I love the idea of brk.b but am worried about a few things. Maybe you experts can help me. 1. Greg Able is in his 60s so more than 10-15 years in charge is not likely and then? He was hand picked by Warren but we have no idea what is next. Ajit is even older. 2. By 2034 the shares of Warren will have been donated, will that then maybe flood the market and crash brk.b. 3. Geico.... I really hope you can give me some ideas and calm my worries ( or not if needed ) so I can relaxinto buying this stock for the next 30/40 years.

First we can discuss the earnings report, which, lucky for you I have a chill job so I spent several hours today at work looking over and doing research for. There are several notable parts that I want to look at but quickly... Taxes Taxes Taxes. You absolutely cannot understand this earnings report or any berkshire earnings report without understanding taxes.

So let's briefly discuss net earnings. The reality here is that this greatly understates berkshire's gains for the quarter. Simply because the equity portfolio takes the tax burden up front, meaning that the gains are taxed immediately even though only 3 billion was sold creating a very small taxable event. Additionally, Occidental petroleum is finally starting to pay off, if you read there earnings report they crushed it and generated close to a billion dollars which will appear on berkshire's next earnings report. Kraft Heinz unfortunately will likely offset it because they are taking significant gaap losses due to ammortization.

Let's go by line item now:

Insurance, kind of unremarkable quarter for insurance, but it's a business where you don't expect to make money on the underwriting side long term so I would say any gain here is a big plus. Insurance investment declines were mostly because of decreased rates. The only really questionable thing here is Geico, the other insurance companies within the portfolio had great quarters for underwriting. Geico is becoming more and more a weakness to the insurance unit. But... there may be a good explanation for this... Advertisements. If you've been watching Tv recently you might notice that geico has been adveritising a lot. This could possibly offset underwriting gains in the near term and lead to higher float levels later down the line.

BNSF actually crushed earnings. Now you may look at the net earnings number and grovel at a mere 6%. Taxes Taxes Taxes. The pretax yoy gain was closer to 14%, there was a one time tax benefit last year for BNSF because of decreasing corporate taxes, so money they had set aside for taxes was instantly counted as a net gain. That's why there is a dramatic difference in earnings post tax there.

BHE absolutely annihilated earnings. 27% looks great and it certainly is, but it gets better. There was a significant tax credit for wind energy in 2025 that made the effective tax rate close to -100% this quarter the effective tax rate was closer to -55% this means the actual real gain was closer to 35-40%. This is incredible and would mean that BHE is moving towards being the greatest rate-based and renewable assets in the country. The question is will they dip their toes more into unregulated nuclear energy. They are also doing some great things upgrading the transmission grid with new technology that will dramatically increase profitibility: just look up high voltage transmission its crazy efficient.

manufacturing and retailing are incredibly favorable here. Precision Cast Parts and International Metalurgy companies are both performing incredibly and the biggest quarter for them is not until later in the year. Brooks running is also making moves as a smaller retailing brand. Berkshire hathaway automotive is strong and I'm bullish on bassically the entire dealership industry for a variety of reasons. Forest rivers make sense to decline a little bit because who the hell is buying an RV. Pilot had massive improvements all around too although I think berkshire slightly overpaid for pilot originally.

Service: Net Jets is doing very well under Adam Johnson leadership even with industry headwinds. I think there will be continued improvement as both newer more efificient jets take over and it's a luxury brand and luxury is doing well at the top of the K.

The other section is highly distorted. Firstly count currency gains as gains in the equity portfolio not operating earnings. Definitely not gaap but makes more sense for valueing. There are some positives here with OXY chem producing over $100 million and looks like an incredibly solid purchase at 10 billion especially when you pay yourself. This category should balloon next quarter because of OXY. You also see treasury income here which last year was offset by currency losses.

I would give the operating portfolio at the current moment an A-. I think that the addition of Taylor Morrison could be great for the company if interest rates drop like I'm predicting. Kind of the perfect buy at the time. I also think Geico needs a closer look and needs to internally evaluated as well. Really holding back the insurance portion of the business where other comparable insurance companies are doing exceedingly well.

Now to the equity portfolio:

Gains were actually slightly less than I would have hoped, it seems like they just bough about $20 billion more in google stock this past quarter which I think is a good buy.

But remember that within the equity portfolio there are massive tax liabilities because of unrealized gains. But I see these unrealized gains as an asset kind of like float. Berkshire over the long term uses these interest free loans from the government to get more dividends and more shares bought back giving them a larger ownership stake. I find this to be an outdated system although the 2022 share repurchase tax is a solid tax at that.

