the ‘loyalty discount’ previously given to Buffett may no longer apply,” he said.
Alphabet (GOOG) stock surged over 6% Monday and nearly 3% after-hours following the launch of Gemini 3.0.
Berkshire Hathaway made an investment in Alphabet last quarter.
Alphabet overtook Microsoft in market value as its shares rallied 85% over six months.
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It’s been an eventful month for the Magnificent Seven and the state of the AI trade, to say the least. With a painful correction sweeping through the tech scene, but some soothing words from a Fed official, it seems like there’s still a pretty good chance that the S&P 500 exits the month of November with gains intact, especially as some of the Magnificent Seven players start shining bright again.
Though it’s too early to say where stocks head back after getting momentarily knocked to the canvas over extreme levels of AI bubble discussion among various pundits, including tech leaders, money managers, banks, and seemingly everyone else, I do think that investors shouldn’t discount the Magnificent Seven group, even as members of the cohort move in differing directions again.
Undoubtedly, Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG) has been the star of the seven this month, sidestepping the AI pullback, thanks in part to a surprising, but very much exciting investment from the Warren Buffett-led (he’s not retired yet!) Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK-B).
If Berkshire, a cash-flush firm that’s all about value investing, has a horse in the AI race with Alphabet, a broad-sweeping AI bubble thesis doesn’t hold up as much, in my humble opinion, especially when it comes to the profoundly profitable companies pouring ample cash into the effort.
Timing the AI bubble is still timing the market, and it’s a move that might not lead to a satisfactory return compared to just staying invested and “owning the market.” Cashing out or shorting some of the high-flyers in tech, I think, might be that much riskier now that there are some signs that the AI correction is healing, even if you’re proven right about overvaluations in the long term.
In any case, we’ve seen some movement in the Mag Seven “leaderboard in recent weeks, with Alphabet pole-vaulting over Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), whose shares have really stalled of late. With Alphabet stock blasting off more than 6% on Monday while surging close to 3% in the after-hours session despite not getting slammed amid the recent AI pullback in the prior week, it seems like Alphabet shares are about to go into overdrive as investors look to price in the latest and greatest AI model, Gemini 3.0, which appears well ahead of the competition (including the likes of OpenAI’s ChatGPT).
Perhaps. Either way, the AI race is going into overdrive, and unless OpenAI can pull the curtain on something soon, I think Alphabet might be the new AI champion to bet on, as the firm looks to monetize the technology in profound ways. With Gemini coming to Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) devices, I think Google’s AI business might leave its much-smaller rivals in the dust. Sure, some might think it’s too late to be chasing Alphabet stock after an 85% surge in six months.
However, it seems like Gemini is just hitting an inflection point of sorts. And if Google can monetize the model (dare I say a hyper-monetization boom?), I think a strong argument can still be made that Alphabet stock is still cheap at 31.5 times trailing price-to-earnings (P/E), or just north of 27.0 times forward P/E.
After an explosive move, it’s clear that prior AI search fears were unwarranted and that Google’s AI Mode has had its way with the competition. As impressive as Gemini 3.0 is (Marc Benioff had great things to say about the model), it’s shocking to think that it’s only going to get better from here.
If the new model has Benioff switching from ChatGPT and saying things like he’s “not going back,” I think there’s a lot to take in as the man says things like “the world just changed, again.” I think Benioff is right on the money and wouldn’t bet against Alphabet as it takes the lead, with enough firepower to stay ahead in the AI race, perhaps for good.
As Google advances Gemini further, while new monetization channels (like the deal with Apple) open up, I think the AI ROI fears might be put to rest, as Alphabet charges ahead to become the most valuable company on earth. Though it won’t be easy to top Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA), I do think Alphabet will pull it off next year. There’s too much AI momentum behind it, and the multiple still remains too low.
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BANGKOK (AP) — Asian shares tumbled on Tuesday, with benchmarks in Tokyo and Seoul sinking more than 3%, after Nvidia and other artificial-intelligence -related shares pulled U.S. stocks lower.
U.S. futures dropped, with the contract for the S&P 500 down 0.6% while the future for the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.4%.
Computer chip giant Nvidia, at the center of the craze over AI, is due to report its earnings on Wednesday. Worries that stock prices of such companies have shot too high have roiled world markets recently, with big swings in places that rely heavily on trade in computer chips such as South Korea and Taiwan.
Also hanging over the markets is the release due Thursday of U.S. employment data that was delayed by the prolonged government shutdown.
Regional markets felt a chill after the yield on 30-year Japanese government bonds surged to 3.31%, reflecting rising risks as Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi prepares to boost government spending and push back the timetable for bringing down Japan’s huge national debt.
The yen was trading above 155 to the U.S. dollar, near its highest level since February. On Monday, the yen fell to its lowest level against the euro since 1999, when the unified European currency was launched.
Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 was down 3% at 48,835.20 by midday, with selling of tech shares leading the decline. Chip maker Tokyo Electron shed 5.4%, while equipment maker Advantest dropped 4.6%.
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In Seoul, the Kospi fell 3.1% to 3,960.82. Samsung Electronics dropped 2.9%, while chip maker SK Hynix shed 5.7%.
In Taiwan, the Taiex fell 2.3% as TSMC, the world’s largest contract chip manufacturer, declined 2.4%.
Chinese markets were not immune from heavy selling.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng declined 1.5% to 25,997.20, while the Shanghai Composite index slipped 0.6% to 3,949.83.
In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 gave up 2.1% to 8,452.50.
On Monday, the S&P 500 fell 0.9% to 6,672.41, pulling further from its all-time high set late last month. The Dow industrials dropped 1.2% to 46,590.24, while the Nasdaq composite sank 0.8% to 22,708.07.
Nvidia dropped 1.8%, though it is still up nearly 40% this year. Losses for other AI winners included a 6.4% slide for Super Micro Computer.
Other areas of the market that had been high-momentum winners also sank. Bitcoin extended its decline, dragging down Coinbase Global by 7.1% and Robinhood Markets by 5.3%. Early Tuesday, it was down 2% at $90,110.
However, Alphabet gained 3.1% after Berkshire Hathaway said it has built a $4.34 billion ownership stake in Google’s parent company. Berkshire Hathaway, run by famed investor Warren Buffett, is notorious for trying to buy stocks only when they look like good values while avoiding anything that looks too expensive.
Another source of potential disappointment for Wall Street is what the Federal Reserve does with interest rates. The expectation had been that the Fed would keep cutting interest rates in hopes of shoring up the slowing job market.
But the downside of lower interest rates is that they can make inflation worse, and inflation has stubbornly remained above the Fed’s 2% target.
A strong jobs report on Thursday would likely stay the Fed’s hand on rate cuts, while figures that are very weak would raise worries about the economy.
In other dealings early Tuesday, U.S. benchmark crude oil lost 42 cents to $59.49 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, gave up 43 cents to $63.77 per barrel.
The dollar fell to 155.08 Japanese yen from 155.26 yen. The euro rose to $1.1600 from $1.1593.
___
AP Business Writers Stan Choe and Matt Ott contributed.
Berkshire Hathaway signaled on Saturday that it remained cautious about markets, letting cash swell to a record $381.7 billion even as profit rose, in its last financial report before Warren Buffett bows out as chief executive.
For a 12th straight quarter, Buffett’s conglomerate sold more stocks than it bought for its $283.2 billion equity portfolio, whose holdings include Apple and American Express.
