Friday's Market Minute: Warren Buffett's Shopping Spree

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At 91 years old, Warren Buffett remains indisputably one of the most high-profile investors of our time. His investments have a momentous following—and for good reason. Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has a consistent track record of outperforming the broader market, holding true in even the most difficult trading environments like today. Year-to-date, Berkshire Hathaway is up nearly 16% vs. the S&P 500’s 5.5% decline. Buffett’s successful methods have always been transparent and direct, as he consistently has invested in fair value, high-yielding, blue-chip companies with solid fundamentals and longevity.

Back in February, in a letter to shareholders, he wrote to that “little excites us” – but has since gone shopping. According to an SEC filing, Berkshire Hathaway disclosed buying roughly 121 million shares of HP Inc. worth about $4.2 billion, upping the company’s stake to 11.4%. HP shares surged on the news Thursday, closing the day over 14.7% higher. This follows last month, when Berkshire agreed to buy Alleghany for $11.6 billion – which was its first multi-billion-dollar deal since purchasing Dominion Energy’s transmission business back in 2020. 

A lot of Buffett’s success this year are attributed to his investments in the energy sector, after Berkshire added to its stake in Occidental Petroleum last month – putting its stake at roughly 15%, worth around $7.7 billion. In addition to the 15% position in Occidental, Berkshire owns a sizable portion of Chevron at roughly 38 million shares. Shares of Occidental and Chevron jumped a whopping 96% and 40% in the first quarter, respectively.

But Buffett’s success is not without criticism. At a bitcoin conference in Miami on Thursday, billionaire venture capitalist and entrepreneur Peter Thiel criticized several leaders of the financial industry, calling Warren Buffett a “sociopathic grandpa from Omaha”. But many would point out that Berkshire’s returns speak for themselves long-term. The top five investments in Berkshire Hathaway remain to be Apple, Bank of America, Coca-Cola, American Express and Kraft Heinz. Apple is Berkshire’s largest holding, representing about 47% of the total portfolio. Berkshire also has a substantial energy subsidiary that owns PacifiCorp and MidAmerican, as well as oil and natural gas pipelines and renewable energy companies.

This post contains sponsored advertising content. This content is for informational purposes only and not intended to be investing advice.