{"id":36626,"date":"2023-05-07T02:26:12","date_gmt":"2023-05-07T02:26:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/buffetts-berkshire-posts-35-5\/"},"modified":"2023-05-07T02:57:06","modified_gmt":"2023-05-07T02:57:06","slug":"buffetts-berkshire-posts-35-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/buffetts-berkshire-posts-35-5\/","title":{"rendered":"Buffett’s Berkshire posts $35.5 billion profit, buys back more stock"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

OMAHA, Nebraska (Reuters) – Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc posted a $35.5 billion first-quarter profit on Saturday, reflecting gains from stocks such as Apple Inc, while higher investment income and a rebound at car insurer Geico bolstered operating results.<\/p>\n

Berkshire also sped up repurchases of its own stock, buying back $4.4 billion, while paring its investments in other stocks such as Chevron Corp, which is still a major holding.<\/p>\n

Results were released ahead of Berkshire’s annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, part of a weekend that draws tens of thousands of people to the city.<\/p>\n

Buffett, 92, has run Berkshire since 1965, transforming it from a struggling textile company into a conglomerate with dozens of businesses including Geico, the BNSF railroad, Berkshire Hathaway Energy, and manufacturing and retail units including See’s Candies and Dairy Queen ice cream.<\/p>\n

The diversification has led many investors, not just Buffett fans, to view Berkshire as a stable long-term investment even amid recession fears and concerns about the banking industry.<\/p>\n

MORE CASH<\/p>\n

Net income equaled $24,377 per Class A share and rose from $5.58 billion, or $3,784 per share, a year earlier.<\/p>\n

That in part reflected a 27% jump in Apple’s stock price, leaving Berkshire with a $151 billion stake in the iPhone maker.<\/p>\n

An accounting rule requires Berkshire to report unrealized gains and losses with net results, and Buffett urges investors to ignore the resulting volatility.<\/p>\n

Quarterly operating profit increased 13% to $8.07 billion, or about $5,561 per Class A share, from $7.16 billion.<\/p>\n

Those results benefited from Geico snapping a six-quarter string of underwriting losses, and a 68% increase in how much Berkshire’s insurance units generate from investments.<\/p>\n

Geico’s pretax underwriting gain was $703 million, benefiting from higher premiums, fewer crashes and a significant drop in ad spending, which may have led to fewer high-risk drivers seeking coverage.<\/p>\n

Berkshire’s cash hoard grew $2 billion in the quarter to $130.6 billion, as the company sold $13.3 billion of stocks and bought just $2.9 billion.<\/p>\n

Chevron appears to have been among the sales, with Berkshire’s stake falling 28% to $21.6 billion though the oil company’s stock price dropped just 9%.<\/p>\n

Berkshire also owns a 23.6% stake in another oil company, Occidental Petroleum Corp.<\/p>\n

Its stock sales more than offset the $8.2 billion Berkshire spent to boost its stake in truck stop operator Pilot Travel Centers to 80% from 38.6%, leaving the founding Haslam family with 20%. The increase was expected.<\/p>\n

IMPACT OF WILDFIRES<\/p>\n

Profit at the BNSF railroad fell 9% to $1.25 billion, hurt by higher fuel costs and lower shipping volumes. <\/p>\n

Berkshire Hathaway Energy, normally a steady earnings generator, saw profit fall 46% as it set aside $359 million for legal and other costs from wildfires in Oregon and northern California, where it has multiple operations, in 2020. <\/p>\n

Operating results also reflected October’s purchase of insurance holding company Alleghany Corp, while net results included a gain related to Pilot.<\/p>\n

Berkshire’s Class A shares have risen 4.9% this year, trailing the Standard & Poor’s 500’s 7.7% gain. The index lagged Berkshire by 23.4 percentage points in 2022, excluding dividends.<\/p>\n

\n

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in Omaha, Nebraska; Editing by Alexander Smith and Diane Craft)<\/p>\n

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OMAHA, Nebraska (Reuters) – Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc posted a $35.5 billion first-quarter profit on Saturday, reflecting gains from stocks such as Apple Inc, while higher investment income and a rebound at car insurer Geico bolstered operating results. Berkshire also sped up repurchases of its own stock, buying back $4.4 billion, while paring its […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":36891,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1213],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-36626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-business","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportBusinessNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ450BX-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36626"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36626\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36892,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36626\/revisions\/36892"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}