Billionaire Warren Buffett’s company, Berkshire Hathaway, has made record money, the Financial Times writes. The company raised $189 billion in cash in the first quarter of 2024, partly due to Buffett disposing of some of his stocks, including Apple.
According to the British newspaper, these monetary values show that the money has been accumulating without any new investments by the company on the horizon.
The company revealed on Saturday that it sold just under $20 billion worth of shares in the first three months of the year, and bought just $2.7 billion in the same period. As a result, the value of its stock portfolio fell to $336 billion from $354 billion at the end of 2023.
The document, released to the markets on Saturday, shows that Berkshire sold a significant portion of its stake in Apple. At the end of the period under review, its position in the iPhone maker was worth $135.4 billion, while at the end of 2023 it was worth $174.3 billion.
These numbers come as Berkshire shareholders gather in Omaha, Nebraska, for the company’s annual meeting.
Berkshire also reported that its operating profit grew 39% in the first quarter, year over year, to $11.2 billion.
Despite record cash and growth in operating profits, net profit (“real” profit) fell 64% to $12.7 billion. However, it is important to highlight that Warren Buffett does not discourage his shareholders from having confidence in the company’s net income numbers – he says they are “meaningless” – because they are affected by fluctuations in the value of his stock portfolio from quarter to quarter.
Since the beginning of the year, Berkshire shares have risen 11%, outpacing the S&P 500’s total return of 8%. Berkshire has not paid a dividend since the 1960s, the newspaper wrote.
“Writer. Analyst. Avid travel maven. Devoted twitter guru. Unapologetic pop culture expert. General zombie enthusiast.”
