Watch Warren Buffett preside over the full 2025 Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholder meeting

If everyone will please take their seats. Now, this is my u this is my 60th annual meeting and uh and it's the biggest and I think it'll be the best yet. And uh I would uh before I start, I'd like to give you a few figures from from uh yesterday because we set all kinds of records. Uh yesterday we had uh um 19,700 people that joined us in the afternoon between noon and 5:00. And that was up from 16,200 which was a previous record the year before. Uh and uh in every aspect we set records.

Uh sees Candy did uh uh $317,000 against 283,000 the year before. And most of these were limited by capacity. I mean, there were there were lines there throughout the total day. Brooks did 310,000. Uh it was an all-time record sales day for them. And I think they have close to 3,000 runners lined up for Sunday. Uh which is a lot of people to get up that I I think we we've had 2200 or 2400 before, but but 3,000. And uh that doesn't count me and it won't count me. And uh I could go up and

down the line. Jazz Jazz wares uh um around 250,000 double the previous years. They they just sell as fast as they can sell. Most of most every every place had had uh had uh people lined up at the uh at the cash register sometimes for a lot longer wait than wish we had. But uh but we'll learn the game eventually. And it goes on and on. Every company set records and uh and uh there's no way of knowing how many people we have here today. We have people listening in around the world. Uh but uh

uh I think we're setting we'll probably set records in a great variety of ways. And uh I would uh we're going to have in a minute we'll get to the question and answer, but I' I'd like to first introduce our directors and and uh uh I'm I'm Warren Buffett and I was born and bred right here in Omaha. Uh we have Greg Ael. He was born and bread in Canada and we have a Jeep Jane who was born and bread in India. So we we have a very diverse group and uh uh in the audience

and I will introduce them alphabetically and if they'll stand as I introduce them and uh I know it'll be an effort but withhold your applause till the end so that uh so that we can get through the list but we'll alphabetically uh with Howard Buffett. How I would just stand and uh withhold the applause. It'll go to his head. Uh Susan Buffett. We have Steve Burke, Ken Chanel, Chris Davis, Sue Decker, who's our lead director, Charlotte Gman, Tom Murphy Jr., Ron Olsen, and I'll have a few and when we finish I'll have a few more

things to add about him. Wally Whites and Mel Whitmer. And with that, you've got our all-star cast. And Ron, if you don't mind standing, I would like to point out that that Ron, they finally got through an age director thing at at Birkshire. Uh I think we had five that were over 90 here not too long ago, but uh but we put in the highest uh or Sue tells me anyway that it's the the highest age uh uh limit that any any of the companies she checked out came up with. But uh uh Ron has

been on the board for 28 years and uh been associated with Charlie Munger at Munger Tolls for many years beyond that and has been around at a variety of times of crisis and joy and disappointments and surprises and everything else at Bergkshire and has been of invaluable help to us. So, I think I think I'd like to give a special hand to Ron [Applause] Olsson and uh I think I'll do something else that isn't done usually at annual meetings, but I I haven't had a chance. Uh I listened to them on Thursday afternoon. It's the

only It's the only uh It's the only investment quarterly call that I listen to, but uh I listen to Tim Cook and I understand and it'll be tough for me to see him from up here, but Tim Cook, there he is. I'm somewhat embarrassed to say that Tim Cook has made the Bergkshire a lot more money than I've ever made Berkshire. So I uh credit credit should be given to him for uh I knew Steve Jobs briefly and Steve of course did things that nobody else could have done in developing Apple but but uh Steve

picked out Tim to succeed him and he really made the right decision. Steve died young as you know and uh nobody but Steve could have created Apple but nobody could but but Tim could have developed it like it has. So so on behalf of all of Bergkshire, thank you Tim. There's a couple other people I'd like to thank. uh I don't do any work in terms of the show or anything else around Bergkshire but uh what you see today uh is the product of a lot of people at Berkshire they forget you know that they

don't think of themselves as the one who's supposed to screw a light in and leave for somebody else specialist to come along and do other things. uh the people of Bergkshire put on this this show every year and uh uh you know our our chief financial officer and just everybody pitches in. It's a remarkable organization that way, but it's led this year uh in the last few years by Melissa Shapiro and she's made this whole thing work. Melissa And then we got an idea a while back. Well, many years ago, uh well, I'll take it

all the way back. uh maybe uh 65 years ago I met uh Carrie Sa's grandfather and uh wife they had nine children and Susie and I joined a a um playhouse group and I don't look like the kind of guy that would join a playhouse group but it was turned out to be a great a great move in many ways. First of all, I enjoyed the plays. Uh but beyond that uh uh I met not only uh not not only Carrie's grandfather who ran an insurance company in Omaha, Bill Kaiser uh but I uh also

met uh the Blumpin boys uh parents Louie and and Francis. So in in one sort of accident um when I was in my 20s uh came up with all kinds of good things and in connection with Carrie her father ran a company called uh Central States and later on we bought that company and then her father ran the company her sister went to work for Bergkshire some years ago and then uh she decided to have a family and subsequently had four kids. So she left but Carrie moved right in and Carrie uh uh had amazing

talents behind just like a good many people do. They they they have talents you don't you don't realize till uh you give them some responsibility. And so 10 or 11 years ago at uh I asked Carrie to do a 50th anniversary book uh about Bergkshire and just use her imagination and and she never she didn't need to check with me or do anything. She just she'd never edited a book. She'd never published a book. She'd never dealt with the printers before. But she just went out and promptly put together this 50th anniversary book and then

this year uh well then Carrie of course got married and had three kids so she had to leave us but but uh and we have a we go to a baseball game once a year and we invite some of our distinguished alumni like Carrie to join us and uh Carrie uh uh even though she was raising three children uh and you may have met one or two of them uh in the last day or so. She volunteered to bring bring together a 60th anniversary book and uh which I I asked for and uh again she

took the whole thing. She just did it. uh she kept doing the things with her kids and every now and then she'd I'd ask her how it was going and she'd tell me how it was going and so she put together this 60th anniversary book and um um got it done by you know maybe a week before the meeting because I I gave her the assignment very late and uh yesterday we sold I think it was 4,000 plus 4 to 4,500 maybe. We we 4,400. Uh we printed 8,000. We intended to print 5,000, but so

we sold 4,400 books yesterday and uh we'll have 30 I guess roughly 3,600 left out there today. And it's kind of a whimsical and but but accurate and uh uh uh she came out with just the book I hope she would come out with. And uh and then as we went through uh this publishing experience uh Carrie wouldn't take a dime. Um, but I did get her to name her uh favorite charity and this statement center which takes care of homeless people uh and does a great many other things. Uh it's located about five or

six miles from where we are here south. Has been doing a wonderful job. her grandfather helped form it. Uh her husband's now joined the board and uh we are selling 20 copies of uh this is a commercial place, isn't it? We are selling a uh 20 copies that uh we sold 10 prior to the meeting. That's all we let them sell and we raised a few hundred,000 doing that. Uh, I think we sold one for $100,000 and um, but we limited that to 10. And the only difference in these and the $25 version is that

uh, Carrie and I sound signed them. Uh but we saved six for yesterday and uh the six brought $148,000 which is a pretty good average per book of about 20 odd,000 and I then I had him say four more. So, uh, this afternoon when we disband at 1:00, uh, the, uh, area right behind us that has all the goods in it in the bookstore, uh, they will sell the final four and when we get all through, I'll match whatever we've raised for the the 20 and, uh, and we'll give the, uh, Steven Center a boost

both in financially, but also in awareness. Uh, so anyway, [Applause] that and when you look at that book, Carrie really did the whole thing. I mean, there's a lot of information in there. She dug through it and and she came through a couple times maybe to check a fact or two, but she she she got all she got material from the Munger family. She she just did a wonderful job and and and uh I I I I couldn't get her to take a penny for it. So, I'm going to ask her to do a lot

of other things in the future. But okay. Uh with that, I think we've we've covered all the the business. So, uh, we will move to Becky questions that she's received from I don't know how many she's received, but from all over the country and perhaps outside the country, and she's picked out a group of them, which uh she has not shared with me uh and uh we will alternate questions between Becky and uh the audience which we have by zones and and uh and with that I will uh turn things over Becky for the first

question. Thanks Warren. Um this first cut question comes from Bill Mitchell. I received more questions about this than any other question. He writes, "Warren, in a 2003 Fortune article, you argued for import certificates to limit trade deficits and said these import certificates basically amounted to a tariff, but recently you called tariffs an act of economic war. Has your view on trade barriers changed or do you see import certificates as somehow distinct from tariffs?" Yeah. Well, the import certificates were distinct, but they they their goal was to balance u imports against exports and so that the

trade deficit would not grow in an enormous way. In fact, it would have and it had various other provisions in it to to help uh uh third world countries as that time as they were called to perhaps catch up a little bit. uh and they they had a variety of aspects to them, but basically they were designed to balance trade and uh I think you can make some very good arguments for the fact that balanced trade is good for the world and the more balanced trade there is the better. It will continue to be better

for cocoa to be raged in Ghana and coffee and Colombia and a few things. And and over time the uh American industry has gone from being an agricultural country. This was this was nothing but an egg country. I mean that uh virtually uh and that was only 250 years ago. And we have become a very industrial country and uh we did not want to make that a situation uh in my view uh where we ran uh greater and greater deficits building up greater and greater debts against the country. So I I designed this uh import

certificate thing which uh Charlie thought was a little rub too much like Rub Goldberg. I don't know whether that time name is but it's gimmicky but uh it's certainly a lot better than anything I I think than we're talking about now and there's no question that trade trade can be an act of war and uh and I think it's led to bad things just the attitudes it's brought out uh in the United States. I mean, we should be looking to trade with the rest of the world and we should do what we do best and

they should do what they do best and uh I don't think it that's that's what we did originally. I mean, we were good at producing tobacco and cotton uh uh 250 years ago and we and we traded it and uh uh we want a prosperous world uh with eight countries with nuclear weapons, including a few that are what I would call quite unstable. I do not think it's a great idea to try and design a world where a few countries say, "Haha, we've won." And uh uh other countries uh are envious. [Applause] So, so my

my import certificate idea which went no place. Uh uh I think we've got extra copies with not a great demand for the copies. Uh if anybody and if you'd like and write the office, I think we could we could probably send you a copy of it. But the main thing to do is not use trade should not be a weapon. And the United States, United States, we've won. I mean, we have become an incredibly important country starting from nothing 250 years ago. There's nothing been anything like it. And it's a big mistake in my view

when you have 7 12 billion people that uh don't like you very well and you got 300 million that are crowing in some way about how well they've done. And uh uh I don't think it's right and I don't think it's wise. Uh I do think that the more the more the more prosperous the rest of the world becomes. It won't be at our expense. The more prosperous we'll become and with and the the the safer we'll feel and your children will feel someday. Uh, so that's but don't ex don't expect my import certificate idea

to go to up down there with Adam Smith's wealth of nations or anything. Okay. Uh, let's go to area one. Mr. Buffett, U, Mr. Abel, and Mr. Jane. Good morning. Uh, I'm St. J. I'm from Hong Kong. Mr. Buffett and Mr. Monger did a very good and successful investment in Japan in the past five or six years. The recent CPI in Japan is currently above 3%. Not far away from its 2% targets. Bank of Japan seems very determined in raising rates while Fed ECB and other central banks are considering to cut them. Do you think