Berkshire also did not repurchase any of its own stock, the fifth straight quarter without buybacks, though its stock price has significantly lagged the broader market.
Lower insurance losses helped boost third-quarter operating profit 34 percent to $13.49 billion, topping analyst forecasts, while net income grew 17 percent to $30.8 billion.
An Inc.com Featured Presentation
But revenue grew just 2 percent, slower than the overall U.S. economy’s growth rate.
Economic uncertainty and waning consumer confidence have been drags, Berkshire said, stalling sales growth at the Clayton Homes homebuilder and reducing revenue from Duracell batteries, Fruit of the Loom apparel and Squishmallows toymaker Jazwares.
“Berkshire, which is often considered a microcosm of the U.S. economy, isn’t even keeping up,” said Cathy Seifert, a CFRA Research analyst with a “hold” rating on Berkshire. “Investors will struggle to find a catalyst for this stock.”
Buffett preparing to bow out, Abel to take over
Buffett, 95, is letting cash build up as he prepares to end his six-decade tenure as chief executive at the end of the year.
Vice Chairman Greg Abel, 63, will succeed the legendary investor, though Buffett will remain chairman.
Abel is known as a more hands-on manager than Buffett.
It is unclear what he will do with Omaha, Nebraska-based Berkshire’s cash, with options potentially including paying the $1.03 trillion conglomerate’s first dividend since 1967.
Berkshire is planning to use $9.7 billion of cash to buy Occidental Petroleum’s OxyChem chemicals business, a transaction announced on October 2.
James Shanahan, an Edward Jones analyst who upgraded his Berkshire rating to “buy” in September, said the company’s resistance to spending more cash during this year’s market rally has been disappointing.
“If you feel like stocks are expensive, including your own shares, you’re eventually going to be right, but you can be wrong for a long time, and that’s what happened here,” he said.
Net income rises, helped by gains on stocks
The $13.49 billion quarterly operating profit, or about $9,376 per Class A share, grew from $10.09 billion a year earlier. Currency fluctuations accounted for more than two-fifths of the increase.
Results benefited in part from an absence of major catastrophes such as hurricanes.
But the Geico car insurer reported lower gains as it spent more, possibly on advertising, to acquire new policies.
Insurance will likely face headwinds as falling interest rates reduce income from Berkshire’s cash holdings, which also occurred in the third quarter.
The BNSF railroad boosted profit 6 percent, citing lower fuel costs and “improved employee productivity.”
Meanwhile, a 9 percent drop in profit at Berkshire Hathaway Energy reflected legal bills from wildfires, and higher costs from natural gas pipelines and Northern Powergrid in Britain.
Berkshire is still evaluating how U.S. President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed in July might affect the viability of its renewable energy projects.
The $30.8 billion of net income, or $21,413 per Class A share, rose from $26.25 billion a year earlier.
Net results include gains and losses on stocks Berkshire is not selling. This adds volatility, and Buffett believes such results are useless in understanding his company.
Stock price lags broader market
Investors have voted their apprehension about Berkshire’s outlook and pending management change by selling its stock.
Since Buffett announced on May 3 he would step down, Berkshire’s stock price has fallen 12 percent, and trailed the Standard & Poor’s 500 by 32 percentage points.
For all of 2025, Berkshire is 11 percentage points behind the index.
“Impatient investors feel an urgent need for Berkshire to deploy its cash, and have been casting their nets elsewhere,” said Tom Russo, a partner at Gardner Russo & Quinn in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, which invests $10 billion.
Russo has owned Berkshire stock since 1982 and said Berkshire remains “extremely well-positioned” for the long term.
“Berkshire isn’t going to deploy capital that won’t increase intrinsic value on a per share basis,” he said. “Knowing that guides Berkshire means investors won’t have to second-guess it.”
The conglomerate owns close to 200 businesses that also include chemical and industrial companies, and familiar consumer brands such as Dairy Queen and See’s Candies.
It has not made a huge acquisition since paying $32.1 billion for aerospace parts maker Precision Castparts in 2016.
“Abel has a tremendous opportunity,” Shanahan said. “He has a lot of available cash and by all accounts he is an excellent operator, so he may want to deploy capital in Berkshire’s operating businesses to improve their performance.”
Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Alden Bentley, Joe Bavier and Franklin Paul
Berkshire Hathaway signaled on Saturday that it remained cautious about markets, letting cash swell to a record $381.7 billion even as profit rose, in its last financial report before Warren Buffett bows out as chief executive.
For a 12th straight quarter, Buffett’s conglomerate sold more stocks than it bought for its $283.2 billion equity portfolio, whose holdings include Apple and American Express.
Berkshire also did not repurchase any of its own stock, the fifth straight quarter without buybacks, though its stock price has significantly lagged the broader market.
Lower insurance losses helped boost third-quarter operating profit 34 percent to $13.49 billion, topping analyst forecasts, while net income grew 17 percent to $30.8 billion.
An Inc.com Featured Presentation
But revenue grew just 2 percent, slower than the overall U.S. economy’s growth rate.
Economic uncertainty and waning consumer confidence have been drags, Berkshire said, stalling sales growth at the Clayton Homes homebuilder and reducing revenue from Duracell batteries, Fruit of the Loom apparel and Squishmallows toymaker Jazwares.
“Berkshire, which is often considered a microcosm of the U.S. economy, isn’t even keeping up,” said Cathy Seifert, a CFRA Research analyst with a “hold” rating on Berkshire. “Investors will struggle to find a catalyst for this stock.”
Buffett preparing to bow out, Abel to take over
Buffett, 95, is letting cash build up as he prepares to end his six-decade tenure as chief executive at the end of the year.
Vice Chairman Greg Abel, 63, will succeed the legendary investor, though Buffett will remain chairman.
Abel is known as a more hands-on manager than Buffett.
It is unclear what he will do with Omaha, Nebraska-based Berkshire’s cash, with options potentially including paying the $1.03 trillion conglomerate’s first dividend since 1967.
Berkshire is planning to use $9.7 billion of cash to buy Occidental Petroleum’s OxyChem chemicals business, a transaction announced on October 2.
James Shanahan, an Edward Jones analyst who upgraded his Berkshire rating to “buy” in September, said the company’s resistance to spending more cash during this year’s market rally has been disappointing.
“If you feel like stocks are expensive, including your own shares, you’re eventually going to be right, but you can be wrong for a long time, and that’s what happened here,” he said.
Net income rises, helped by gains on stocks
The $13.49 billion quarterly operating profit, or about $9,376 per Class A share, grew from $10.09 billion a year earlier. Currency fluctuations accounted for more than two-fifths of the increase.
Results benefited in part from an absence of major catastrophes such as hurricanes.
But the Geico car insurer reported lower gains as it spent more, possibly on advertising, to acquire new policies.
Insurance will likely face headwinds as falling interest rates reduce income from Berkshire’s cash holdings, which also occurred in the third quarter.
The BNSF railroad boosted profit 6 percent, citing lower fuel costs and “improved employee productivity.”
Meanwhile, a 9 percent drop in profit at Berkshire Hathaway Energy reflected legal bills from wildfires, and higher costs from natural gas pipelines and Northern Powergrid in Britain.
Berkshire is still evaluating how U.S. President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed in July might affect the viability of its renewable energy projects.
The $30.8 billion of net income, or $21,413 per Class A share, rose from $26.25 billion a year earlier.
Net results include gains and losses on stocks Berkshire is not selling. This adds volatility, and Buffett believes such results are useless in understanding his company.