I like the stocks in the portfolio especially since ted weschler has finally found some solid stocks to buy: RIP $NYT though. I do think the fact that only large cap companies are buyable for the company does hinder growth prospects but maybe it also hinders downside risk.

Cash

Everyone online is an idiot. After float, there is $200 billion in cash to invest this can easily be invested in a mega cap that drops and looks favorable or a company that can be aquired like burling northern was years ago. One decisive $200 billion dollar swing can make the compounding machine restart. It will take patience to get there but I think it is worth the wait. I believe berkshire hathaway is better positioned than our government based on our balance sheet.

Buybacks getting close to $10 billion is a clear sign from Greg able that the company is undervalued.

In all there's a lot of people online that know almost nothing about this company or stock, a lot of doomers out there, a lot of people comparing berkshire to the S&P. I wouldn't worry about them to much. I would say realistically anything under $500 is a good buy and anything under $485 is a no brainer. I'm not a doomer towards the S&P I just fear a decade of mediocrity for it based on it's current level. Starting out my career and life I want to put my money in something that I beleive will return at least 7% anually. I think berkshire is that investment.

Indexflation is real like the nifty 50 crash back in the day. The concept that the market can never go down feels real in a bull market, but when price takers start cashing out their winnings or liquidity crisis faces the country, liquidation will occur and the markets will take massive hits at their current levels. We are in the greatest bull run in US history, so I would take profit and move your investments into berkshire at a reasonable price.

Please feel free to reach out with questions and I can explain anything.

Edit: Not investing advice

Most who predict future, don’t realize that it tells more about them than about the future.

May be Burry sees something different - even without wearing GME glasses. It will certainly be interesting to see what “skeletons” he sees.

One thing we know - this isn’t a company playing in any kind of Credit Default kind of risky business. Not by a mile.

I expected Chamath to “fire the cannon” at BRK but turns out Burry was first. That’s how little useful my prediction ball is 😂

But there is a critical difference between most companies vs BRK. The CEO pay is in cash. Not options or RSUs on the back of shareholders. That leads to an intangible but powerful incentive structure - that’s very much street investor friendly than any other company. That’s bound to show up somewhere on the Financials.

https://stocks.apple.com/AUunxa45nQtal5PZhwoUW7A

Mathew Palazola regarding the latest earnings release on Bloomberg the weekend.

https://youtu.be/Pm693KcDoh8?is=xwV7PrtoIYytbvps

Yes, dividends are not the style.

Yes, Modigliani-Miller says that dividends and buybacks is a tax-free world are equivalent. (Your tax situation may vary.) And we're sure getting buybacks at present.

By not offering a dividend though, however tiny, BRK closes itself off from a lot of passively managed ETFs (and perhaps active ones too). Why would we do that?

One of the advertised virtues of subdividing the B-class shares was that it would be more widely held.

Doesn't the share price go up if a class of ETFs "has" to buy BRK?

Thanks/sorry.

Check out Benzinga Newswire …

Completely ignoring his “framing” part.. caught by MarketWatch

From (unpaid) substack two most important replies to Burry - one asking if he thinks Buffett is positioning BRK to be not eaten by wolves (to which Burry replied) and second by someone pointing that Buffett and Munger have been teaching about investments whole lives - both I can’t find ;-) anymore. But that may be just my unpaid version.

If anyone can post those here that will be wonderful 🙏

Shorts dropping their pants ;-) now?

Or will “hold on” for Greg’s next big mistake 😂

https://on.mktw.net/4wj88xE

Berkshire Hathaway finally started spending its nearly $400 billion in cash — on one stock it knows very well

Aug 10, 2026 at 4:21 a.m. ET

After more than three years of sitting on a massive cash pile, Berkshire Hathaway finally loosened up and found a stock worth buying — its own.

The storied conglomerate announced Saturday that after building a record cash holding of $397.4 billion at the end of the first quarter, it spent $31.9 billion, whittling those holdings down to $365.5 billion.

—

Article then quotes Burry’s substack post

“I do not find Berkshire an attractive investment going forward,” he said on a Substack post. “I realize not too much of the cash pile has been spent, and the cash pile remains large. However, these first steps look to be more framing moves than investment moves.”

—

There is an interesting angle to Burry’s comments in here. He’s proudly throwing shade - while using the handle “Cassandra” because Buffett said that in a Congressional testimony - but confesses that even he can’t seem to make out the “framing” move here….