BOJ, Bank of Japan makes sense to proceed the rate hike? Will is planned rate hike deter you from further investing Japanese stock market or even considering to realize your current profits. Thank you very much for arranging this greatest event every year. Finally, I wish you healthy always and keep holding this shareholding. Thank you. Well, I'm going to extend the same goodwill to Japan that you've just extended to me. I I I I let the people of Japan determine their best course of action in terms of economics. It's it's an incredible story. Uh and uh uh

five it's been about six years now as you pointed out. I was just going through a little handbook uh that probably had two or three thousand Japanese companies in it. Um, one problem I have is that I can't read that handbook anymore. The the print's too small. But, uh, the uh, and here were these five trading companies. They have a special name for them in Japan, but they were selling at ridiculously low prices. And uh, so I spent about a year acquiring them. And then we got to know the people better. and everything that Greg

and I saw we like better as we went along. So we got fairly close to the 10% limit that we we told the companies we would never exceed without their permission. And uh so we did ask them reasonably whether that limit could be relaxed and it's in the process of being relaxed somewhat. Um, we I I would I would say that I'll speak for Greg beyond me that I in the next 50 years. Uh, and I hope he's running things. Uh, we we won't give a thought to to selling those. I mean they had uh

uh and uh Japan's record has been extraordinary actually in terms of that uh uh my guess is that Tim would tell you Tim Cook would tell you that iPhone sales there are about as great as any country outside the United States. American Express would tell you that they sell their product very very well in Japan. Coca-Cola that we do business with. Another big investment of ours, they do extraordinarily well in Japan. They have a number of habits in uh in a civilization that operates differently than ours. Uh Japan is by far the biggest. Uh they

this is the container they've always preferred uh for soft drinks and and they have uh they have a whole different sort of distribution system there. But we have been treated extremely well by the five companies. They they they talked with Greg primarily. Uh, I went over there year or two ago, but uh, Greg Greg's Greg's more cosmopolitan than I am, so he's he'sn't saying much actually, but uh, very little. And but he is I don't How many times do you think you've met with representatives of one company, the other? Yeah, when you think of the

five, there's definitely a couple meetings a year, Warren. And I think the thing we're building with the five five companies is one, it's it's been a very good investment, but we are really, as Warren touched on, we we envision holding the investment for 50 years or or forever. But I think we also are building relationships to do incremental things with each of those companies. And we really do hope to do big things with them uh globally. They bring different perspectives and different opportunities and we see and that's the uh that's why we're building that long-term

relationship with them. It's super long-term and and and they have a much they have a they have different customs. They have different uh approaches to business. That's that's true around the world. And uh and uh we're we we don't have any intention in any way of trying to change what they've done because do because they they do it very successfully and uh and our our our main activity is just to is just to cheer and clap and uh and that I can still do it 94. Uh so uh we will own [Applause] those, you know,

we we will uh we we will not be selling any stock. I mean that is just it's that that will not happen uh in in decades if then. Uh and I my guess is that they will find things because they cover the world pretty much. Uh the five trading companies, we will find things occasionally that may be very large for any individual company there. Uh they may in some way be assisted by some some help we bring to the situation. Uh but but that will be an expanding relationship. Uh it's too bad that Bergkshire has

gotten as big as it is because we love that position and I'd like it to be a lot larger than than it is. that even with the five companies being they're very large companies and they're large companies in Japan uh and we've got at market that you know in the in the range of $20 billion invested but I'd rather I'd rather have a hundred billion than 20 billion and that's the way I feel about several other investments we have but uh size is an enemy uh a performance at Bergkshire and uh I don't know any

good way to solve that problem but but uh Charlie always told me that having a few problems was good for me. I never quite understood that but he if you listen to I moralize you would understand and uh and and it's not an impossible problem at all that uh and the Japan the Japan investment is has just been right up our alley. You want to add anything on that? No, I think uh you've touched it, but um as you said, it's right up our alley and I I absolutely agree, Warren. I I do believe we'll

see some very large opportunities long term and that and that's just been a great plus of that that relationship. Yeah. Yeah. I would say they they they want to they would like to present us with opportunities. We would like to receive them. We've got the money. We both get along well very well with each other and they have different they have some different customs than than we have. Uh they drink the number one Coca-Cola product they drink over there something called Georgia coffee. Uh so uh I'm I'm I haven't converted them to Cherry Coke and

they're not going to convert me to Georgia coffee. But it's it's a perfect relationship. I just wish we had could get more like it. Uh uh and I never dreamt of that when I picked up that little wasn't so little. Was about that thick but sometimes two companies to a page and and a couple thousand pages I believe. But it's amazing what you can find when you just turn turn the page. We showed a movie last year that uh about turn every page and I would say that turning every page uh is one important ingredient

to bring to the investment field. that uh and that very few people do turn every page and the ones who turn every page aren't going to tell you what they're finding. So you you got to do a little of it yourself. Okay. Uh Becky, this next question comes from Advate Prasad in New York. He writes, "Today, Berkshire holds over $300 billion in cash and short-term investments, representing about 27% of total assets, a historically high figure compared to the 13% average over the last 25 years. This has also led Berkshire to effectively own nearly 5% of

the entire US Treasury market. Beyond the need for liquidity to meet insurance obligations, is the decision to raise cash primarily a d-risking strategy in response to high market valuations? Or is it also a deliberate effort to position Birkshshire's balance sheet for a smooth smoother leadership transition, providing Greg Ael with maximum flexibility and a clean slate for future capital allocation decisions? And I will add one line from another shareholder, Mike Conway, who asks, "Are you encouraged you may see some fat pitches coming your way?" Yeah. Well, I wouldn't do anything nearly so noble as to withhold

investing myself just so that Greg could look good later on. [Applause] Now if he if he gets any edge what I believe I'll resent it. So the uh now the the amount of cash we have is we we we would spend well we came pretty close to spending 10 billion not that long ago for example but we'd spend a hundred billion. I mean and and those decisions are not tough to make. uh when when something is offered that is that uh makes sense to us and that we understand and uh offers good value and where

we don't worry about losing. And the one problem with the investment business is that things don't come along in an orderly fashion and they never will. I mean, it isn't like every day. Uh, you know, the the long-term record is sensational, but that is not a product. And I've been in, let's see, I've had um 200 trading days times 80 years. And yeah, at uh 16 million trading days, it been we kind of uh uh I mean 16,000 trading days. It it would be nice if every day you got four opportunities or something like that

and you know you could and they were expected to be equally attractive. you know, if I if I was running a numbers racket, you know, every day would have the same expectancy of that I would keep 40% of whatever the handle was. And so the only question would be is how much we transacted. But we're not running that kind of a business. And so we're running a business which is very very very opportunistic. And uh Charlie always thought I did too many things. uh he thought if we did about five things in our lifetime, we

we could we could uh we'd end up doing better than if we did 50 and and uh and that we never concentrated enough. Uh so that we would rather have if we've got 335 billion now in treasuries, we would rather have conditions that have developed where we would have like 50 billion or something like that. But that that just isn't the way the business works. And we have made a lot of money by not wanting to be fully invested at all times. And uh um we don't think it's improper actually for people who are passive

investors just to make a few simple investments and sit with their life uh sit for their life and them. But we've made the decision to be in the business. So uh we think we can do a little better than that by behaving in a very irregular manner. But if you told me that I had to invest uh well our let's say that we have a roughly 40 billion a year coming in and we start with 335. If you told me I had to invest 50 billion every year till we got down to 50 billion, that

would be the dumbest thing in the world to invest in that manner. Things get extraordinarily attractive very occasionally. The long-term trend is up. Nobody knows. And uh I certainly don't know. Greg doesn't know. Ajet doesn't know. Nobody knows what the market is going to do tomorrow, next week, next month. And nobody knows what business is going to do tomorrow, next week or next month. But they spend all their time talking about it because it's it's easy to talk about and uh but it it it has no value. Uh I've never found anybody I wanted to

listen to on the subject. And uh the on the other hand, I found the leafing through things like that big Japanese book that I can't read anymore. Uh the uh it's it's a that's a treasure hunt. And every now and then you find something and occasionally, very occasionally, but it'll happen again that uh I don't know when it won't. It could be next week. It could be 5 years off, but it won't be 50 years off. He will have we will be bombarded with offerings that that uh we'll be glad we have the cash for.

And it'd be a lot more fun if it would happen tomorrow, but it's very unlikely to happen tomorrow. Very very unlikely to happen tomorrow, but it's not unlikely to happen in five years. And then it gets the probabilities get higher as you go along. It's kind of like death. I mean, if you're 10 years old, the chances that you're going to die the next day are low. Get to be 115 or something like that. It's almost a cinch. Uh, particularly if you're a male. I mean, all the records are held by females in terms of

age. And uh I tried to get Charlie to have a sex change so he could test out whether and [Applause] uh he did pretty well for being a male. I'll put it that way. Okay. Station station two good morning Warren Greg and Ajit my name is Jackie Han I'm from China and now work in Toronto Canada this is my eighth Birkshshire hustling meetings at this point I've probably spent more time with you than most people spend on Netflix as you might guess coming from a Chinese family we always had a soft spot for real estate.

So the your question isn't why don't you own a house, it's why are you still buying stocks instead of more property? So here is my question. With today's high interest rates and global uncertainty, do you still believe in being greedy when others are fearful or the value investing facing new challenges in today's environment? Thank you. Yeah. Well, in respect to real estate, it's so much harder than stocks in terms of uh negotiation of deals, time spent, the involvement of multiple parties in the ownership. Usually when when when real estate gets in trouble, you find out

you're dealing with more than the equity holder. Uh uh but there have been times when uh large amounts of real estate uh have changed hands at bargain prices, but usually stocks were cheaper, but they were a lot easier to do. So uh Charlie did more real estate. Charlie enjoyed real estate transactions. uh and and he actually did a fair number of them in the last 5 years of his life. Uh but he was you know he was playing a game that it was an interesting game to him. Uh but I think if he you'd asked

him to make a choice when he was 21 and he had to either be in stocks exclusively the rest of his life or real estate the rest of his life he would have chose the stocks of the second the there's just so much more opportunity at least in the United States there's so much more opportunity that presents itself in the security market and does in real estate. And in real estate, you're dealing with a usually dealing with a single owner or a family that owns maybe a large property they've had a long time. Maybe they've

borrowed too much of money against it. Maybe the population trends are against them. But but to them, it's an enormous decision. When you walk down to the New York Stock Exchange, you can do billions of dollars worth of business totally anonymous. And you can do it in 5 minutes and the trades are complete when they're complete. In real estate, when you make a deal, a big deal with a distress lender, you know, when you sign the deal, then you go into another phase. I mean, then people start negotiating more things and more things and it's

it's it's a whole different game and a different type of person to some extent enjoys the game. Uh uh we uh we we did a few real estate deals that came our way in 2008 and nine, but but the the amount of time that they would take us compared to doing something intelligent and probably better. Uh and securities, uh there was just no comparison. I mean, in a real estate deal, every every sentence is as important to the person and and in stocks, uh, if somebody needs to sell 20,000 shares of Berkshire or something and

they call us and the price is right, it's done in 5 seconds and and it closes all the time. that uh uh people who you certainly wouldn't want to have marry your daughter or they behave well actually um in in in in socks. Partly that's because that they're probably having their their wires or phones or whatever it is uh recorded as to what they've said and everything. But but the the completion rate for working on anything in stocks is if assuming you're got a meeting of the minds on prices essentially 100% in real estate. It