Stock price lags broader market
Investors have voted their apprehension about Berkshire’s outlook and pending management change by selling its stock.
Since Buffett announced on May 3 he would step down, Berkshire’s stock price has fallen 12 percent, and trailed the Standard & Poor’s 500 by 32 percentage points.
For all of 2025, Berkshire is 11 percentage points behind the index.
“Impatient investors feel an urgent need for Berkshire to deploy its cash, and have been casting their nets elsewhere,” said Tom Russo, a partner at Gardner Russo & Quinn in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, which invests $10 billion.
Russo has owned Berkshire stock since 1982 and said Berkshire remains “extremely well-positioned” for the long term.
“Berkshire isn’t going to deploy capital that won’t increase intrinsic value on a per share basis,” he said. “Knowing that guides Berkshire means investors won’t have to second-guess it.”
The conglomerate owns close to 200 businesses that also include chemical and industrial companies, and familiar consumer brands such as Dairy Queen and See’s Candies.
It has not made a huge acquisition since paying $32.1 billion for aerospace parts maker Precision Castparts in 2016.
“Abel has a tremendous opportunity,” Shanahan said. “He has a lot of available cash and by all accounts he is an excellent operator, so he may want to deploy capital in Berkshire’s operating businesses to improve their performance.”
Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Alden Bentley, Joe Bavier and Franklin Paul
Berkshire Hathaway’s third-quarter earnings report on Saturday revealed Warren Buffett continued to sell more stocks than he bought with the legendary investor poised to step down as CEO by year’s end.
The conglomerate sold $12.5 billion of stock in the latest period and bought $6.4 billion, marking the 12th consecutive quarter of net selling. More details on specific stocks will come in a separate regulatory filing later this month.
Meanwhile, Berkshire’s cash hoard swelled to a fresh record high of $382 billion as operating earnings jumped 34% while Buffett held off on buying back stock for the fifth straight quarter.
As the company’s stock portfolio has shrunk, money has been shifting into Treasury debt. But with short-term rates falling recently, Berkshire’s third-quarter net investment income dropped 13% to $3.2 billion.
The cautious stance on stock investing began in 2022, when the Federal Reserve launched its most aggressive rate-hiking campaign in more than 40 years to rein in inflation.
That tightening slammed stock valuations, but apparently not enough to trigger Buffett’s bargain-hunting instincts. The Fed’s subsequent pivot to rate cuts later sparked a rally that sent stocks to new highs.
More recently, the massive market selloff in April, after President Donald Trump unveiled his shocking tariffs, also didn’t get Buffett off the sidelines. In the second quarter, Berkshire sold $3 billion in stocks on net.
Markets quickly bounced back and set new highs just months later with AI-related companies leading the charge. By contrast, Berkshire Hathaway shares have lost 12% since May, when Buffett announced that he will step down as CEO by the end of the year and hand over the role to Greg Abel.
While Buffett is expected to stay on as chairman, he may be staying away from dramatic moves to clear the decks for Abel, who had already been taking on a bigger leadership role before May.
The Oct. 2 acquisition, Berkshire’s largest since buying insurer Alleghany in 2022, was the first-ever Berkshire announcement that quoted Abel and didn’t mention the current chief executive by name.
“It’s genius. It’s certainly a win-plus for Berkshire because it also helps the company that they own 30% of,” Doug Leggate, Wolfe Research energy analyst, told Fortune last month. “It’s completely self-serving, it’s logical, and—not in any nefarious way—definitely helpful.”
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon supports amending quarterly earnings report requirements. Michel Euler/POOL/AFP via Getty Images
Since 1970, U.S. public companies have been mandated by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to provide financial updates every three months via quarterly earnings reports. This 55-year-old tradition could soon be cut in half under the Trump administration, which is seeking to move to semi-annual reports. The proposal has drawn both praise and criticism from some of Wall Street’s most influential leaders.
Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, voiced his support for President Donald Trump’s suggestion during an interview with Bloomberg TV yesterday (Oct. 7). “I would welcome it,” he said, noting that quarterly forecasts make “CEOs get their back up against a wall.” “They have to meet these things—earnings—and then they start doing dumb stuff,” he added.
Trump floated the proposal last month, arguing that reporting earnings every six months instead of three would “save money and allow managers to focus on properly running their companies.” The President previously pushed for a similar change in 2018 during his first term, when the SEC solicited public feedback but ultimately left the quarterly requirement in place.
This time, however, the SEC appears more willing to act. The agency has indicated that the proposal will be a priority, with Paul Atkins, the SEC’s chair, calling the President’s request “timely” and something the SEC is “working to fast-track.” A draft proposal could be released in the next few months, according to Atkins.
Dimon said JPMorgan would still report earnings quarterly, but with “much less stuff.” He described the requirement as part of a larger problem of “endless rules” that make it harder for companies to go public. “We’ve gone from 8,000 public companies in 1996 to, like, 4,000 today,” he told Bloomberg. “You want an active market, and we’ve kind of crushed it.”
Dimon isn’t alone in supporting the potential shift. Adena Friedman, CEO of Nasdaq, praised Trump’s proposal after it was announced, arguing that quarterly reporting encourages “short-termism“—an excessive focus on immediate results. In a LinkedIn post, she called for “common-sense reforms to reduce the burden on publicly listed companies.”
What financial leaders think of quarterly reporting
Still, Solomon admitted that eliminating quarterly reports could reduce transparency. “I’m still thinking it through, and the firm’s still thinking it through,” he added, noting that he has yet to decide whether he supports the change.
Citadel CEO Ken Griffin, however, has made up his mind. “I don’t understand the merits of holding back from the market, readily knowable information,” he told CNBC in September, warning that accountability could suffer if longer gaps between reports are allowed. “In this day and age, quarterly reporting is fair,” added Griffin. Griffin agreed with Dimon’s view that overregulation discourages initial public offerings, saying barriers to expanding the number of publicly owned companies should be addressed.
This isn’t the first time financial leaders have questioned the quarterly reporting model. In 2018, Dimon and Warren Buffett co-authored a Wall Street Journal op-ed urging companies to reduce or eliminate quarterly earnings forecasts. They argued that such forecasts push companies toward short-term thinking and discourage those with longer-term goals from going public. “Our views on quarterly earnings forecasts should not be misconstrued as opposition to quarterly and annual reporting,” wrote Dimon and Buffett, who maintained that transparency remains “an essential aspect of U.S. public markets.”
Warren Buffett pictured at Dairy Queen, one of his favorite restaurants, in September 2010. Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images
Warren Buffett turns 95 years old today (Aug. 30). The billionaire investor’s diet, however, has never quite grown up. His devotion for Coca-Cola is well known, as is his fondness for ice cream, candy and hamburgers. Buffett has never tried to hide it. “I found everything I like to eat by the time I was six,” he told CNBC in a 2023 interview. “I mean, why should I fool around with all these other foods?”
The Berkshire Hathaway chairman has built one of the world’s largest fortunes. But when it comes to food, he keeps it simple. While other billionaires might celebrate a milestone birthday with a lavish meal, Buffett is more likely to be found at McDonald’s or a local Omaha steakhouse.
Here’s a look at some of the Oracle of Omaha’s favorite orders:
Gorat’s Steak House
Gorat’s is known as Warren Buffett’s favorite steakhouse. Photo by Mark Miller/The Washington Post via Getty Images
Buffett is such a loyal customer of Gorat’s Steak House in Omaha, Neb. that the restaurant has become a tourist attraction. Each May, during Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting, Buffett fans flood Gorat’s, generating as much as one to two months of sales in just a few days.