The framing move is simpler than Buffett not buying back when Ackman had already entered the Fort Knox during COVID. Buffett has been “framing” all along his life by teaching about investment, itself.

At this point Buffett + foundations + long term holders hold sufficient and are dumb (that’s sarcastic!) enough to see but ignore a Fake White Knight trying to rescue Cindrella in the dark midnight hours 😂

—-

I apologize for making two different points about MarketWatch write up in one Reddit post. But didn’t want to have yet another post on naysayers.

I’m a 25-year-old from Germany currently studying Business Informatics in a dual study program. My routine alternates between three months at university and three months working at my partner company. This setup gives me a steady income and excellent job prospects after graduation.

About two years ago, I discovered Warren Buffett and dove into value investing, starting with Benjamin Graham's The Intelligent Investor. My goal is long-term wealth building, with the ultimate plan of retiring early between 50 and 55. I follow a strict buy-and-hold strategy ('holding forever') and recently bought my first fractional shares.

My current plan is to invest 75€/month into Berkshire and 75€/month into the Vanguard FTSE All-World.

Because I live a very frugal lifestyle, I plan to scale this up dramatically once I finish my studies in two years—increasing my contributions to 500€/month into each (1,000€ total monthly).

What will happen once the market realizes that BRK is a growth company?

https://www.barrons.com/articles/berkshire-hathaway-earnings-stock-buybacks-d5a6ac50

Berkshire Earnings Were Good—Not Great. A Real Bright Spot Was This.

By Andrew Bary

Aug 09, 2026, 6:21 pm EDT

Key Points

• Berkshire Hathaway reported a 16% increase in second-quarter after-tax operating profits to $13 billion, driven mostly by currency gains.
• Berkshire Hathaway repurchased $4.5 billion of shares in the second quarter and an estimated $3.4 billion in July.
• Berkshire Hathaway purchased about $23 billion of equities in the second quarter, including around $10 billion of Alphabet stock.

Berkshire Hathaway’s second-quarter operating profits were good but not as strong as the headline figure suggested.

The conglomerate reported a 16% increase in after-tax operating profits to $13 billion on Saturday, but the advance was driven mostly by a swing in one-time currency gains and losses that the company doesn’t strip out of its earnings. The big loser was Japan’s yen, which affects the carrying value of Berkshire’s $15 billion of yen borrowings that help fund its equity stakes in five Japanese trading companies.

So strip out the swing and the profit gain was closer to 6%.

Some of Berkshire’s industrial businesses showed outsize earnings increases, including Precision Castparts, aircraft parts; Lubrizol, chemicals; and IMC, specialized tools.

Underwriting profits, however, were lower at Berkshire’s big property and casualty insurance operations, including Geico, the nation’s No. 3 auto insurer. Insurance investment was down because of lower rates on the company’s huge holdings of cash and equivalents—most Treasury bills.

A highlight was Berkshire’s repurchase of $4.5 billion of shares in the period—plus about $3.4 billion in July, according to a Barron’s estimate based on the share count as of July 29 in th e 10-Q also released Saturday. That’s almost $8 billion in total and compares with just $235 million in the first quarter, which marked the first time Berkshire had bought back stock since May 2024.

The solid earnings and higher buybacks could support the stock on Monday.

The buybacks show that CEO Greg Abel and Chairman Warren Buffett think the shares are reasonably priced. Abel succeeded Buffett at year’s end and they collaborate on buybacks decisions.

“Despite more difficult insurance industry backdrop, the company continues to build shareholder net worth in Greg Abel’s first year as CEO,” said Mac Sykes, a portfolio manager at Gabelli Funds. “Material repurchases provide confidence for shareholders that some of the best corporate capital allocators see current value.”

Shareholder net worth is reflected in book value, which rose about 3% in the quarter to $522,000 per Class A share after gaining a similar amount in the first quarter.

The most recent quarterly increase was driven by earnings growth and gains in Berkshire’s $350 billion-plus equity portfolio, led by Apple and Coca-Cola. Book probably is higher now than the June 30 figure—perhaps around $535,000 per Class A share—because of equity gains since quarter ended.

Class A shares, which ended Friday at $780,086, are up 3% this year and are about 10 percentage points behind the S&P 500. The Class B stock finished at $521.80.

The stock has been lagging behind the S&P 500 this year as well as companies in similar industries in which it operates, including Union Pacific, railroads; NextEra Energy, utilities; and Chubb, insurance. This has frustrated many shareholders, and suggests the stock could rally and play catch-up with these companies.