just begins when you agree on deals and then they take forever. So that for a guy 94 it's it's not it's not at the most interesting thing to get involved in something where the where the negotiations could take years. uh and uh we we have the capability. There have been some huge failures in in in fact it uh if you go all the way back to Zechonorf in the 1960s he was going to change the world and Century City out in California is a product of his and and if you go to uh Urus if

you go to he was sitting on top of the world with the earth buildings and uh so people tend to get in trouble in that business. Uh the banks usually don't want to recognize it, but that takes a long time to go through the through the bank processes. They just got through redoing the Musk cologne that he made when he was buying it three years ago. uh uh the company that's now X and you know 3 years to work out a transaction that uh or you've got parties on both sides that aren't ready to act

that we find it much better when people are just ready to pick up the phone and you can do hundreds of millions of dollars worth of business in the day. I've been spoiled but I like being spoiled so we'll keep it that way. Okay, Becky. Um, this question comes from Sam England in San Francisco and it's for Warren and A. As AI systems become more capable and harder to interpret, how do you see that affecting the insurance industry's ability to assess, price, and transfer risk? Are there parallels to past disruptions Bergkshire has navigated in underwriting

or capital allocation? Okay, Becky, and G's got about a 100 points of IQ on me, and he's just going to be here this morning, so I'm going to let him answer the question first. Well, uh, there is no question in my mind that AI is going to be a real gamecher and it's going to change the way we assess risk, we price risk, we sell the risk and then the way we end up paying claims. Having said that, I certainly also feel that people end up spending enormous amount of money trying to chase the next

new new fashionable thing. We uh are not very good in terms of being the being the fastest or the first mover. Our approach is more to wait and see until the opportunity crystallizes and we have a better point of view in terms of risk of failure, upside downside. So right now the individual insurance operations do dabble in AI and try and figure out what is the best way to exploit it. But we have not yet made a conscious big-time effort in terms of pouring a lot of money into this opportunity. And my guess is we

will be in a state of readiness and should that opportunity pop up we'll be in a state where we'll jump in promptly. Yeah. And I was just add I wouldn't trade I wouldn't trade everything that's developed in AI in the next 10 years for for a G. So if you gave me a choice that uh uh gave me a choice of having a hundred billion dollars available to participate in the insurance property casualty insurance business for the next 10 years. and I had a choice of getting the top AI product out of whoever's whoever's developing

it or having a Jeep making the decision. I would I would take a Jeep [Applause] anytime and I'm not kidding about that. Okay, station three. Hello, I'm Sean Seagull from Chicago, Illinois. Thank you for investing your time to you and the executive committee for putting on this meeting and for bringing together a diverse group of people in attendance under one roof. Out of all the companies that Birkshshire Hathway owns, there was one that you acquired, the Chicago based company, Portillos, Hot Dogs. How did you know that this would be a good fit for the overall

company's portfolio? Well, I'll have to ask Greg about that because I don't know anything about it. So, maybe he bought it when I was looking the other way, but I think I got to call a friend on this one. Uh yeah, I I u I we own a lot of companies, but I do like to think I know most of them, but but the uh uh and and maybe a subsidiary of a subsidiary in some way, but but I I really don't know a thing about it. I'm sorry, but that that may be a good

thing. I do know something about hot dogs, though. and and we do have a lot of companies in Chicago, Warren. Yeah. Through Marman and that's been a great opportunity where we've accumulated a a variety of uh excellent companies under that portfolio. But as you noted, uh I don't believe Portillos falls under that. No, I I look at I I look at the financial statements of about Yeah. perhaps 50 or 60 of our companies uh every every month uh but in the case of Marman for example Marman itself owns over a hundred companies and uh yeah

it uh it was the creature of it was created by Jay Pritsker and uh and his brother Bob and it was a remarkable company when we bought it but But it was highly diversified already and then we've diversified it further. So it is it is something of a birker within Bergkshire and uh uh we found we found that that's working uh very good as arrangement. It it was interesting. Jay Pritsker was a uh uh remarkable manager and there's various branches of the Pritsker family. So you you'll it's it's really goes back to A and Pritsker

before J and so on. But in in 19 54, they changed the federal tax code very dramatically in the United States. It was quite a blow to me because I've been at Colombia and I'd been reading a JK Lasser book about the tax code and then they went and changed the whole damn thing. So it but 54 was a big year, big change. Those years come every now and then like 1986 and uh and you may see a big one one of these days. Uh, and there was a company called Rockwood Chocolates in in U

Brooklyn and they made Rockwood Chocolate Bits, which we used to sell at the Buffett grocery store and people made chocolate chip cookies out of them and everything. And uh then it turned out that cocoa, which lately has had a big run too, cocoa was 5 cents a pound in 1941 when LIFO was first allowed for for insurance for for tax purposes. And the Rockwood chocolate company went into on the LIO message. So they they owned like 30 million pounds or thereabouts of Coco. And then Coco took a run in 1955. And I had just moved

to New York. And uh uh there was a provision in the new tax code that if you were in two or more companies uh and you did certain things and you've been in them for 5 years and you got out of one of them that there would be no capital gains tax unlike all inventory gains and tax rates were around 48% maybe 52% and so you there was this huge profit this cuz um uh the cocoa had gone up in price, but that made it terrible for them in selling Rockwood chocolate bits because the price

of retail of the chocolate bits did not match what was going on at wholesale. Something almost identical has been happening in the chocolate business recently. Hershey chocolate just came out said they're going to have a bad quarter and we're paying $4.50 a pound for chocolate that from co because things are going on in West Africa that that make uh cocoa prices go up dramatically. In any event, Jay Pritsker bought control of Rockwood the chocolate company. And like I say, I was 24 or five years old. And they called the meeting to split off the to

uh one one of the chocolate businesses in a way that would then enable them to to recognize the gain on this these cocoa beans without paying 50% roughly 50% federal taxes on the gain. So I went to the meeting which was in Brooklyn and nobody was there. This is in the turn every page category except one guy and I was 24 and he was 29 and it was Jay Pritsker and nobody had showed up at the meeting and it was kind of a crummy building they had but they had a lot of coco there and

Jay just gave me a lecture or a lesson really I should say on on the tax code and I mean it would I I could have gone to graduate school for years and never learned as watch as he did. And then later we actually bought the company that Rockwood Company after he did some other things became the basis for Marman. and Marman among other things uh developed the car that uh won the first Indianapolis Speedway race and uh it invented the rear view mirror which I'm not sure is a great great advantage in economics or

anything but but uh the guy that would they used to have on the Indianapolis 500 they had two people in the Our one guy was to look back and see what the other people were doing and the other guy was to drive the car and our guy got sick and uh so they invented a rear view mirror. So if you want to look at the kind of you know what's going on in the laboratories of Berkshire Hathaway and we we got people working on things like the rear view mirror. A a Warren. Yep. I'm happy

uh a friend did call. Um so that's that still works. Um Pet Peter Eastwood who runs uh one of our Berkshire subsidiaries and does a great job of running it uh tracked down that Portello's is owned by a private equity firm called Berkshire Partners. So that was the basis of the question, but it's not associated with uh with Berkshire. So, we got we got to the bottom of that one. Yeah. Thank you, [Music] Peter. That's just a sample of the way we operate around. Okay, Becky. All right. This question comes from Jessica Pune who says,

"You've long been a strong believer in the American tailwind and the resilience of the United States, and history has proven you correct. Today, the US appears to be undergoing significant and potentially revolutionary changes. Some investors are now questioning the concept of American exceptionalism. In your view, are investors being overly pessimistic about the US economy or is the country indeed entering a period of fundamental change that requires a reassessment from a new perspective? Well, I would say that Jessica, who I believe is in some she is the uh stepgranddaughter of one of our managers that I

I mentioned in the annual report, may not be the same one. But in any event, uh America's been America's been insignificant and revolutionary changing really ever since it was developed. I mentioned that, you know, we started out as an agricultural society. We started out as a society with with high promises and we didn't deliver on very well. We we said all men were created equal. And then we wrote a constitution that said blacks get three counted as three fifths. And and in article two, you you'll find male pronouns used 20 times and no female pronouns

used. So, you know, it took till 2000, I mean, you know, 2000 or 1920, I should say, uh, till the 19th until the 19th amendment was passed, saying, "Oh, yeah, we promised the women this back in 1776, and now we'll do something about it." And then we didn't do something about it for a long time. So, we're always in the process of change. will always find all kinds of things to criticize uh in the country but the luckiest day in my life is the day I was born you know because I was born in the

United States and at the time about 3% of all the births in the world were taking place in the United States and uh I'd like to say that I had something to do you know listen so sent messages out to My parents for God's sakes moved to the United States before I born or anything. But I was just lucky and I was lucky to be born. I was lucky to be born white. I was l all kinds of things. But it's been if you don't think the United States has changed since I was born in

1930. It's been we've gone through all kinds of things and gone through great recessions. We've gone through world wars. we've gone through the development of a atomic bomb that that uh we never dreamt of, you know, at the time I was born. So I I would not get discouraged about the fact that that never doesn't look like if we've solved every problem that's come along. And uh uh if I were being born today, you know, I I would just keep negotiating in the womb until they they said you can be in the United States. So

it uh uh we're all pretty lucky. Do you want to give any We've got two non United States guys here just to get the other side who now live in the US. Okay. Station four. Hi, Mr. Buffett. My name is Daniel and I'm from Tennifly, New Jersey. First of all, I just want to say how grateful I am for getting the opportunity to ask you a question. When it comes to your principles of investing, you often talk about how important it is to be patient. Has there ever been a situation in your investing career where

breaking that principle and acting fast has benefited you? Thank you. Well, that's a good question. And uh there are times when you have to act fast. In fact, uh we made a great deal of money because we're willing to act faster than anybody around. Uh Jessica Tombs is I I think she's the stepdaughter of of um our stepg granddaughter of Ben Rosner, a manager of ours. And in 1966, I got a call from a fellow named Fel Steiner in New York, and he said, "I I represent uh Mrs. Annenburgg. Uh, and there were there were

actually nine Anenburgg sisters, I believe, before War Anenberg came along as the son. But he said, "We have a business we'd like to sell you." So, I called Charlie up and uh I got a few details and it sounded very interesting and uh uh Charlie and I went back to the office of Will Felsteiner in New York was a marvelous guy. Never met him since, but uh he was handling things for Mrs. Uh well, ace a a Simon Butchune and her name was Annberg and her husband had been the partner of of Ben Roer, but

he had died and uh and Ben got kind of tense about working with her. Uh and so he u offered us this business at a bargain price. He offered us a business for $6 million. It had $2 million of cash. It had a $2 million piece of property in a 900 block of of u what's the key street in Philadelphia down there? Market Street. And uh and it was making 2 million a year pre-tax. And the price was 6 million. and Charlie and I went back to this place and uh Ben Rosner was there and

he really he just was upset about doing business with his his partner's widow. He was she was extremely wealthy and uh and he just didn't he wasn't enjoying it. He was very nervous about selling it. And he he said to me and Charlie, he said uh um he said, "I'll run this business for you until December 31st and then I'm out of here." And I got Charlie and we went out in the hallway and I said, "If this guy quits at the end of the year, you can throw away every book on psychology I've ever

read." happy. And so that began a wonderful we bought the company, had a great relationship. And did I know that morning when I got a phone call uh from Will Fsteiner, there was background about it. Uh uh I' I've had a couple of times and that was one of them where people in the east felt that they had a a stereotype in their mind of what people from the Midwest were like. And uh Ben had been married, his first marriage was to a woman from Iowa. and he just figured that anybody from the Midwest was