The menu ranges from $12 onion rings to a $99 lobster dinner. But most visitors stick to Buffett’s go-to: a rare T-bone steak with a double side of hash browns, a cherry Coke and, occasionally, a root beer float.
Smith & Wollensky
Smith & Wollensky hosted Buffet’s annual “Power Lunch” between 2000 and 2022. AFP via Getty Images
Steak, hash browns and a cherry Coke is also Buffett’s standard order at Smith & Wollenksy, the New York steakhouse that hosted his annual “Power Lunch” auctions between 2000 and 2022. Proceeds benefited the Glide Foundation, a San Francisco nonprofit. While winners paid just over $25,000 in the early years, bids regularly topped $1 million after 2008. The final lunch set a record at $19 million.
Some of those meals fell on Buffett’s birthday. In 2018, the restaurant marked his 88th with a Coca-Cola-themed cake. A year earlier, Smith & Wollensky had baked a dessert decorated with some of his favorite treats.
Piccolo Pete’s
Not every charity lunch took place at Smith & Wollensky. When guests wanted a quieter setting, Buffett often chose Omaha’s Piccolo Pete’s, an Italian steakhouse that closed in 2016. His go-to meals there were veal with lemon, chicken parmesan or, of course, steak.
It was at Piccolo Pete’s where hedge fund manager Ted Weschler dined with Buffett in 2010 and 2011 after bidding $5.2 million across two auctions. The lunches ultimately led to Weschler joining Berkshire Hathaway as an investment manager.
McDonald’s
Most mornings, Buffett swings by a McDonald’s drive-through on his way to work. His order rotates among three choices: two sausage patties for $2.61; a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit for $2.95; or a bacon, egg and cheese biscuit for $3.17. (Prices were as of 2017.)
In the 2017 documentary Becoming Warren Buffett, he revealed that his wife, Astrid Menks, places exact change in his car cup holder for whichever option he chooses. Buffett said he splurges based on the stock market’s mood: “When I’m not feeling quite so prosperous,” he explained, he opts for the cheapest $2.61 meal.
Dairy Queen
Warren Buffett (L) and Bill Gates (R) flip over their Dairy Queen Blizzard treats at the opening of a new branch in Beijing, China on Sept. 30, 2010. AFP via Getty Images
Buffett also has a special connection to Dairy Queen. Berkshire Hathaway acquired the chain in 1998 for $585 million, and Buffett has been a loyal customer ever since. He often visits Omaha locations with his great-grandchildren and typically orders vanilla ice cream topped with chocolate syrup and malted milk powder.
His loyalty has even led to unusual moments. In 2014, he tried to order Dairy Queen ice cream at The Four Seasons before settling for chocolate chip cookies.
NEW YORK (AP) — The typical compensation package for chief executives who run companies in the S&P 500 jumped nearly 10% in 2024 as the stock market enjoyed another banner year and corporate profits rose sharply.
Many companies have heeded calls from shareholders to tie CEO compensation more closely to performance. As a result, a large proportion of pay packages consist of stock awards, which the CEO often can’t cash in for years, if at all, unless the company meets certain targets, typically a higher stock price or market value or improved operating profits.
The Associated Press’ CEO compensation survey, which uses data analyzed for The AP by Equilar, included pay data for 344 executives at S&P 500 companies who have served at least two full consecutive fiscal years at their companies, which filed proxy statements between Jan. 1 and April 30.
Here are the key takeaways from the survey:
A good year at the top
The median pay package for CEOs rose to $17.1 million, up 9.7%. Meanwhile, the median employee at companies in the survey earned $85,419, reflecting a 1.7% increase year over year.
CEOs had to navigate sticky inflation and relatively high interest rates last year, as well as declining consumer confidence. But the economy also provided some tail winds: Consumers kept spending despite their misgivings about the economy; inflation did subside somewhat; the Fed lowered interest rates; and the job market stayed strong.
The stock market’s main benchmark, the S&P 500, rose more than 23% last year. Profits for companies in the index rose more than 9%.
“2024 was expected to be a strong year, so the (nearly) 10% increases are commensurate with the timing of the pay decisions,” said Dan Laddin, a partner at Compensation Advisory Partners.
Sarah Anderson, who directs the Global Economy Project at the progressive Institute for Policy Studies, said there have been some recent “long-overdue” increases in worker pay, especially for those at the bottom of the wage scale. But she said too many workers in the world’s richest countries still struggle to pay their bills.
The top earners
Rick Smith, the founder and CEO of Axon Enterprises, topped the survey with a pay package valued at $164.5 million. Axon, which makes Taser stun guns and body cameras, saw revenue grow more than 30% for three straight years and posted record annual net income of $377 million in 2024. Axon’s shares more than doubled last year after rising more than 50% in 2023.
General Electric Co. CEO Lawrence Culp Jr. signs a $52 billion deal by Emirates to purchase Boeing aircraft with GE engines, at the Dubai Air Show, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Monday, Nov. 13, 2023. (AP Photo/Lujain Jo)
General Electric Co. CEO Lawrence Culp Jr. signs a $52 billion deal by Emirates to purchase Boeing aircraft with GE engines, at the Dubai Air Show, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Monday, Nov. 13, 2023. (AP Photo/Lujain Jo)
Almost all of Smith’s pay package consists of stock awards, which he can only receive if the company meets targets tied to its stock price and operations for the period from 2024 to 2030. Companies are required to assign a value to the stock awards when they are granted.
Other top earners in the survey include Lawrence Culp, CEO of what is now GE Aerospace ($87.4 million), Tim Cook at Apple ($74.6 million), David Gitlin at Carrier Global ($65.6 million) and Ted Sarandos at Netflix ($61.9 million). The bulk of those pay packages consisted of stock or options awards.
The median stock award rose almost 15% last year compared to a 4% increase in base salaries, according to Equilar.
Tim Cook attends the WSJ. Magazine Innovators Awards at the Museum of Modern Art on Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2024, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)
Tim Cook attends the WSJ. Magazine Innovators Awards at the Museum of Modern Art on Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2024, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)
“For CEOs, target long-term incentives consistently increase more each year than salaries or bonuses,” said Melissa Burek, also a partner at Compensation Advisory Partners. “Given the significant role that long-term incentives play in executive pay, this trend makes sense.”
Jackie Cook at Morningstar Sustainalytics said the benefit of tying CEO pay to performance is “that share-based pay appears to provide a clear market signal that most shareholders care about.” But she notes that the greater use of share-based pay has led to a “phenomenal rise” in CEO compensation “tracking recent years’ market performance,” which has “widened the pay gap within workplaces.”
Some well-known billionaire CEOs are low in the AP survey. Warren Buffett’s compensation was valued at $405,000, about five times what a worker at Berkshire Hathaway makes. According to Tesla’s proxy, Elon Musk received no compensation for 2024, but in 2018 he was awarded a multiyear package that has been valued at $56 billion and is the subject of a court battle.
Other notable CEOs didn’t meet the criteria for inclusion the survey. Starbucks’ Brian Niccol received a pay package valued at $95.8 million, but he only took over as CEO on Sept. 9. Nvidia’s Jensen Huang saw his compensation grow to $49.9 million, but the company filed its proxy after April 30.
The pay gap
At half the companies in AP’s annual pay survey, it would take the worker at the middle of the company’s pay scale 192 years to make what the CEO did in one. Companies have been required to disclose this so-called pay ratio since 2018.