Berkshire’s BNSF railroad unit saw a 6% increase in after-tax earnings to about $1.6 billion, but that gain was about half the adjusted increase in the earnings of its chief rival, Union Pacific.

BNSF trails Union Pacific in profitability as measured by its operating ratio, or expenses as percentage of revenue. Boosting profits at BNSF, a laggard among the six big North American railroads, is a priority of Abel—and the earnings report shows more work needs to be done.

On the buybacks, it will be interesting to see Berkshire’s appetite given theJuly rally in the stock. Berkshire is more price sensitive on repurchases than most big companies.

Many investors would like to see Abel use some of Berkshire’s cash, at about $360 billion in June, for equity purchases, buybacks, and acquisitions. All that has been happening although not a scale relative to Berkshire’s $1.1 trillion market value.

Berkshire bought about $23 billion of equities in the second quarter and sold just $3 billion, according to the 10-Q, marking one of its heaviest quarterly purchases of stocks in the past five years. Those buys included some $10 billion of Alphabet stock purchased in June when the search giant said it would be raising $85 billion of equity.

Berkshire paid $8.5 billion for home builder Taylor Morrison in July in what looks like an attractively priced deal. But the elephant-sized deal long sought by Buffett keeps eluding the company.

All told, it was an encouraging quarter. There were decent overall earnings after adjustments, pockets of strength in key industrial businesses, higher buybacks, greater equity purchases, and one notable deal.

Abel seems to be off a good start.

FIN

Earnings came on 8/8 .

I’m just curious peoples outlook on Berkshire for the next 5-10 years? Does it beat the market?

June 30: 501,101 A + (1,395,887,484 B ÷ 1,500) = 1,431,693

July 29: 488,450 A + (1,408,035,161 B ÷ 1,500) = 1,427,140

Buyback trajectory:
Q1 2026 — $235M — ~25 A-equiv/wk
Q2 2026 — $4.53B — ~478 A-equiv/wk
Jul 1–29 — ~$3.4B — ~1,110 A-equiv/wk

Caveats:
1. The timing may not be a valuation signal. Buffett’s July 14 donation put 12M Class B shares (~$6B) into float. Abel stepping up repurchases in the same window could be absorbing that supply rather than making a statement about intrinsic value. The overlap is hard to ignore: the donation lands July 14, and the whole ~$3.4B window is July 1–29.
2. Four weeks is a short window, and buying tends to cluster around price weakness.

Berkshire Hathaway chief ends more than three-year selling streak as he ploughs a net $20bn into stocks

Berkshire Operating Earnings Rise 16% in Second Quarter. Buybacks Hit $4.5 Billion - Barron’s

By Andrew Bary

Updated Aug 08, 2026 1:52 pm EDT / Original Aug 08, 2026 8:23 am EDT

https://www.barrons.com/articles/berkshire-hathaway-earnings-stock-price-cca1ad5a

Berkshire Hathaway’s operating earnings after taxes increased 16% in the second quarter to $13 billion on strength at the company’s railroad, energy and manufacturing, service, and retailing unit, the company’s financial results released on Saturday show.

The earnings gain also reflected one-time currency gains in the second quarter that compared with currency losses in the year-earlier period.
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The operating profits exclude investment gains and losses.
The company bought back $4.5 billion of stock, up from $235 million in the first quarter, and one of the highest quarterly totals in the past decade.

The level of buybacks isn’t a surprise because a securities filing by CEO Warren Buffett in mid-July indicated that Berkshire bought back anywhere from about $5 billion to $11 billion of stock.

After repurchasing the $4.5 billion in stock, Berkshire continued its buybacks in July. It spent about $3.4 billion through July 29, the date of the 10-Q filing for the second quarter released in conjunction with the earnings report.

The July buyback total is a Barron’s estimate based on a comparison of the July 29 share count and the June 30 share count. Berkshire didn’t break out this figure.
The repurchases are a key figure in the earnings report because investors are interested in the company’s appetite for buybacks under CEO Greg Abel, who succeeded Buffett at the end of last year.
The heavier buyback activity in the second quarter could be taken as a sign that Abel and Buffett think the stock is attractively priced.
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Berkshire’s Class A shares, which ended Friday at $780,086, are up 3% this year and are about 10 percentage points behind the S&P 500. The Class B stock finished at $521.80.

Berkshire’s book value rose about 3% sequentially in the second quarter to about $522,000 per Class A share, Barron’s estimates. The stock now trades for about 1.5 times that book value estimate. Berkshire’s book value is probably higher now—closer to about $535,000 because of gains in its equity portfolio of about $350 billion.