okay. And uh the trick when you do when you get in business with somebody or get in a room with somebody like that and they want to sell you something for $6 million that's got 2 million of cash and couple million of real estate and it's making 2 million a year. Uh you don't you don't want to be patient then. You want to be patient and waiting to get the occasional call. My phone will ring sometime, you know, and with something that, you know, wakes me up. I may be sleeping in there or something, but

it it you just never know when it'll happen. And that's what makes it what makes it fun. I mean it it uh uh so patience it it's a combination of of of patience and a willingness to do something that afternoon if it comes to you. You don't want to be you don't want to be patient about about acting on deals that make sense and you don't want to be very patient with people are talking to you about things that will never happen. So, uh, it's it's not a it's not a constant asset. It's not a

constant liability to be patient. Greg, you Well, Warren, I was going to add, uh, as you're being patient, I I happen to know, and I think that goes for our uh, Ajit also and all our managers. uh very patient when we're looking at opportunities and as you touched on we want to act quickly but while we're being patient um never underestimate the amount of reading and work that's being done to be prepared uh to act quickly because we we do know be it equities but I would include a variety of of private companies that when

the opportunity presents itself we're ready to act and and that's a large part of uh being patient is is using it to be prepared. Yeah. And and of course it it doesn't come in anything like an even flow. I mean it's the most uneven sort of activity you could get into. And uh uh the main thing you have to do is you have to be willing to hang up after 5 seconds and you have to be willing to say yes after 5 seconds. And and uh uh you can't you can't be filled with self-doubt in

the business. You just forget it isn't going to work. That uh uh go into some other activity. uh uh but you also I mean one of the great pleasures it is the great pleasure actually in this business is having people trust you and that's that's really the why why work at 90 when you've got more money than anybody could count you know if they started today and had machines there helping them and everything else it that it means nothing in terms of of uh how you're going to live or how your children are going to

live or anything else. Uh and uh but it it it and but both Charlie and I, we just enjoyed the fact that people trusted us and they trusted us 60 years ago or 70 years ago and and and partnerships we had and uh we never sought out professional investors to join our partnerships. Among all my partners, I never had a single institution. I never I never wanted an institution. I wanted people and I I didn't want people that were sitting around and having people present to them every 3 months and and tell them what they

wanted to hear and all that sort of thing. So, and and that's what we got and that's why we've got this group here today. So, it it's all worked out. But that uh it it's you don't want to be patient when things are going your when when the time comes to act. It uh you you want to get it done that day. Okay, Becky. This question is from Flavio Montenegro, a shareholder from Guatemala. Um a couple of years ago in this meeting, Mr. Jane outlined the significant challenges GEICO faced in modernizing and integrating its IT

systems. It was also mentioned that competitors were ahead in their pricing strategies because of the use of telematics. Today, GEICO's turnaround is evident through strong pricing and operational improvements. Could you provide more details on the specific actions taken under Todd's leadership and how those changes will help sustain a long-term competitive advantage in the coming years? Yeah. Uh Todd has done a great job for us in terms of turn turning around the operations. When he took over uh there were two major issues that Geico was behind its competitors on. Firstly, the term we used and we

all have been using is matching rate to risk and secondly telematics. We were at the bottom of the list in so far as telematics are concerned about 5 6 years ago. Uh since then we have made rapid strides and telematics which used to be a source of competitive disadvantage to us is no longer so and I would argue that our telematics at Geico is about as good as anyone else's today. So that's been one huge catch up. Secondly, in terms of matching rate to risk, there again, I think we have caught up with our competitors

and we as good as anyone else in in the field. All this together with the cost reduction effort that Geico and Todd gets a lot of credit for, he has basically reduced the workforce by 20,000. starting with something close to 50 odd,000, he's brought it down to 20,000 and that translates to uh I guess at least $2 billion per year. So all this has allowed Geico to become a much focused competitor. So much so in the last seven quarters, Geico has shown a combined ratio that has a eight in front of it. And I never

thought I'd live to see the day when anyone could have a combined ratio at so low as it is right now. So I think Geico has done a great job. Uh it's 80 combined translates to the the largest profit anyone is making on the underwriting side in the personal automobile business. So you know we've achieved a lot. Todd has achieved a lot. But I do not want to be so arrogant as to say that mission accomplished. Uh we've achieved a lot but I still think we need to do a lot more in technology. AI as

we talked about is going to be a big force and we need to play catchup there. Not catchup but we are to be in a state of readiness. So I think Geico is in a great shape right now. Uh did Warren you want to add anything? No, I it's it's it's a fascinating case study, but and that's what's so interesting about the whole game of business, but particularly about our businesses is that that each one is a little different. Uh but they're all they all have challenges of certain sorts and but they also many certain

numbers have opportunities. We we paid $50 million for half of GEICO in 1976. what turned out to be half a geico. 50 million 50 50 uh we now own 100% but 50% of two billion that we earned in the first quarter is a billion dollars which on a $50 million investment is you know 20 for one in a quarter. Uh so it you know now that takes years to develop but the interesting thing is the auto insurance policy which didn't even exist 100 years ago. I mean you you didn't you just well I should say

120 years ago. Uh but there it's by far the largest item in the property casualty insurance business. It's it's huge. The the only thing I'd like to add is in addition to the underwriting profit, GEICO provides $29 billion a float. Oh yeah. In addition, yeah. And that's not unimportant when you paid $50 million to get the businesses. It's giving you $29 billion to work with for nothing. And on top of that gives you a billion dollars of of profit in a quarter. Uh the interesting thing about auto insurance is that that we are the company

was started in 1936. We're selling the same product as 1936. We're we're being more sophisticated about pricing it than we were then. Somebody just made the judgment. a fellow that came from USAA uh made the judgment that that government employees the name Geico stands for government employees insurance company that government employees were better drivers than average and uh I don't think he was an actuary or anything else but he just made an observation and uh so he left USAA which is still a very successful company and he started Geico for a few hundred,000 and he

made money the first year from my underwriting. He made money the second year. This is not a public offering type thing to you know use phony accounting for 10 years and all that sort of thing just prices to make money and uh that's exactly what's been done since 1936. the policy really, you know, your insurance, your auto insurance policy that looks a lot like the one that you had then. And this huge field has sprung up uh around us and it's still growing and and of course nobody likes to to buy insurance, but they sure

like to drive and and and uh uh Geico is a fascinating story. And about three times over the years, the company is gotten sidetracked one way or another and uh and then it gets back to its basics and and it's a wonderful wonderful business and and uh we showed at this annual meeting one time a a uh message from Laura Murdavidson and Lauren Murdavidson in in January of 1950 was the only person in the ing that uh I'd gone down on a Saturday to visit but turned out they didn't work on Saturdays in Washington and

I pounded on the door till finally a janitor let me in and I said to the janitor is there anybody I can talk to here except you and he didn't take it personally and he said well there's one guy up on the sixth floor and a fellow named Larmer Davidson did wonderful things for me you you get a breaks in life in terms of people you will meet who can just change your life dramatically. And uh if you if you you need a handful of those and uh and when you get them, you treasure them.

And we've had them on on this board at Bergkshire. You know, if you take Tom Murphy and Sandy Goddisdman and Walter Scott and Bill Scott, we we one thing we've done is we've held on to the human assets. We've made lifelong assets out of people that that are the right sort. And uh with incredible talent, but also just lots of fun to work with and always doing more than their share. And you know it to get a chance to talk to Lauren Davidson on a Saturday afternoon, you just listen carefully. Uh and that comes in

the in the category of turn every page. You know, some of them you want to turn pretty fast, but but uh uh you just get lucky in life and you want to take advantage of your luck. Okay, station five. My name is Benjamin Graham Sanderson from Pasadena, California. Warren, thank you for all you've taught us over the years. Earlier, you said nobody but Steve Jobs could have created Apple, but nobody but Tim Cook could have developed it like he has. Warren, nobody but you could have created Bergkshire. And I presume you view Greg as an

outlier among outliers, but he seems so normal. Sorry, Greg. Yeah, that's a nice way of saying not normal, actually, but I appreciate it. So, I was hoping you could share what specifically about Greg makes him your preferred successor. And Greg, we're excited to get to know you more over the next few decades. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Well, you you've hit on the most important question and know in terms of the business. We've got a wonderful group of businesses. We've got a uh we've got an ability to do things that nobody else can do,

which is hard to get in the capitalistic system. It's been developed as fully as as as the United States has been. I mean, imagine being able to create something that is in a very very very big playing field. I don't think you'd really be very very hard to develop anything like it. I don't think you could develop the people around it that let alone the capital position, you know, and the history and everything else. And the answer of course is that it it does take a a long long time and it takes getting around you

a small cadre of people which then spreads out somewhat. But uh where you've got mutual trust uh where people do more than their share and I've been around a lot of businesses over the years and by nature I'm somewhat critical of everything. I mean, I I I'm looking for what's wrong in things because that's part of investing is is looking, you know, what aren't you? What are you missing? Uh but we have uh you know, we've got people that if they're asked to put on a show like this, instead of doing whatever their regular job

is, they they participated. I went around the groups of people who were exhibiting yesterday for an hour and a half and these are people who are thanking me, you know, and totally enthused about coming and doing a lot of work for which they don't get paid anything extra. I don't know anything about the arrangements the individual companies make, but they they work hard and they enjoy their work. And uh you know, you really want to work at something you enjoy. I've always had I've had five bosses in life and I liked every one of them

and they were all interesting. I still decided that I'd rather work for myself than anybody else. But but if you if you find people that are wonderful to work with, you know, that's the place to go. And I've I've told my kids that basically you don't get lucky like I did when I found it seven or eight years of age. what really interested me, you know, it could have taken a lot longer, but but uh uh you want to uh find the song, find the sound is uh there's a movie called The Glenn Miller Story,

and Glenn Miller went on from having a broken down band for 15 years to to uh turning out the first he found the sound and and uh and created the first gold record. I don't know whether any of you know what it was, but it was the Chattanooga Chuju and in 1941, I think it was. Uh, and he turned around from being a a nothing in with a band that he had till he found the sound. And uh I always have told my kids ever since that their their their sound isn't my sound, you know,

but uh and you don't find it necessarily on the first job you take cuz you got to eat, you know, and but if you get lucky like I did, you you find it be you find it when you're very young and then, you know, just keep doing it and uh And don't worry don't worry too much about starting salaries and don't worry about about uh and be very careful who you work for because you will take on the habits of the people around you. So there's certain certain jobs you shouldn't take and uh but you've

got the greatest country in the world and you got the greatest time in the world. So, uh, I would say that that, uh, well, I while I'm handing this over to Greg that, uh, that, you know, you can't even dream all the dreams that you could have about a place like Berkshire. But big thing you have to do though is always is to be sure you can play the next day. I mean in terms of in terms of financial activities on a meaningful scale uh you know you you don't want to go you don't there

was a a book about what was the name of that book uh you only have to get rich once I mean you don't you don't want to do anything that risks uh what's been created. So you don't you if if very stupid things are happening around you, you do know not want to participate. If people are making more money because they're borrowing money or they're participating in in securities that are really pieces of junk, but but uh but they they hope to find a bigger sucker later on. You just have to forget that it uh

that'll bite you at some point and and the basic game is so good and you've been so lucky to be born now. I mean, if if I've been born in 1700, I'd say, I want to go back in the womb. What the hell with this? It's too hard. And but now I've come along to do something where I can just play around all day with things I enjoy doing. and uh and uh it's really uh it's a pretty wonderful life. Anything Greg you want to add or subtract from that? nothing to subtract but um I