The pay ratio tends to be highest at companies in industries where wages are typically low. For instance, at cruise line company Carnival Corp., its CEO earned nearly 1,300 times the median pay of $16,900 for its workers. McDonald’s CEO makes about 1,000 times what a worker making the company’s median pay does. Both companies have operations that span numerous countries.
Overall, wages and benefits netted by private-sector workers in the U.S. rose 3.6% through 2024, according to the Labor Department. The average worker in the U.S. makes $65,460 a year. That figure rises to $92,000 when benefits such as health care and other insurance are included.
“With CEO pay continuing to climb, we still have an enormous problem with excessive pay gaps,” Anderson said. “These huge disparities are not only unfair to lower-level workers who are making significant contributions to company value – they also undercut enterprise effectiveness by lowering employee morale and boosting turnover rates.”
Some gains for female CEOs
This photo provided by Otis Elevator Co. shows CEO Judy Marks. (via AP)
This photo provided by Otis Elevator Co. shows CEO Judy Marks. (via AP)
For the 27 women who made the AP survey — the highest number dating back to 2014 — median pay rose 10.7% to $20 million. That compares to a 9.7% increase to $16.8 million for their male counterparts.
The highest earner among female CEOs was Judith Marks of Otis Worldwide, with a pay package valued at $42.1 million. The company, known for its elevators and escalators, has had operating profit above $2 billion for four straight years. About $35 million of Marks’ compensations was in the form of stock awards.
Other top earners among female CEOs were Jane Fraser of Citigroup ($31.1 million), Lisa Su of Advanced Micro Devices ($31 million), Mary Barra at General Motors ($29.5 million) and Laura Alber at Williams-Sonoma ($27.7 million).
FILEw – Jane Fraser, CEO, Citigroup, speaks during a Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee oversight hearing to examine Wall Street firms on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2023 in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
FILEw – Jane Fraser, CEO, Citigroup, speaks during a Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee oversight hearing to examine Wall Street firms on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2023 in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
Lisa Su, CEO of Advanced Micro Devices, arrives for a dinner at the Elysee Palace, during an event on the sidelines of the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit in Paris, Monday, Feb. 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Thomas Padilla, File)
Lisa Su, CEO of Advanced Micro Devices, arrives for a dinner at the Elysee Palace, during an event on the sidelines of the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit in Paris, Monday, Feb. 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Thomas Padilla, File)
Christy Glass, a professor of sociology at Utah State University who studies equity, inclusion and leadership, said while there may be a few more women on the top paid CEO list, overall equity trends are stagnating, particularly as companies cut back on DEI programs.
“There are maybe a couple more names on the list, but we’re really not moving the needle significantly,” she said.
FILE- Mary Barra, chair and CEO of General Motors, talks to David Rubenstein during an interview hosted by the Economic Club of Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 13, 2023, in Washington. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough, File)
FILE- Mary Barra, chair and CEO of General Motors, talks to David Rubenstein during an interview hosted by the Economic Club of Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 13, 2023, in Washington. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough, File)
Prioritizing security
Equilar found that a larger number of companies are offering security perquisites as part of executive compensation packages, possibly in reaction to the December shooting of UnitedHealthCare CEO Brian Thompson.
Equilar said an analysis of 208 companies in the S&P 500 that filed proxy statements by April 2 showed that the median spending on security rose to $94,276 last year from $69,180 in 2023.
Among the companies that increased their security perks were Centene, which provides health care services to Medicare and Medicaid, and the chipmaker Intel.
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Reporters Matt Ott and Chris Rugaber in Washington contributed.
Warren Buffett’s conglomerate has added another zero to its haul from a months-long selling spree of Bank of America Corp. stock.
In its 14th round of disposals, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. eclipsed $10 billion of total proceeds from whittling its stake in the second-largest US bank, a regulatory filing on Monday shows. Buffett, 94, began paring the massive investment in mid-July, putting pressure on the stock’s price ever since.
In the latest batch, Berkshire reaped $383 million over three trading days, as it unloaded fewer shares than in many previous rounds. Buffett’s selling has tended to trickle off when the stock’s price falls toward $39, his company’s filings show. The shares closed at $39.96 on Monday.
Berkshire’s remaining 10.1% stake is worth about $31.4 billion at that price.
Most people (56.8%) around the world identify as introverts, according to a 2020 study from The Myers-Briggs Company. Those with an introverted personality are often reflective and self-aware, prefer to write rather than speak and feel tired after being in a crowd.
Naturally, many introverts aren’t big fans of public speaking. Addressing an audience might be an inevitable part of professional life, but the average introvert probably isn’t clamoring to get in front of a group.
Warren Buffett, the 94-year-old billionaire chairman and CEO of conglomerate holding company Berkshire Hathaway, considers himself an introvert. In his biography The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life by Alice Schroeder, he admits that speaking in front of a crowd used to make him physically ill.
“I was terrified of public speaking,” Buffett says. “You can’t believe what I was like if I had to give a talk. I was so terrified that I just couldn’t do it. I would throw up. In fact, I arranged my life so that I never had to get up in front of anybody.”
After Buffett graduated from Columbia Business School, where he studied under investor Benjamin Graham, he returned to Omaha, Nebraska. There, he saw an advertisement for a public speaking course using the Dale Carnegie method.
Buffett was familiar with Carnegie’s 1936 self-help book How to Win Friends & Influence People, and he’d even signed up for a Carnegie public speaking class in New York — before he backed out and stopped payment on the $100 check.
Buffett decided to give the course another chance in Omaha.
“I took a hundred bucks in cash and gave it to Wally Keenan, the instructor, and said, ‘Take it before I change my mind,’” he recalls in The Snowball.
In Keenan’s class at Omaha’s Rome Hotel, Buffett discovered the key to conquering his public speaking fears.
“The way it works is that youlearn to get out of yourself,” Buffett explains. “I mean, why should you be able to talk alone with somebody five minutes before and then freeze in front of a group? So they teach you the psychological tricks to overcome this. Some of it is just practice — just doing it and practicing.”
Practicing under the same conditions in which you’ll speak or otherwise perform can help promote success in high-pressure situations, Sian Beilock, cognitive scientist and current president of Dartmouth College, told Entrepreneurin 2022.
Additionally, it can help to take a step back as the event draws near, according to Beilock. Then, during the high-stakes moment, she suggests interpreting physiological responses positively; for example, consider sweaty palms or a racing heart signs of excitement rather than anxiety.
“And it worked,” Buffett says of the psychological techniques he learned in his public speaking class many decades ago. “That’s the most important degree that I have.”
Buffett‘s certification of completion for the Carnegie course, dated January 1952, hangs above the sofa in his office, according to Schroeder’s account.
Now, Buffett stands in front of an audience of 40,000 at Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting, where attendees line up hours before the event to listen to the Oracle of Omaha speak.
The Microsoft co-founder has long been one of the world’s wealthiest people. Yi-Chin Lee/Houston Chronicle via Getty Imag
Bernie Sanders, the famously anti-billionaire senator of Vermont, and Bill Gates, the world’s seventh wealthiest person with an estimated net worth of $138.5 billion, make an unlikely pairing—especially when it comes to debating income inequality. Despite their differences, the duo sat down together to discuss wealth and taxation for the latest episode of Gates’ new Netflix series What’s Next? The Future with Bill Gates.