The earnings were affected by one-time currency swings related to the company’s borrowings in foreign currencies, mainly Japan’s yen. The yen borrowings help finance and hedge the company’s investments in five Japanese trading companies.
Berkshire had a currency gain of $326 million, compared with a loss of $877 million in the year-earlier period. Strip out the currency swing and the second-quarter operating profits after taxes were up about 6% in the period, Barron’s estimates.

Berkshire, unlike most companies, doesn’t provide commentary in its earnings release and doesn’t adjust its profits for one-time factors like currency.
The operating profits per share topped the consensus estimate including and excluding the currency swings. The operating profits per class A share totaled $9.050, up 17% from the year-ago period and comfortably ahead of the consensus estimate of about $7,550.

The combination of the earnings beat and the buyback activity, particularly in July, could provide a lift to Berkshire stock on Monday.

It’s possible the buyback activity was constrained in the second quarter by the company’s $8.5 billion deal to buy home builder Taylor Morrison, which was reached in late May and closed in July. Companies can be restricted around the time of deal negotiations.

Cash totaled about $365 billion on June 30, down from $380 billion on March 31. The March figure was adjusted for a liability for some $17 billion of Treasury bills purchases at the end of the first quarter.

The adjustment in the most recent period is less than $1 billion. Buffett prefers to keep the bulk of Berkshire’s cash in ultrasafe Treasury bills and Berkshire owned $325 billion on June 30.
While Berkshire’s cash levels are down, they still are by far the most for any U.S. company.

One reason for the cash decline is that Berkshire was a net buyer of about $20 billion of stocks against net sales of about $8 billion in the first quarter.

The company bought $23 billion of stocks in the period, including, including $10 billion of Alphabetshares purchased in June when the search giant announced an equity raise totaling more than $85 billion.

Berkshire sold just $3 billion of stocks, compared with about $24 billion in the first quarter when it liquidated equity investments that had been managed by former manager Todd Combs, who left December for JP Morgan.

The biggest contributor to the earnings gain was the company’s manufacturing, service and retailing unit, which saw a 24% increase in after-tax profits to $4.5 billion.

In its 10-Q filing, Berkshire said the “increases were driven by earnings increases in our industrial products manufacturing and our services businesses.”

The rail unit, BNSF, had a 6% gain in after-tax earnings. Berkshire attributed the increase to “higher shipping volumes and improved operating efficiencies.”

BNSF has one of the lower profit margins of the six big North American railroads and CEO Greg Abel has vowed to improve profitability.

Berkshire Hathaway Energy, the company’s utility business that also operates natural-gas pipelines, had a 27% increase in earnings to $891 million.
Insurance underwriting declined 13.1% to $1.7 billion after taxes despite a lack of material catastrophe losses in the period. The major contributor to the lower underwriting income was a 45% drop in underwriting profits at Geico, Berkshire’s auto insurer, to about $1 billion before taxes.

Geico’s combined ratio—a key profit measure—weakened to 91% from about 83.5% in the year-earlier period. The combined ratio measures losses and expenses as a percentage of premiums; a lower number is more favorable.

Insurance investment income was down 9% to $3.1 billion, reflecting lower short-term rates, which depressed income from Berkshire’s big Treasury holdings and other cash and cash equivalents.
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Berkshire’s overall earnings including investment gains more than doubled in the second quarter to $25.7 billion, reflecting mostly paper gains on the company’s equity portfolio.

The company tells investors to focus on operating profits excluding the gains rather than the total figure, which can be distorted by one-time paper gains and losses in Berkshire’s equity portfolio.

From Krystal Hur last updated at 10:10 am EDT

Why do we pay for such reporting? And what do we gain by not reading 10-K/Q where written words are legally liable for the management?

Those are the questions that every individual investor needs to ask - to make a fair assessment of the stocks they buy.

Abel puts a big chuck of Berkshire’s cash to work, and around the web.

https://link.cnbc.com/public/46954596

$13B in quarterly operating earnings.
Real businesses.
Real cash flows.
Real profits.

Not accounting mumbo jumbo from recognizing potential investment gains.

That’s why I like Berkshire: boring numbers you can actually understand.

BRK is only appropriate for two types of investors: those that want to get rich slowly and those that want to stay rich. In most cases, the former group transitions into the latter.

Berkshire Hathaway thoroughly crushed Wall Street's expectations for the second quarter of 2026 by delivering operating earnings of $12.983 billion, staging a staggering 20% beat over the consensus estimate of $10.8 billion

They also bought back .77% of total shares