I would always just say I couldn't be more as I've said in the past more humbled and honored obviously to be in this role but to to have actually been part of Bergkshire for Warren it's now 25 plus years had the opportunity to be part of Berkshire and to to work with you and Ajit and our our board but many other people in our company and as you touched on um when you find something like that and you find something like that like Bergkshire that's so special It's it you fall in love with it and

it's it becomes just what you want to do every day and it's just an incredible opportunity. So, thank you. [Applause] And to the gentleman who asked the question, if if you don't find it immediately, you know, uh don't starve to death or anything in the meantime, but but but uh you will find it and and you'll you'll find it in in the right individual in in a sense. It's somewhat like finding the right person in marriage. I mean that uh probably the first some of you married may have married the person you made met on

your first date. Although I guess they don't even have dates anymore but but the uh uh but you know it's it uh sometimes it pays to wait too. Okay, Becky. Uh this is a question from Mark Bonnke and Helen Friedrien in Rapid City, South Dakota. As the US dollar quickly loses value in relation to other foreign currencies in 2025, is Berkshire Hathaway taking steps to minimize this currency risk and its impact on quarterly and annual earnings? If so, please explain. And I I'll just add from Mary Chang, another shareholder. Berkshire currently borrows in Japanese yen

to offset its currency risk and its Japanese stock investments. In the future, will you invest in foreign currency denominated assets unhedged? Yeah. Well, we always have um pretty much uh the Japanese situation is different because we we do intend to stay so long with that position and the funding situation is so cheap that u we essentially have have attempted to some degree to to match purchases against the end denominated of funding. Uh but that's not a policy of ours. In fact, that's the first time we we've we've done that. And and we've owned lots of

securities of uh of of in in foreign currency. So uh we do nothing in in u in terms of the question about its impact on quarterly and annual earnings. uh we don't do anything based on its impact on quarterly and annual earnings. I mean, there's never been a board meeting I can remember where I or a conversation I had with Charlie when I said where I say if we do this our annual earnings will be this you know and therefore we ought to whether it's accounting or whe anything uh we just you know the the

number will turn out to be what it'll be what counts as where we are five or 10 or 20 years from now and and if you start focusing on what number you're going to produce. Uh you will quickly get tempted, at least based on the experience I've seen from viewing 20 companies, you will get so you'll one way or another uh play around with the numbers and sometimes seriously play around with the numbers. And uh uh I've seen people that that you know I trust him in all kinds of other ways but they regard playing

around with numbers is perfectly okay and that's just not something you know we just don't think about that. So uh actually the the uh the end um um uh the relationship of the end behavior of the end in the last quarter you know resulted in certain gap charges and uh but it doesn't make it it doesn't make any difference. it'll change next, you know, next month or next year. And and obviously, we wouldn't want to be owning anything that we thought was in a currency that was really going to hell. And that's the big thing

we worry about with the United States currency. I mean it the the tendency of a government to want to debase its currency over time is there's no system that beats that. You you can pick dictators, you can pick representatives, you can do anything. But but the people there there will be a a push toward weaker currencies and of course that is I mentioned very briefly in the annual report that that the fiscal policy is what scares me in the United States because it's it's made the way it is and uh and uh all the motivations

are to doing a lot of things that will cause can cause trouble with with money. But that's not limited to the United States. It's all over the world and some places it gets out of control regularly as you know they know they know no they uh they devalue at rates that are breathtaking and that's continued. I mean, and you people can study economics and you can have all kinds of arrangements, but in the end, if you've got people that control the currency, uh you can you can issue uh paper money and you will or you

can engage in clipping currencies like they used to do centuries ago. Or there will always be people And it's the nature of their job. I don't I don't I'm not singling them out as particularly evil or anything like that, but the natural course of government is to is to make the currency worth less uh over time. And uh and that's got important consequences. And it's very hard to build checks and balances into the system to keep that from happening. And uh we've had a lot of fun here in the last either the first 100 days

or the last 100 days, whatever you want to call it. The uh uh watching what happens when people try to make sure that they aren't running fiscal risks and uh that game isn't over and it never will be over. it, you know, in finality. If you look if you look up in in search the great inflations of post World War II, it's just a list that goes on forever and the same names keep popping up and everything. So currency is a the value of currency is a scary thing and and uh uh we don't have

any great system for beating that we do in this particular Japanese position because we expect to hold it for 50 or 100 years or more and we will be owning something that's denominated in the end and easily predictable and we'll just as long as the carry honored is right and everything will will uh will attempt to issue uh Japanese denominated liabilities but that that's not because of anything we care about in terms of quarterly or annual earnings. Greg, do you have anything to say on that? I was just going to say that relative to the

question that there's no question we were fundamentally very comfortable with investing in the five Japanese companies and recognizing we're investing in yen. The fact we could then borrow in yen was a almost just like a nice incremental opportunity. But we were very comfortable both with the Japanese companies and with the currency we would ultimately realize i.e. in the yen. Yeah, we we only made as I referred to earlier one big currency play which was connected a little bit with when I wrote that article for fortune and we got long 12 other currencies as I remember

only four or five of them are really big currencies but when when I say we got long it that means we're short the dollar and uh so we held that position for a couple years and we we made several billion dollars on it which was significant to us then, still is. Uh the uh Charlie always felt that if if he had to pick an area outside of stocks in which to invest and he knew a lot about bonds, he knew a lot about real estate, he knew a lot about a lot of things. But he

he said the he thought he could he he thought he could make a lot of money out of being in foreign currency. But uh uh we just we've done it once. It's not inconceivable we would do it again, but it's unlikely. Uh, but there could be things happen in the United States that would make us want to own a lot of other currencies. And I I suppose if we if we made some very large investment European country or some there might be a situation where we would do a lot of financing in in their currency,

but it's it's not a it it was something that just was sort of obvious to do in the Japanese situation where we had the ability to borrow a very very low carrying uh carrying cost and uh and we felt very good about the income we'd be receiving from these securities and we and if the present condition which it won't I mean it never does but pre prevail for decades and decades we would probably keep doing the same sort of thing but uh things change in the world too. So don't take that as a prediction. Okay,

section six. Uh good morning Warren and Greg Ajit. Thank you so much for hosting this event. Good to be here. My name is Dash Boyinder and I'm from great country of Mongolia. A little bit background about my country. Mongol is an emerging market and landlocked country sandwiched between Russia and China. But we are rich in history and minerals and have full democracy and growing economy. Last week, we hosted our second annual Mongolia investor conference in New York to attract investors like yourself. I know you meet and give advice informally to government leaders such as South

Korea, China, and India. What advice would you give to government business leaders of emerging markets like Mongolia to attract institutional investors like yourself? It'd be great if you have long-term plans for exposure to emerging markets as a hedge or an opportunistic investment. Lastly, I welcome all of you to Mongolia and my country folks would be very happy if you can make it to our economic forum this July. Oh, thank you. Yeah, I I have trouble planning a trip to Council Bluffs, which is just a few miles from here, but takes an optimist. Uh actually I

met a fellow here at the annual meeting um oh probably 20 years ago or more who did a lot in Mongolia and uh uh it he's he did very well in Mongolia and uh actually moved there for quite a while. Uh I would say that if if you're looking for advice to give the government over there, it's to develop a reputation for for having a solid currency over time. I mean that we we we don't really want to go into any country where we think that there's a a chance I mean a significant probability of

runaway inflation. It just it's too hard to figure. People other people have figured out ways to make money in in hyperinflationary situations, but uh that's not our game and I I I don't think I'd play it well. So, uh we wouldn't be we that that would be that would be a factor with us. the chances are and we won't find anything in Mongolia that fits our size requirements aside from that. But I but like I say, I it uh I think my friend that I met here 20 years ago has done very well in in

uh Mongolia. And if if the country develops a reputation for being businessfriendly and currency conscious conscious uh and I think that that bolds very well for the the res the residents of that country particularly if it has some other natural assets that uh it can build around. Uh, I don't know that much about the minerals there or anything of the sort, but but uh uh I mean who would have been on the United States in 1790? But uh um we we we didn't we didn't have to have perfection. We just had to be better than

the other guy for quite a while. And we started out with nothing and we ended up with close to 25% of the world's GDP and faster growth rates and generally sounder currencies and all kinds of things. But uh so uh I wish you well. Okay, Becky. This question is from Peter Shen in New Jersey. Uh it's for Mr. Buffett and Mr. Jane, in recent years, large private equity firms like Blackstone, Apollo, and KKR have aggressively expanded into insurance, raising permanent capital, managing float, and aiming to replicate the model that Bergkshire pioneered decades ago. Given that

these firms are now directly competing for insurance assets, often using higher leverage and more aggressive investment strategies, how do you view their impact on Berkshire's insurance operations and underwriting discipline? Do you believe that the qu private equity model poses risks to policy holders in the broad financial system and has this competition made it more challenging for Berkshire to find and price insurance opportunities safely and profitably today? Okay. Yeah. Part of the question is very easy. There's no question the private equity firms have come into the space and we are no longer competitive in this space.

We used to do a fair amount in this space. Uh but in the last 3 four years, I don't think we've done a single deal. Now you ought to separate this whole segment in two separate segments. One is the property casualty end of the business and the life end of the business. Uh the private equity firms that you mentioned are all very active in the life end of the business, not the property casualty end of the business. uh you are right in identifying the risks in these private equity firms are taking on both in terms

of leverage and in terms of credit risk and while the economy is doing great and credit spreads are low these pe the private equity firms who've taken the assets from very conservative investments and I wouldn't say high octane but they've certainly invested these assets in situations where that where they get a lot more uh return on the investment and as I said as long as the economy is good and credit spreads are low they will make money they'll make a lot of money because of leverage uh however there is always the danger that at some

point the regulators might get cranky and say you know you're taking too too much risk on behalf of your policy holders uh and that could end in tears is we do not like the riskreward that these situations offer and therefore we put up the white flag and said, you know, we can't compete in this segment right now. Yeah, I think there are people that want to copy Burku's model, but usually they don't want to copy it by also copying the model of the CEO having all of his money in the company forever. And uh I

mean they've got a different equation. They're they're interested in and and you know and that's capitalism, but they have a whole different uh situation and and they probably have a somewhat different fiduciary feeling uh about what they're doing. And uh and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't work. And if it doesn't work, they go on to other things. And if I what we do here at Bergkshire doesn't work, I spend the end of my life regretting what I've created. So it it uh it's just a whole different personal equation. And uh there is no

property casualty company that can basically replicate Birkshire. That that wasn't the case at the start. I mean at the start we just had national indemnity a few miles from here and anybody could have duplicated what we had but uh but that was before a G and and the G came with us in 1986 and and at that point the other fellow should have given up. [Applause] Yeah. Station seven, please. Hi, my name is Marie. I'm from Melrose, Massachusetts. Thank you for the time today. As a young person interested in investing like myself, I would love

to hear your insights, Mr. Buffett. What were some pivotal lessons you learned early in your career? And what advice do you have young for young investors who are looking to develop their investment philosophy? Thank you. Well, those are good questions. I wish I thought of them myself earlier in my life. Uh the you know who you associate with is just enormously important and don't expect that you'll make every decision right on that. I mean, but you you are going to go into you're going to have your life progress in the general direction of the people

that you that you work with, that you admire, that become your friends. Uh I mentioned a few fellows that that have died in the last couple years. Well, all of those people were people that that that uh you know, if we were working together on something 1 10,000th the size of Burkshire, I mean, they'd be the kind of people you choose. You just they're there people that make you want to be better than you are. And you want to hang out with people that are better than you are and that you feel are better than

you are because you're going to go in the direction of the people that you you associate with. And uh and that's that's something you learn and of course you learn it late in life. that uh you you uh it's hard to really appreciate how important some of those factors are until you get much older. But when you've got people around you like Tom Murphy and and like like well like just name them Sandy Goddisman that uh Walter Scott that uh you're just going to live a better life than than uh you do if you just

go out and look at somebody that's making a lot of money and decide you're going to try and copy him or something of the sort. Uh uh so I would I would I would try to I tried to be associated with smart people too where I could learn a lot from them and I would try to look for something that I would do if I didn't need the money. I mean what you're really looking for life is something where you've got a job that you'd hold if you didn't need the money. And I've had that.