“Several of my friends raised an eyebrow when I told them I was going to meet with him,” said Gates in a blog post on Wednesday (Sept. 18) discussing his meeting with Sanders and the show, which aired the same day. “After all, Sen. Sanders is the first U.S. Senator in history to go on record saying that billionaires shouldn’t exist,” he added.
Sanders maintained this stance during their discussion, calling the existence of ultra-wealthy individuals “unacceptable” and “obscene.” Gates, meanwhile, suggested that billionaires should voluntarily donate their wealth but disagreed on outlawing them altogether. “But again, I’m biased,” conceded the Microsoft (MSFT) co-founder. Gates, who has given away some $77.6 billion via the Gates Foundation, has long been a champion for billionaire philanthropy and in 2010 helped create the Giving Pledge, a campaign that urges the ultra-wealthy to donate the majority of their wealth.
How much should the ultra-rich be taxed?
Despite their different stances on banning billionaires, both Gates and Sanders are advocates for higher taxes on the rich. “I’m amazed that the rich aren’t taxed substantially more than they are,” said Gates during the episode. “If you raise taxes a fair bit, there should be enough to somewhat raise the social safety net, which is not as well-funded as I would make it,” he added. The centibillionaire said his ideal tax system would leave the wealthy with a third of their current fortunes, which would give Gates around $46 billion given his current fortune. Sanders, meanwhile, said he “would go a lot further.”
Gates’ comments echo statements he made earlier this month in an interview with The Independent, where he voiced his desire for more progressive tax policies. “If I designed the tax system, I would be tens of billions of dollars poorer than I am,” he told the outlet.
In a 2019 blog post, Gates suggested increasing taxes on large investments by the wealthy and urged the U.S. government to raise the capital gains tax to equal taxes on labor. While those relying on salary and hourly work are taxed at a maximum of 37 percent, “the wealthiest generally only get a tiny percentage of their income from a salary; most of it comes from profits on investments, such as stock or real estate, taxed at 20 percent if they’re held for more than a year,” he said.
During his discussion with Gates, Sanders pointed to a similar idea proposed by Warren Buffett in 2011 when he criticized the fact that he was taxed less than his employees. “That is not what the American people want to see,” said the senator.
Earlier this year, JPMorgan Chase (JPM)’s Jamie Dimon—estimated to be worth $2.3 billion—said that higher taxes on the rich would help the nation bring its debt down while increasing economic spending and growth. “You would maybe just raise taxes a bit, like the Warren Buffett-type of rule,” Dimon told PBS, referring to a tax rule borne out of Buffett’s comments that dictates no households earning more than $1 million annually should pay a smaller share of their income in taxes than middle-class families.
Most investors have probably heard of Bill Gates, best known as a billionaire philanthropist and co-founder of Microsoft(NASDAQ: MSFT).
After heading up the technology company he founded for more than 25 years, the former CEO stepped down to focus on his charity work. Gates is worth an estimated $132.6 billion (as of this writing), according to Forbes, making him the ninth richest person in the world. However, the fabled billionaire has pledged that “the vast majority of my wealth would go toward helping as many people as possible.”
The vehicle he uses to support that goal is the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust. “Our mission is to create a world where every person has the opportunity to live a healthy, productive life,” the Gates Foundation website declares. The foundation has made grant payments of $77.6 billion since its inception, “taking on the toughest, most important problems.” As a result, holdings of the Trust tend to vary from quarter to quarter.
While the Trust continues to own stakes in more than two dozen companies, 83% of its portfolio was comprised of just four stocks at the close of the second quarter.
Image source: Getty Images.
1. Microsoft: 33%
Of all the holdings in the Gates Trust, Microsoft is by far the largest. This shouldn’t be a surprise, given that Gates set up the foundation with his own holdings. The Trust owns roughly 35 million shares of Microsoft stock valued at $14.7 billion.
Yet this isn’t the Microsoft of old. The company has expanded beyond its browser and operating system software, with Azure Cloud becoming the fastest-growing cloud infrastructure provider. It’s up 29% year over year in the most recent quarter, outpacing both Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Alphabet‘s Google Cloud.
However, it was Microsoft’s early move into generative AI that has investors most excited. Management noted that Azure’s cloud growth included “eight points from AI services,” helping illustrate the upside. The company’s AI-powered digital assistant — Copilot — and other AI tools could generate incremental revenue of $143 billion by 2027, according to analysts at Evercore ISI.
The Trust also benefits from Microsoft’s quarterly dividend, which the company has paid out consistently since 2004 and increased every year since 2011. The current yield of 0.7% might seem inconsequential, but that’s a function of the impressive stock price gains of more than 200% over the past five years. Furthermore, with a payout ratio of less than 25%, there are likely many more dividend increases on the horizon.
2. Berkshire Hathaway: 21%
Fellow billionaire Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway(NYSE: BRK.A)(NYSE: BRK.B), has similar plans to donate the bulk of his wealth to charity. He joined Gates in the “Giving Pledge” in 2006 and has since donated roughly $43 billion to the Trust, including a bequest of $4 billion in June. As a result, the Gates Foundation currently holds nearly 25 million Berkshire Hathaway Class B shares worth $11 billion.
Given Berkshire’s portfolio of profitable businesses and successful stock holdings, it isn’t surprising that the Trust continues to keep so much of the stock on hand. The portfolio provides built-in diversification and is expected to rake in billions in dividend income over the coming year. Furthermore, Berkshire just pared down its stock holdings and boosted its cash pile to a record high. It’s now holding roughly $277 billion in cash.
Given the company’s history of success and massive cash pile, it isn’t surprising that it’s still one of the Trust’s largest holdings.
3. Waste Management: 16%
Gates has a soft spot for boring companies with strong recurring revenue, which is the very definition of Waste Management(NYSE: WM). If you have any doubt, consider this: The Gates Trust has a stake of more than 35 million shares of Waste Management stock worth $7.3 billion.
Beyond just trash collection, Waste Management owns a number of reclamation stations that recover glass, paper, metal, and plastics and redirect them for recycling. The company also operates a number of landfills where it collects landfill gases to generate electricity and power vehicles.
In the second quarter, revenue grew 5.5% year over year, while its adjusted operating EBITDA increased 10%.
Let’s not forget the dividend. Waste Management has increased its payout for 15 consecutive years, with a current yield of 1.43%. And with a payout ratio of 46%, there’s plenty more where that came from.
4. Canadian National Railway: 13%
Another area where Gates and Buffett share common ground is enduring faith in railroads. Buffett was clear when he bought out Burlington Northern Santa Fe in 2009, saying that railroads transported goods “in a very cost-effective way… they do it in an extraordinarily environmentally friendly way… [releasing] far fewer pollutants into the atmosphere.” Gates clearly shares this mindset, as the Trust holds nearly 55 million shares of Canadian National Railway(NYSE: CNI) worth $6.2 billion.
What sets Canadian National apart is that it’s the only transcontinental railroad in North America, connecting the Atlantic coast, the Pacific coast, and the Gulf of Mexico. Regarding Buffett’s point, railroads reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 75%. This is primarily because they’re four times more efficient than long-haul trucks, making railroads a more cost-effective option. Add to that their high barriers to entry and significant economic moat, and it’s easy to understand the appeal.
Canadian National has a solid track record of dividend payments, with consecutive increases every year since it was initiated in 1996, and a current yield of 2.1%. The current payout ratio of 38% suggests there’s plenty of opportunity for future increases.
