Berkshire Cuts Wells Fargo Stake to Get Below Fed's Limit
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. is cutting its stake in Wells Fargo & Co. to less than 10 percent after the Federal Reserve told the billionaire’s company that remaining above that threshold would limit its ability to do business with the bank.
Berkshire sold 7.13 million shares of Wells Fargo this week and plans to divest an additional 1.87 million in the near future, the Omaha, Nebraska-based company said Wednesday in a statement. Buffett’s company oversaw about 500 million shares as of Dec. 31, valued at more than $27 billion at the time, according to Berkshire’s annual report. [...]
Buffett likely voted shares to back Wells Fargo board
Wells Fargo & Co's largest investor, Warren Buffett, has likely already voted his shares to support the bank's recommendations at its contentious annual shareholder meeting next week, a representative told Reuters on Wednesday, which include reinstating most of the board's directors. [...]
Now the board, whose members include new CEO Tim Sloan, is facing opposition in the shareholder vote next week after proxy advisers recommended rejecting many of them.
Buffett's assistant, Debbie Bosanek, told Reuters that Buffett supports management and the board, and that he has likely voted shares held by him and Berkshire to reflect that view. [...]
As Tesla bills stall, Lege weighs loophole for Buffett
The latest effort by Tesla Inc. to sell the electric cars that it makes directly to Texas consumers appears to have stalled in the Legislature, even as a bid by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. to win an exception to the strict regulations preventing automobile manufacturers from also owning dealerships is racing forward.
Senate Bill 2279 — filed Tuesday by state Sen. Kelly Hancock, R-North Richland Hills — would allow manufacturers to own dealerships “so long as the vehicles they sell or service are not the same type of motor vehicle that they manufacturer or distribute.” It has been scheduled for a Thursday Senate committee hearing.
Berkshire Hathaway Automotive, which has 85 dealerships in 10 states and is based in Irving, needs the exception to avoid violating existing Texas law because its parent company owns recreational-vehicle maker Forest River Inc., as well as a large stake in Chinese electric-car maker BYD Co. [...]
Apple and the Airlines in Buffett and Munger's Own Words
Munger on Apple and airlines during the 2017 Daily Journal Corp. meeting: [...]
"Now it may work out to be a good idea for the same reason that our railroad business turned out to be a good idea, but there’s some chance that it might not. He’s changed, and I think he’s changed when he buys his airlines, and he’s changed when he buys Apple. Think of the hooting we’ve done over the years about high tech – we just don’t understand it. It’s not in our circle of competency. The worst business in the world is airlines. What do we appear in the press with? Apple and a bunch of airlines. I don’t think we’ve gone crazy; I think the answer is we’re adapting reasonably to a business that has gotten very much more difficult. I don’t think we have a cinch in either of those positions. I think we have the odds a little bit in our favor. And if that’s the best advantage we can get, we’ll just have to live on the advantage we can get. I used to say you have to marry the best person that will have you. And I’m afraid that’s a rule of life and you have to get by in life with the best advantage you can get. And things have gotten so difficult in the investment world that we have to be satisfied with the type of advantage that we didn’t used to get. On the other hand, the thing that caused it to be so difficult was we got so enormously rich. That’s not a bad trade off." [...]
When Warren Met Jorge Paulo: Buffett and Lemann Recall Their First Deal
The billionaire investors Warren Buffett and Jorge Paulo Lemann have teamed up to engineer some of the biggest and boldest mergers and acquisitions in recent years, but they have rarely appeared in public together.
On Saturday night, however, the two appeared on a stage in Cambridge, Mass., to be interviewed by the dean of the Harvard Business School, Nitin Nohria. [...]
Mr. Lemann and Mr. Buffett got to know each other when both were on the board of Gillette. Around that time, Mr. Lemann was selling Banco de Investimentos Garantia, an investment bank of which he was a founder in Brazil. [...]
But it was not until 2013 that they first did a deal together. Then, Mr. Lemann’s 3G Capital and Mr. Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway teamed up to acquire H.J. Heinz for $23 billion. Two years later, 3G Capital, again together with Mr. Buffett, merged Heinz with Kraft Foods. [...]
kathy ireland® Worldwide (kiWW®) has inked an agreement to design a wide-ranging collection of branded art and wall décor for the home with Larson-Juhl and The Buffalo Works. The Buffalo Works will work with kiWW® to curate, develop and market the art program, partnering with Larson-Juhl as the exclusive supplier for the branded program. [...]
[Kathy Ireland, kiWW's Chair, CEO and Chief Designer:] "Larson-Juhl is a member of the Berkshire Hathaway business family. We began our kathy ireland® Home collection with a Berkshire Hathaway flooring company. Our first retail client was Irv Blumkin and Nebraska Furniture Mart, still clients and dear friends, all these years later. To join Larson-Juhl and The Buffalo Works means we are collaborating with some of the Berkshire Hathaway best! We will celebrate together at the Annual Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders Meeting where our new artwork will be on display," she adds. [...]
Established more than a century ago, Larson-Juhl is the global leader in custom picture frame design, manufacturing and distribution. The company also provides high quality conservation products to museums, galleries, and libraries and serves the framing market with a full range of solutions, from art printing and volume framing to wall decor. A Berkshire Hathaway company headquartered in Norcross, GA, Larson-Juhl operates 54 facilities in 17 countries around the world. [...]
Why Warren Buffett Loves Dividends, but Doesn't Pay Any
Despite Buffett's love of dividends, Berkshire Hathaway has never paid one to its shareholders, nor does Buffett plan to start implementing a dividend anytime soon. This may seem like a big contradiction -- as Buffett himself said in his 2012 letter to Berkshire shareholders, "It puzzles them [some of Berkshire's shareholders] that we relish the dividends we receive from most of the stocks Berkshire owns, but pay out nothing ourselves." However, Buffett's reasoning makes perfect sense. [...]
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