Charlie had it for a very very long time. In fact, all the fellows I named uh had it and uh and they also every one of those ones I named, they always did more than their share and they sought they never sought more than their share of the credit. They just behaved as the way you you'd like anybody you you work with. And when you find them, you treasure them and and when you don't find them, you still keep doing whatever causes you to eat uh or enables you to eat. But uh but you don't

you don't give up on on looking around and you will find you'll find people do wonderful things for you. I mentioned I mentioned uh uh earlier the you know going down to Geico and knocking on the door when the door was locked. I mean, who knows what was behind that door. I went in, but but you know, in 10 minutes, I found that I had a man that uh was going to be just wonderfully helpful to me. And of course, if somebody's going to be helpful to you, you want to try to figure out ways

to be helpful to them. So, you get a compounding of of good intentions and good behavior. And unfortunately, you can get the reverse of that in life, too. and uh and you know with a lot of I I was lucky in having a a good environment for uh living that kind of a life and and other people you know have a whole different environmental situation they have to overcome it but don't be don't feel guilty about your good luck if you've got if if you know if you've got uh well if you live in the

United States you you know you you've you've uh there 8 billion people in the world and there's 330 million United States, you've already won the game uh to a great degree and then just keep making the most of it. But you you don't want to you don't want to associate with people or enterprises that ask you to do something that or tell you to do something that you shouldn't be doing. And uh that's one of the problems. I mean the different professions select for different types of people and uh uh there's it's interesting to me

that in the investment business uh uh so many people get out of it after they've made a pile of money that that uh uh it it you really want something that you'll stick around for. you know whether you need the money. Greg doesn't need the money or G doesn't need the money uh remotely and they but they enjoy what they do and they're so damn good at it. It's it it's uh you know it just well I've had the advantage of seeing how that works over time. the best manager I ever knew and there's a

lot of contention for who that would be but actually was Tom Murphy senior that uh who lived the the almost 98 and uh I've never seen anybody that could get the potential out of other people uh more than than uh Murf. I mean, if if if if you wanted to if you wanted to become a better person, you went to work for for Tom Murphy. And uh uh there are all kinds of successful people that really don't have that sort of don't bring that to the party. And and I'm not saying that's the only way

to succeed, but I think it's I think it's the most pleasant way to succeed for sure. And uh uh and I think that you know the the Bergkshire experience is pretty dramatic. I mean to to operate with Sandy Goddisman from 1963 until he died a couple years ago. And um Walter Scott 30 years and Craig operated with him for 25 years or so, whatever it was. Yeah. 30. Yeah. And and uh you know, you really can't miss it. Uh and you know, you you'll learn all the time, but you'll you not only learn how to

be successful at business, you'll learn how to be successful at life. And uh uh so that's that's that's my recommendation and that u and uh and for some reason I apparently you live longer too because it's pretty amazing. I mean, these people I'm talking about, including myself, I mean I mean, you know, you can I like to attribute it to this and a few other things, but I I I think a happy person lives longer than somebody that that that's uh doing some things that they don't really admire that much in life. Okay. Uh let's

move on to I guess it's Becky next. Um the first quarter ended March 31st and it did show that Bergkshire's cash pile expanded from the end of the last year. But the greatest market turmoil came in April. Martin Devine, a shareholder from Scotland who is attending the meeting today wants to know, has the recent market volatility presented Bergkshire with opportunities? And Martin just wrote in an addendum in the last 40 minutes or so pointing out that you mentioned Bergkshire almost invested $10 billion recently and wanting to know if you could talk more about that. Well,

the I can give you a good answer to the second part of which is no but it the but 10 billion wouldn't have done that much. You know that's the other side another side of it. Uh what has happened in the last uh 30 30 45 days, 100 days, whatever, whatever you want to pick up, whatever this uh this uh period has been is is is really nothing. There's been three times since we acquired Bergkshire that Bergkshire has gone down 50%. Uh in a fairly short period of time, three different times. Nothing was fundamentally wrong

with the company at any time. But but this is not a huge move. Uh the Dow Jones average at 381 in September of 1929. they got down to 42. So that's probably going from 100 uh to 11. Uh this is not this has not been a dramatic uh bare market or anything of the sort. I mean it uh it it you know like uh some pointed out if I've I've had 200 and 50 trading days a day, you know, for however many years I've been old enough to trade stocks that got 17 or 18,000 days.

There's been plenty of periods that that uh uh just are dramatically different than this. I mean, when the day I was born, the Dow Jones was a 240 and my first that was August 30th, 1930. And between that and the low, it went from 240 to 41. I mean, so if people think that it made a really major change, it it didn't if if it gone up 15% instead of down 15%, people think they take that with remarkable grace. But uh but uh if it makes a difference to you whether your stocks are down 15%

or not, you you're you're you need to get a somewhat different investment philosophy because the world is not going to adapt to you. You're going to have to adapt to the world. And you will see a period in the next certainly in the next 20 years you'll see a period that that will be in what somebody in the market described one time as a hair curler compared to anything you've seen before. I mean that's just it just happens periodically. the world makes big big big mistakes and surprises happen in dramatic ways and the more sophisticated

the system gets the more the surprises can be out of right field that's that's just that's part of the stock market and that's what makes it a good place to to focus your efforts if you got the proper temperament for it and a terrible place to get involved if if you get frightened by markets that decline and get excited when stock markets go up. I don't mean to sound particularly critical. I mean, I know people have emotions, but you got to check them at the door when you invest. Okay. Station 8, please. Good morning, Mr.

Maf. Mr. Greg and Mr. AI. My name is Peter Chen. I'm from Shanghai, China. This is my first time attending this shareholders meeting. I would like to ask a question about the wisdom of life. Have you ever encountered any major setbacks or or low points in your life and how did you get through and overcome them? Thank you very much. Yeah. Well, everybody gets setbacks and uh and some people have particularly bad luck in that respect and others get through with fairly minors. But Charlie, you know, but uh he had setbacks, I had setbacks. I

mean, it it it's it's part of life and uh and they're not any fun. I don't have any great advice for you about about uh you know having the time of your life while you're having some major setback but but uh it it you know it it comes with lifetime you know but uh you certainly have a setback when you die and so everybody's got that setback guaranteed to them and uh but some people get and I mean It isn't a laughing matter in a sense because I mean people get extraordinary bad luck and other

people get extraordinary good luck. Usually the people who get good luck don't really think it was so much luck as themselves but but you're just going to have it. I think you're going to I think that you're less likely to have it in terms of medical problems in terms of you know various things in life. I mean you were born at a good time. I mean you if you look all the way through the history of China when when would you rather have been born you know 100 years ago 500 years ago thousand years ago

or now you know it it it's just hands down you'd be lucky. I mean, you know, if if I came from 20 generations of shepherds, I I I think I get kind of tired of, you know, my life just looking at these sheep every day. But, uh, you know, we can sit here and I can I can watch Nebraska not quite played the same game of football that we played 20 years ago, but but I mean, everything in life has been made so much better. uh that you've got to figure that you do a lucky

store straw by, you know, staying in the womb for a couple hundred thousand years and then just emerging at at the right time. Uh so I would I would focus on the things that have been good in your life rather than than than the bad things that happen because bad things do happen. But but uh it it it it's uh it it it can often be a wonderful life. You can get terrible breaks in it. I mean, you know, it uh uh so far that really hasn't happened with me, but it's happened with some of

my friends, but you get some bad breaks from time to time. Uh uh but for 94 years I've been able to drink whatever I want to drink. And you know they they predict all kinds of terrible things for me but it hasn't happened yet. So and yeah and it's true. I mean, if you look at what pro football players are making now and everything compared to what they were making 30 or 40 years ago, you can say, "Well, isn't that wonderful?" But if you look at the if you look at the lifespan of professional athletes,

after a while, you get used to really decide that you're better off if you uh if you really weren't the first one chosen to be on the baseball team or the basketball team or anything. anything else. The uh the human body uh well Charlie and I and I think I speak for the others to some extent that and we we never didn't we never really exercised that much or did anything. We were we were carefully preserving ourselves for the years. So, look at the bright side of things to the extent that you can and that

uh and you know, you're lucky enough to you're here today, you're healthy, you're you come from a long distance and and uh and you're getting a chance to learn more about something that interests you and uh compare that with the situation couple hundred years ago that you would have been offered. So anyway, that's enough moralizing. Okay, Becky. Uh, this question comes from Himmanu Bendal for Ajet and Warren. Um, autonomous vehicles are already driving across roads in American cities with no driver involvement. How do Warren and Ajet think about any disruption risk from these autonomous vehicles

to GEICO's auto insurance business which is built around understanding and underwriting human drivers? Wouldn't what we call auto insurance today just become product liability for autonomous vehicles and autonomous software companies? Well, a Jeep. Yeah, there's no question that uh insurance for automobiles is going to change dramatically once self-driving cars become a reality. Uh the big change that we will see is what you identified. Most of the insurance that is sold and bought revolves around operator errors and how often they happen, how severe they are and therefore what premium we ought to charge. To the extent

these new self-driving cars are most safe and are involved in fewer accidents, uh that insurance will be less required. Instead, it'll be substituted by as you mentioned product liability. So we at Geico and elsewhere are certainly trying to get ready for that switch where we move from providing insurance for operator errors and be more ready to provide protection for product errors and errors and omissions in the construction of these automobiles. Yeah, we expect we expect change in all our businesses and uh it's good thing we didn't and Charlie pushed me into it. But uh if

I'd settled for being in New England textiles, you know, and even though it worked well for 70 years or so prior there too, you know, it the world changes and and if the game didn't change at all really wouldn't be very interesting, you know, it uh uh if every time you if you ever every time you you know swung at a baseball, you had a home run the game wouldn't be interesting if every time you hit a golf a golf ball you had a hole in one wouldn't be interesting. So it the fact that there

will be things you have to think about all the time as you go along and you'll make mistakes and all that that's really part of the fun. I mean that your your your brain would turn to mush if you didn't have a few problems now then. So, um I I uh you know, auto insurance will change, although it's remarkable how little it has changed, but it's only been around since, you know, a relatively small time. And who knows what we're doing to move in transportation a 100 years from now. You go back a couple hundred

years ago, who could have predicted the United States would look like what it does and people would move like they do and people would enjoy themselves like they do. And I mean, it's just it it it's it's an it's a dynamic world. And the biggest thing we have to worry about, unfortunately, is that that uh we've learned how to destroy the world too and in in in in recent years. And so we've got this wonderful world which now we we know that there are eight countries that and probably a ninth coming on that can destroy

and and uh uh and we don't have what I would consider the necessarily the perfect people leading each of one of the nine or or some of the nine countries. And uh you know when Einstein came up with the equals MC² back in 1905 he uh he didn't dream of the fact I mean that energy could really be converted or uh mass could be converted into energy and the way that we change the world. When I was born in 1930, they had known about the law of physics that that Einstein had come up with uh