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If Warren Buffett’s Son Didn’t Sell His 90K Berkshire Hathaway Inheritance 47 Years Ago To ‘Buy Time,’ He Would Have This Much Today
Peter Buffett, the son of legendary investor Warren Buffett, made a life-altering decision 47 years ago when he traded his inheritance “to buy time.” Although he missed out on what could have been hundreds of millions of dollars in profit, he stands by his choice, confident that his father would agree.
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Finding His Path: At 19, Buffett received a portion of the proceeds from the sale of his grandfather’s farm, which his father invested in Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE:BRK) (NYSE:BRK), amounting to $90,000, according to CNBC. His father made it clear that this was all the financial support he would receive for personal use. Despite knowing it was his entire inheritance, Peter sold his Berkshire stock to fund his passion for music.
Buffett dropped out of Stanford University, purchased a modest studio apartment in San Francisco, and invested in upgrading his recording equipment. He dedicated his time to honing his piano and music production skills.
His big break came unexpectedly when a neighbor asked him about his profession, setting him on the path to a successful career in music.
He told the neighbor that he was a “struggling composer” and the neighbor offered to introduce him to his son-in-law who was an animator looking for ad tunes for a new cable station — it turned out to be MTV.
Buffett is now 66 years of age and has released around 15 studio albums over his successful career.
The Path Not Taken: If the son of the legendary investor would have stayed in college and held onto his $90,000 investment in Berkshire Hathaway, it would be worth over $400 million today.
“But I didn’t make that choice and I don’t regret it for a second. I used my nest egg to buy something infinitely more valuable than money: I used it to buy time,” Buffett said.
That’s a decision that his father would be proud of, he noted. The billionaire taught his son that work isn’t about making as much money as possible, instead it’s about doing something that you love to do.
Buffett acknowledged that the money was a privilege, calling it a gift that he had not earned.
“Without those hundreds of unpaid hours spent fiddling with my recording gear, I would not have found my sound or approach,” Buffett said.
The musician used the money to buy time to pursue something that he enjoys waking up and doing each day, which is exactly what his father tells young people to do. The billionaire has previously recommended that people pursue careers they would want even if money was not part of the decision-making process.
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This story is part of a new series of features on the subject of success, Benzinga Inspire.Some elements of this story were previously reported by Benzinga and it has been updated.
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(Bloomberg) — Asian markets are poised for losses on Monday as fears of a deeper US economic slowdown roil traders around the globe worried that the Federal Reserve may be behind the curve on rate cuts. Oil climbed on rising tensions in the Middle East.
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US futures dropped in early trading, amid the fallout from heavy losses on Wall Street on Friday and Berkshire Hathaway Inc.’s weekend disclosure that it slashed its stake in Apple Inc. by almost half during the second quarter. Contracts indicate that Australian, Japanese and Hong Kong shares are set to drop on Monday.
Berkshire’s selling is “going to be immediately seen as a negative,” said Mark Lehmann, chief executive officer at Citizens JMP Securities. “Apple is the number one player in the global consumer space and that’s the statement about the global consumer.”
Oil rose in early Monday trading after Saudi Arabia lifted the price of crude it sells to Asia and amid reports Iran may strike Israel to avenge assassinations of Hezbollah and Hamas officials. Saudi Arabian and Israeli stocks slumped more than 2% on Sunday, outpacing Friday’s losses on Wall Street.
Japanese shares have plunged in the last two sessions on expectations for more domestic interest rate hikes. The broader Topix index sank more than 6% on Friday, marking its worst day since 2016. The yen has continued its gains, hitting 145.78 against the dollar on Monday, its strongest since January.
Data on Friday showed that US nonfarm payrolls rose by 114,000 in July — one of the weakest prints since the pandemic — and job growth was revised lower in the prior two months. The jobless rate unexpectedly climbed for a fourth month to 4.3%, above the Federal Reserve’s year-end forecast, triggering a closely watched recession indicator.
The S&P 500 saw its worst reaction to jobs data in almost two years, dropping 1.8%. Intel Corp. plunged 26% on a grim growth forecast, adding to a string of poor tech earnings that have sent the Nasdaq 100 down over 10% from its peak to enter a correction.
A worsening conflict in the Middle East risks adding more tumult to markets as investors brace for a turbulent second half of the year. A gauge of bond market volatility has climbed, while the VIX Index – Wall Street’s fear gauge – jumped to the highest in almost 18 months after a weak US jobs report ratcheted fears of a recession, as focus increases on an already chaotic US election race.
“In the next few months global and Australian shares look vulnerable to further falls, suggesting that it’s too early to buy the dip,” said Shane Oliver, chief economist and head of investment strategy at AMP Ltd. in Sydney. “A correction is underway.”
Meantime, US Treasuries climbed Friday, with policy sensitive two-year yields falling to the lowest since May 2023 as worries mount the Fed’s decision to hold rates at a two-decade high is risking a deeper economic slowdown. Traders are projecting the Fed will cut rates by more than a full percentage point in 2024, with an increased chance of an outsized 50-basis point cut in September, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
“With the unemployment rate above and core PCE inflation now below the Fed’s year-end forecasts, we believe that the balance of risks favors more aggressive action by the Fed,” said Brian Rose, a senior US economist at UBS Group AG’s wealth management unit. “We are changing our base case to rate cuts of 50 basis points in September and 25 basis points each in November and December” after previously just seeing half that amount by year-end, he wrote in a note to clients.
In Asia, traders will soon focus on the private Caixin China services and composite activity data for a further gauge on the health of the world’s second largest economy after manufacturing PMI contracted unexpectedly for the first time in nine months. The data comes as Chinese officials made clear in July that there would be limited aid to spur domestic consumption.
Elsewhere this week, inflation data in Thailand and Chile are due while Mexico and Peru will hold policy decisions as debate rages on the outlook for emerging market dollar and local currency bonds. The Reserve Bank of Australia’s policy meeting will be parsed to confirm bets of easing by year-end, while US economic activity and credit data and speeches from regional Fed bank presidents will be closely watched.
“Better data this week could provide some confidence to a bond market that is grossly overbought and offer reassurances to equity and credit,” Chris Weston, head of research at Pepperstone Group wrote in a note to clients.
“Conversely, if the data continues to weaken and central banks don’t meet the market pricing in their narrative, one thing seems clear: buying the dip in risk may not be as effective this time around, while short sellers will have a far more prosperous hunting ground,” he said.
Key events this week:
Bank of Japan issues minutes of June meeting, Monday
China Caixin services PMI, Monday
Indonesia GDP, Monday
Singapore retail sales, Monday
Thailand CPI, Monday
Eurozone PPI, HCOB Services PMI, Monday
US ISM Services index, Monday
Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee speaks, Monday
San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly speaks, Monday
Australia rate decision, Tuesday
Japan cash earnings, Tuesday
Philippines CPI, trade, Tuesday
Eurozone retail sales, Tuesday
US trade, Tuesday
New Zealand unemployment, Wednesday
China trade, Wednesday
Chile copper exports, trade, Wednesday
US consumer credit, Wednesday
ECB Supervisory Board member Elizabeth McCaul speaks, Wednesday
RBA Governor Michele Bullock speaks, Thursday
Philippines GDP, Thursday
India rate decision, Thursday
US initial jobless claims, Thursday
Richmond Fed President Thomas Barkin speaks, Thursday
Chile CPI, Thursday
Colombia CPI, Thursday
Mexico CPI, rate decision Thursday
Peru rate decision, Thursday
China PPI, CPI, Friday
Germany CPI, Friday
Canada unemployment, Friday
Brazil CPI, Friday
Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
S&P 500 futures fell 1% as of 8:45 a.m. Tokyo time
Hang Seng futures fell 0.4%
S&P/ASX 200 futures fell 1.5%
Nikkei 225 futures fell 3.1%
Currencies
The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index was little changed
The euro was little changed at $1.0906
The Japanese yen rose 0.5% to 145.78 per dollar
The offshore yuan rose 0.2% to 7.1494 per dollar
The Australian dollar fell 0.1% to $0.6502
Cryptocurrencies
Bitcoin fell 1.4% to $58,304.18
Ether fell 1.8% to $2,700.26
Commodities
Bonds
This story was produced with the assistance of Bloomberg Automation.