25 years earlier. Nobody to my knowledge had thought what can this do to change uh warfare in the future. And literally uh it just wasn't thought. Einstein didn't think about it at at that point. And uh and then in 1939 Roosevelt got a letter around month before Germany moved into Poland got around August 1st. It's the most famous letter in history from from Leo Zard. Leo Zard couldn't get his letter in front of Roosevelt because who ever heard of Leo Zard? it, but he got Einstein to sign it. And uh Roosevelt probably understood about as

much about physics as I do. So he he didn't understand it, but he understood that Einstein signed it. So he calls in General Rover, may not have been general then, and said, "We should do something about this." And and all we did was learn how to destroy the world. And uh we needed to do it. and and uh Germany had Heisenberg and he looked like he was he was ahead of us and uh uh we can't put that genie back in the bottle and it's the world does change and we've got all these one we've

got wonderful things but u but we also have you We have a guy in North Korea. If you if we criticize his haircut, him, you know, who knows what he might decide to do with what does North Korea need uh nuclear weapons for? I mean, it uh can that be a good thing in the world? But they're not going to go away. So, it's a it's a world of change. And we are enjoying incredible change that's contributed everybody in this room living so much better than people were living a couple hundred years ago. But we

haven't been able to to avoid we haven't changed human beings very much so far. We've we've certainly changed weapons of mass destruction and and uh but we haven't made much progress with the human race and and uh we'll see what happens with that. But in the meantime, we'll see changes in auto insurance too and cars and and uh that that will be be more in it be easier for us to deal with it than it was when we had to deal with the problems of of turning out textiles in New England. And uh you know,

you deal with the world as it develops. And like I say, everybody here is living in the luckiest period. But but but you know, enjoy your luck and uh and uh and you still try to figure out the answers to what's going to happen. Yeah. In all insurance as we go along and we've we've done pretty well actually adapting to the answers. There's a few big problems in insurance and uh I don't know how the insurance industry adapts to them particularly, but but that makes the game interesting. You really don't you wouldn't want to go

out and play golf if you know you're going to hit the ball in the hole on every hole. I'd just like to add we talked about the shift to product liability and to protection for accidents that take place because of a error in terms of how the product was designed or supplied. Uh the only thing I want to add is in addition to the that shift I think what we'll see is a major shift where the number of accidents that take place and need to be provided for will drop dramatically because of automatic driving. But

on the other hand, the cost per repair, every time there's an accident, the cost of repairing and bringing everything back to where it used to be would go up very significantly because of the amount of technology that's going into the uh into the car. How those two variables interact with each other in terms of the total cost of providing the insurance, I think, is still an open issue. I'll give you two interesting figures to ponder. When I walked into a Geico's office in 1950, the average price of a policy was around 40 bucks a year.

Uh it varies all over the lot depending on location, everything, but but uh uh you know, it's pretty easy to get up to $2,000 and depending on how urban your areas are and uh everything can get considerably higher. During that same time, the number of people killed in auto accidents uh have fallen from roughly six per 100 million miles driven a little over one. So the cars become incredibly safer and it costs 50 times as much down or thereabouts to buy insurance policy. So, uh, when people talk about the developments in car driving and all

that sort of thing, it it's a lot easier sometimes. I mean, the the Buck Rogers aspect of it. People look at, but they don't actually think of what really happens to the math of the business. The insurance auto insurance industry has been a huge growth industry. And for that matter, uh, homeowners insurance prices in Nebraska have doubled in the last 10 years, adjusted for general inflation. and uh convective storms, you know, have just gone on a tear and it's still unprofitable to write a home b homeowners insurance in Nebraska after doubling the price in the

last 10 years. So, it's very hard to predict what these big changes mean, and you just got to keep thinking all the time. But you don't want to read some research report that says the world's coming to an end or the world's going to be wonderful because of this or that because there's about 50 other developments going on at the same time that you uh that you need to think about that uh and that you needed to keep observing as you go along. You don't re you never reach an answer in this business. You reach

a point of action that you take. But but but uh we try to get into as high probability things as we think we can do and play the game in the same way. But but but it will be different than you think. And and you should wake up every morning and think about that too if you're if you're in the business of of managing businesses. Hey Warren, as we approach the break, uh would you like to address the operating earnings? Oh, yeah. Yeah, let's put up the uh we released our 10 Q this morning and

um uh we always try to do it on a Saturday so nobody gets a jump on other people. And we we just have three simple um charts. you'll see that uh our insurance underwriting income was down dramatically for the first quarter and last year was as good a year as you'll see in insurance that uh uh and it's always unpredictable in insurance but everything broke our way uh or the insurance industry's way last year. Prices are down this year. Risks are up this year. So you don't have to be a genius to figure out what

the answer is on that. So uh but we have we do have unusual advantages in the insurance business. Uh that can't really be replicated by our competition. That doesn't mean they aren't trying to get advantages. We don't have that. But we'll try to replicate anything that seems better. In fact, we'll try and top it. But we I wouldn't talk about our insurance business as much as I do it unless I really thought we had some really permanent advantages in a very very large industry. We just announced within the last 24 hours that we and Zurich

and Shub have arranged a joint operation to be the uh writer of of really large sums that that very few people can do. And of course, we got to write them at the right price in terms of liability, but but we can do that sort of thing without blinking. and anybody that wants to do it wants to get us in it. I mean it uh so anyway our investment income uh did not change that much because we have a float that grows a little bit which gives us more money for investment and then we have

retained earnings which grow. So we would expect in any year to have like 40 billion or more that that we'll build up investments unless we find things uh to do with it. So the investment income rates on treasuries are less than they were or short-term bills I should say are are less than they were before. So you had that negative effect pulling it down but not that much and we had more money. So we came up with a little more earn in the way of earnings. The railroad is earning a little more than than last

year, but it's not earning what it it it should be earning at the present time. And but that that's solvable and uh and and is getting getting solved. Uh and it's still an incredible asset for Bergkshire. The energy company last year was having particular problems and those are absent this year. So those earnings are up and uh and then uh among our range of general businesses they were pretty much a push and I think I think you did a little calculation the other day on how many were up and how many were down did great.

Yeah. Of our uh 49 that we measure closely uh 20 21 were up and 28 were down. So you can tell it was really a a mixed quarter when you go go across uh the operating the non- insurance operating businesses. Yeah. The next slide uh I'm getting a five minute warning here. The uh we'll throw the long ball now. the uh uh shows our financial condition which continues to hold a lot more in cash treasury billables than I would like but I but that's simply a question of when opportunities occur and and if you get

real opportunities every five or six years you're you know you have to be patient. Charlie always pointed out that we made most of our money out of about eight or nine ideas over 50 years and u and we talked about it every day and we read every report and we did everything else. But but if you think you can get an idea a day from listening to your friend book or or doing a lot of reading of the of the financial information published or uh forget it because every now and then you get extraordinary opportunities

and most of the time you don't have much of an edge. Uh so uh we also have on that thing our float which continues to build. I don't think any there's no company that has property casualty company that has our fold is their jeep and yeah clearly we are heads and shoulders above anyone else. Yeah, it uh so that is money that as long as we're writing it and underwriting profit is absolutely free money. But um and and we would expect that over a 50 or 100year period that that we would be able to say

the same thing. But uh there will be there will be years when you have a very bad underwriting record and and it'll lead into the float earnings. But so far in the last 20 years, I think uh we've only had what one underwriting loss of any. Yeah, I think if you look at the entire range including life insurance, our cost of float is 2.2 negative. That means we've got the float plus somebody's given us 2.2% of that of cash to Yeah, it's like running a running a bank where people leave their money with you and

and you pay a minus 2.2%. And you don't have any check clearing or anything else to do and it's included in that. So it it but we run our business actually with a different mindset than than than any other PC company I think probably in the world. and and and I wouldn't be talking about it if I thought they could duplicate it. And then uh the final final pages on share repurchases and clearly we haven't made any we have not made share repurchases so far this year and uh share repurchases if if Bergkshire buys Berkshire

shares and repurchases we've now pay more than you will pay if you buy Bergkshire shares. I don't think people generally know that, but but there is a a tax that was introduced here or so ago. Uh where we pay 1% and that not only hurts us uh because we pay more for it than you do to pay. It's a better deal for you than for us. Uh but it actually hurts some of our investy companies quite substantially. And you know, Tim Cook has done a wonderful job. I mean, really wonderful job running Apple, but he

spent a hundred billion dollars roughly in a year repurchasing shares and there's a 1% charge attached to that now. So that that's a billion dollars a year that he pays when he buys Apple stock in, which we like compared to what you pay. and and that doesn't sound like much, but well, a billion dollars sounds like a lot still in order, but uh there are people that want to increase that that particular rate dramatically and and uh and you you won't read about it or anything like that, but it does make it slightly less attractive

uh than than it was before. And we will only buy in our shares if we think that they are almost certainly underpriced as valued very conservatively. And and uh uh we get that opportunity occasionally, but the higher that charge goes that the federal government charges us for doing it, the less we will be able to do over purchases. So on that happy note, we will rejoin uh at 1:00 and uh uh we will I'm sorry correct that correct that to 11:00 and then we will yeah 11:00 and then we'll continue till 1:00 and then in

the meantime enjoy yourself and uh uh and I think all our stores are still open. So, bring the cash register here. Sure, I'll help you here. Okay, everyone. Okay, we're ready to go. And uh I'm going to lead off by uh actually recommending a movie. I know that's why you came, but uh I would recommend to all of you that u you go to Amazon Prime. I've got no financial interest in this, but you go to Amazon Prime and click on a a documentary called Becoming Katherine Graham. It's an incredible story uh from 50 or

so years ago and to some extent I had the good luck to be kind of a u a viewer of some some American history that I I think is fascinating. So if if if you feel that uh that I misled you, you can write me a note and I promise to report how many how many readers didn't agree with but clear to becoming Kather Graham and you'll see a story of a a remarkable story of American history and there are a good many portions in there that uh I who lived through that period didn't know

about uh at the time and uh I think I don't think really every American citizen ought to watch it. So with that but uh I hope you uh all spend some more money out there and our friendly shops and we will go to station 9. Uh, hi Warren. My name is Robert and I'm a shareholder from uh, Toronto, Canada. Uh, so Warren uh, three years ago Charlie Rose uh, asked you a question to the effect of what you wanted to be remembered for and your reply was he was a teacher. So in that spirit, u