This means a trader who snapped up just $925 worth of the stock at the rock-bottom price would now see their investment worth over $3 million today.
While it hasn’t been confirmed how many people purchased the Class A stock during the technical error—which lasted for around an hour and a half—the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) has swiftly undone their trades.
In an update posted at 9 p.m. last night, NYSE said it would “bust” all the “erroneous” trades of Berkshire Hathaway stock at or below $603,718.30 a share.
The issue, the exchange added, is related to a problem at the Consolidated Tape Association (CTA), which provides real-time information about quotes and trades on the exchange. The CTA oversees part of the Securities Information Processor (SIP) which consolidates all protected bid/ask quotes and trades into a single data stream.
The CTA said it experienced problems with price banding which “may have been related to a new software release” on SIP. As a result the CTA has reverted to the previous version of the software. The CTA did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.
During the blip, the NYSE placed halts on certain trades, and will seek to determine which are erroneous and thus eligible to be canceled. The technical issue has now been resolved, it added, with all tickers trading as normal.
Traders who didn’t hop on a discounted Berkshire Hathaway stock but did buy heavily discounted shares in other brands will also be subject to having their trades struck off—with the ruling not eligible for appeal.
For Berkshire Hathaway, the good news is that its Class B Stock (BRK.B) was not impacted by the ticker problem, and its Class A stock closed at more than $631,000 a share.
Berkshire Hathaway did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.
Costly mistakes
The Berkshire Hathaway mega-bargain is one of many hiccups experienced by various international stock exchanges—and is unlikely to be the last.
Just last week, live data from the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average disappeared from traders screens for around an hour, the Financial Times reported. The system then returned to normal but the cause of the outage is being investigated.
In May 2022, a London trader bypassed hundreds of warning notifications to create a basket worth $444 billion.
While $255 billion was blocked from trading by Citi’s internal management systems, a basket worth $189 billion was still released to the global markets.
A total of $1.4 billion of equities were sold across various European exchanges before the trader canceled the order. Citi was fined a near-$70 million by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority for the oversight and related matters.
But the Berkshire CEO also warned of higher taxes, teased a potential Canadian investment, and revealed a $500 million gift of Berkshire stock.
Moreover, Buffett declared that he could earn a 50% annual return on $1 million, predicted Berkshire’s cash pile would balloon to more than $200 billion this quarter, and recalled the time a Russian chess grandmaster visited Omaha.
Here are 14 interesting nuggets from the Berkshire meeting:
1. Raking it in
Buffett pointed out that Berkshire generated some $37 billion in operating profits last year, meaning that on an average day, he received a fresh $100 million to deploy. The investor was underscoring the difficulty of shrewdly investing such a large and relentless inflow of cash.
2. Cash hoard
Berkshire’s mountain of cash and Treasury hit a record $189 billion last quarter, and it’s likely to swell to more than $200 billion this quarter, Buffett said.
“I don’t mind at all, under current conditions, building the cash position. When I look at the alternative of what’s available, in the equity markets, and I look at the composition of what’s going on in the world, we find it quite attractive.”
3. Taxing times
The government will probably raise taxes in the coming years in a bid to balance its budget, Buffett said.
“I would say with the present fiscal policies that something has to give. I think that higher taxes are quite likely. The government may decide that someday they don’t want the fiscal deficit to be this large, and they may not want to decrease spending a lot, and they may decide they’ll take a larger percentage of what we earn.”
4. Charlie and Costco
Buffett bemoaned that he should have listened to his late business partner, Charlie Munger, and been “more aggressive” with his investment in Costco.
Berkshire increased its stake in the retailer from $32 million in 1999 to $1.3 billion in June 2020, then exited the following quarter. Costco stock surged more than 500% during that period.
Buffett revealed he’s exploring a potential investment in Canada.
“We do not feel uncomfortable in any way, shape, or form putting our money into Canada. In fact, we’re actually looking at one thing now.”
6. New regime
Buffett appeared to change his mind over who would run Berkshire’s stock portfolio once he’s gone. Instead of his investment managers, Todd Combs and Ted Weschler, he suggested his successor as CEO, Greg Abel, would oversee it.
“I think the responsibility ought to be entirely with Greg,” Buffett said. “He understands businesses extremely well and if you understand businesses, you understand common stocks.”
7. Cracking down
Buffett admitted that he and Munger were lenient with underperforming managers, but declared that would change once Abel takes over.
“If you have 20 children and you’re very rich, you’ll have some that will be go-getters anyway, and you’ll have some that won’t. We are a very, very rich company and we haven’t had a history of being very tough on people that coasted. Greg will do something about it.”
8. Bashing banks
Buffett took aim at Wall Street while underscoring that Berkshire’s rock-solid financials allow it to lend and invest money during dark periods when nobody else will.
“At those times, we want to be sure that the US government thinks we’re an asset to the situation and not a liability or a supplicant, as the banks were in 2008 and 2009. They were all tarred with the same brush. But we want to be sure that the brush that determines our future is not tarred.”
“I did sell a house for $7 million. I did not negotiate the 6% down, and I feel I got my money’s worth and then some. And I’m cheap by nature, so it isn’t I’m careless about it. I got my money’s worth.”
10. Mystery gift
Ruth Gottesman, the widow of the late Berkshire director Sandy Gottesman, recently donated $1 billion of Berkshire stock to the Albert Einstein College of Medicine to cover students’ tuition in perpetuity.
Buffett revealed that at the same time that Berkshire was repurchasing those shares from the college in exchange for cash, it was also buying back $500 million of stock from another charitable donor in a different state.
He shared that fact to make the case that Berkshire shareholders are unrivaled in their generosity.
Ruth Gottesman.Brent N. Clarke/Getty Images
11. Pocket change
Buffett claimed that if he had only $1 million to invest instead of nearly $200 billion, he could earn a 50% annual return. “I would try and know everything about everything small, and I would find something.”
12. Dollar champion
Buffett shrugged off fears of “de-dollarization” or dwindling dollar dominance worldwide: “There really isn’t any alternative to the dollar as a reserve currency.”
13. Debt and deficit
The investor raised the alarm on the US government running a large budget deficit and racking up unprecedented amounts of debt.
“I don’t sit and work myself into a stew about it in the least,” Buffett said about the government spending more than it brings in each year. “But I can’t help thinking about it.”
“It won’t be the quantity, it will be whether in any way inflation would get let loose in a way that really threatened the whole world economic situation,” he said about the national debt.
14. Chess royalty
Buffett recalled that Russian chess icon Garry Kasparov once visited his home town and met the legendary founder of Berkshire-owned Nebraska Furniture Mart.
“I know great bridge players, I know great chess players. Actually, Kasparov came to Omaha, met Mrs B.”