Greg, I'm curious to hear maybe a story of where you learned something very, you know, profound from Warren. I'm sure you've learned many things, but if there's a story that kind of comes up in your mind, we'd love to hear it. And vice versa, if we have the time, Warren, what's something that you maybe learned from Greg? Thank you. Yeah, I will turn this over to Greg in just one second. But now, the main thing I'd like to be known for is old age. Well, Ward is uh obviously a remarkable teacher and and I benefit

from that every day and and and as I've already touched on for many years, um I'm fortunate that if I had to uh be remembered as something right now, obviously I'd uh want to be uh remembered as a great father, but equally a coach. Uh, and I and that goes to family, friends, and just being involved with uh the kids I coach in hockey or baseball or whatever it may be. I think we've got a a great opportunity to give back to them at uh a very young age. So, uh obviously those would be um

how I'd want to be remembered and hopefully that'll be uh uh many many years from now. But uh but and I I love thinking of Warren truly as a teacher and and and he's in every day get the opportunity to continue to learn. Warren and I his dialogue is strong every week and we're always talking around opportunities in Berkshire or things that are going on globally or in the US and each one's uh truly a truly a learning moment. Um I I'll maybe go back to the very first meeting with Warren uh and because it

still stands out in my mind. Obviously it was incredible opportunity. We Warren was um buying or uh acquiring Mid-Americ Energy Holdings Company at that time or or or thinking about it and we had the I had the opportunity uh with my partners to go over there on a a Saturday morning and we're discussing the the business and Warren had the financial statements in front of them and uh like anybody I I was sort of expecting a a few questions on how the business was performing or a variety of things, but Warren locked in immediately to

what was on the balance sheet and the fact we had some derivative contracts, the weapons of mass destruction. um and associated with the utility business. We do have them because they they use them to match certain positions and they they're never matched perfectly, but you do have them and we're required in the regulated business. But I I just remember Warren going to it immediately and asking the composition of it and what was the underlying risk in it and wanting to thoroughly under understand and it wasn't that big of a position but it was absolutely one

of the risks he was concerned uh about as he was acquiring uh Mid-Americ and obviously in light of Enron and everything that gone on it was a very pertinent question and then the followup to that was then there's a an energy crisis in the US uh around electricity and natural gas and a variety of folks were were making significant sums of money. This is a year 18 months later and Warren's follow-up question couple years later to me was and I knew it was more just checking or testing. So how much money are we making during

this energy crisis? Are we making a lot? do you know do we are are are are the speculative positions in place and are we making it? The answer was we're really not making any more today than we would have been uh 6 months ago because all those derivatives were truly to support our business and weren't speculative. So just just that focus on understanding the business of what he was acquiring, understanding the risks around it uh still stand out in my mind. Warren? Yeah, it's it's one thing we've really never talked about here, but I spend

more time looking at balance sheets than I do income statements. And uh uh Wall Street really doesn't pay much attention to balance sheets, but I I like to look at balance sheets over an 8 or 10 year period before I even look at the income account because there are certain things it's harder to hide or play games with on the balance sheet than than you can with the income statement. And uh I mean neither one gives you the total answer on anything, but but you you still ought to you ought to understand what the figures

are are saying and what they don't say and what they can't say and what the management would like them to say that the auditors wouldn't like them to say. And I mean there's just a lot to be learned and and you do learn more you learn more from uh from balance sheets in my view than most people give them credit for uh in in terms of uh I really haven't I'm not worried about being remembered about people people don't remember well they don't remember enough about Katherryn Graham example in in terms of this story that

shaped America in many ways certainly had just all kinds of impact and I I think I mean history is so fascinating and uh Charlie was probably the best person you could imagine and what he learned. Charlie was never satisfied with uh just superficial things about any subject. He really wanted to understand it and he always would tell me that you know don't take a position on anything and until you can describe the arguments against it better than the person who is arguing with you that you should be able to argue their case better than they

can. uh he was he was a remarkable uh teacher and uh but so and so were those other fellows I mentioned. Uh uh I've had a and of course my dad was an incredible teacher. So you make the most of the people you meet that are going to make you a better person and probably forget about the rest to quite an extent. Okay, let's move on to number Well, Becky, you're next. This question comes from David Rubin, a shareholder from Scottsdale, Arizona. Uh it's a question for Greg. We've heard over the decades and are familiar

with Warren and Charlie's investment thesis and their circle of competence. During the first 10 years after taking over as CEO, Greg will be tasked with allocating more capital during that time than Bergkshire has had to allocate in its history. Given this, I'd like to hear from Greg about his views on capital allocation, particularly into new businesses. Sure. So um this bar is not too high. Uh no it's uh but very fortunate when you think of Berkshire again and we've we've talked about this where we start from and I I'll I'll clearly touch on the uh

investment and the related investment allocation but we start from a great great place where we've got a a great culture within the business. We have values that we as a management team and and and really um as defined by Warren and and those Charlie and and everybody associated with the business, we've got great values that really set Birkshop Birkshire up well for the for the future. And obviously as we deploy capital uh and allocate capital it's critical to Berkshire as we go forward and equally it's around uh managing risk but when I think of our

our our values or our couple that are absolutely uh critical uh one will maintain the reputation of of Berkshire and and that of our our company and And I view that in investing or how we operate things uh across each of our businesses. That will always be a priority and something that will will ensure is in the forefront of our minds. I think equally as we then look at our our various our back to Warren's balance sheet comment, we will have a fortress of a balance sheet and we want to I thought Sue Decker, our

lead director, said it well yesterday. We've got a we've got a significant set of cash right now, but it it's an enormous asset to have that and that will continue to be a philosophy. Yes. When we can deploy it, uh we'll deploy it well and I'll come to that. But equally we do recognize it as a strategic asset and it allows us to weather the difficult times and and at the same and and and not be dependent on anybody. So again that will be an uh an investment philosophy. We will remain Berkshire and we will

never be dependent on a bank or some other party for Bergkshire to be uh successful. I would thank you. I would then move to um to touch on allocation of capital be absolutely critical but with that comes uh management of risk and and understanding risk and that falls upon uh all our managers insurance non- insurance but we'll bring that across Berkshire and then the other value I would touch on but that really relates to where I'm going is ultimately we have a great set of operating cups companies that do produce significant cash flows. Be it

in the insurance companies creating float or our various non- insurance companies producing significant cash flows on a on an annual basis. We intend to continue to ensure that's a strength of Berkshire as we go forward. It's absolutely critical to our to our long-term success. Now, with those cash flows and with the float and then equally as touched on, we have significant resources already on our balance sheet. We'll really continue to move forward with a very similar philosophy. It's an identical philosophy to what we've had uh currently and and and for the past 60 years. We'll

start by looking at those opportunities uh within our business and by that I mean within our insurance non-insurance businesses are they are they properly capitalized and have the opportunity to manage their business and that uh that will continue to exist. They'll operate in an autonomous way but in the end Bergkshire still manages the capital that will go into that those businesses or what potentially will come out of those uh businesses. Equally the next opportunity is to acquire businesses in their totality or 100%. And there are great times when we can do that. Warren touched on.

We had one that was interesting in the last quarter, the 10 billion dollar acquisition. But again, the value relative to the risk have to be right. And if it's right, we want to own it. If it's not the time, there'll be another time to own assets like that. And then there's the opportunity to own pieces of uh of companies through the equity. But as Warren's always highlighted and again this will be our approach to to how we think around those companies though we we own a piece of a company. We own a a piece of

that uh cash flow. We own a piece of their balance sheet. It's not just a a share certificate. And as we approach that and really we'll approach it with the thought that we're going to own this company for the long term. Um it's again understanding what be it the 100% company or the 1% company you do we thoroughly understand and thoroughly do we have a strong view of what those economic prospects of those companies will look like and Warren said it earlier 5 years from now 10 years from now 20 years from now if if

we don't have a view of that um we won't be investing be it 100% % or 2% of a company through equities. We have to thoroughly understand what those prospects look like and associated with understanding those prospects. We need to understand the underlying risk of the businesses. And it's it's really the investment philosophy and and and how we how Warren and and the team have allocated capital for the p past 60 years. you know, really the the it it will not change and it's it's it's the approach we'll take as we go forward. warm. Yeah.

I And I don't want to go on too long on this, but but Sorry, I covered it. No, no, no. But this is this is important because the uh you know it's it's very obvious um that the country for example needs uh an incredible improvement rethinking redirection even to some extent uh in the grid. I mean, we we've out outgrown uh what would be the model that America should have. And in a sense, it's a problem. something akin to the interstate highway system where you needed the power of the government really to get things done

because it doesn't work so well when you get 48 or 50 jurisdictions that each has their own way of thinking about things. And of course in World War II, we called in people at a dollar an hour. And we knew we had to turn out ships like crazy. And we knew that we had to convert Ford Motor from from being a car manufacturer into an aircraft manufacturer in a matter of days, not weeks, not months. So you need the there are certain really major investment situations where we have capital like nobody else has in the

private system. We have particular knowhow in in in in the whole generation uh and and transmission uh arena. uh the country is going to need it. Uh but we have to figure out a way uh that makes sense from the standpoint of the government, sense from the standpoint of the public and from the standpoint of Birkshire. And we haven't figured that out yet. I don't know whether Greg wants to even explain a few of the major problems, but but that is an that is a clear and present use of hundreds of billions of dollars and

you know, you have people that set up funds and so you know, they're get they're getting paid for just assembling stuff, but it it it's it that's not the way to handle it. The way the way to handle it is to have some kind of a a government private industry cooperation similar to what you do in in a war. And uh and I don't think when they were doing the highway system, I don't think that the government set up its own guys that were going to pour a hole of cement or anything like that, but

they you you needed a cooperation and and and we're at that point, I think, and uh in in terms of energy, but uh I don't think I don't think we've made any progress particularly though. Tell us more about that. Yeah. And I think these are very unique in that not unique in that it's sort of reflective of where we're at. There will be very significant investment opportunities across a variety of industries as Warren touched on in the electric in the electric industry or the energy space. We obviously know that well with our with our existing

business and the capital required to meet the long-term needs of of of what's um uh currently uh projected as demand is enormous and and we as Bergkshire will be in a good position to um help address those needs. But the the model around it and the risks that need to be addressed to deploy that type of capital will be will be different than they are today. Warren's point. Yeah. The the muscle of the federal government will be needed. But the test of whether you can have 48 or 50 depending on the nature of things, jurisdictions

that are cooperating to do something that has opposition will have opposition in every single state. If they'd taken a vote on during World War II or if they' taken a vote on the, you know, the interstate highway system, it had it it would have been slowed down to an incredible degree. I so the question is how to use these strengths that this country has to actually turn it in to what it should be capable of while still preserving you know a republic with 48 and connected and couple unconnected states and and it it is it'll

be interesting to see what happens but we do have capital and we actually have some knowledge that that uh very few very few places have. I mean, we we we know what the game's about, but uh putting together that energy uh with knowledge and with capital and everything is it's just not easy. uh and it should be something that we're capable of in the country, but but the country was not designed for having in a certain way. It was not designed for having 48 different jurisdictions that could mess up anything that you were attempting to

do. And during wartime, it's one thing to get agreement, but during during peace time, it's some it's it's a it's a different problem that's going to be one for the next generation. But I'm just it's it's important. Okay. Station 10. Um good morning Mr. Buffett and Mr. Abel. I'm Darcus Tang. I'm 14 years old. My father U Tang MGRTCO brought me here for two consecutive years. And I promise I will come back um every year since I queue up at 2 in the morning every meeting you hold. My dad owned um BRKA shares and he

said I need to work hard to earn my piece of BRKB. We are both um are from China, Hong Kong and I would like to ask what's the essential element for a global teenager like me if we want to be part of Berkshire like Mr. Greg Apple like what piece of knowledge I should learn. So you hire me in the future. Well, if you're talking about the future, you better talk to Greg. So we'll let Greg answer that. Uh my final words finally Mr. Buffett. Uh I learned a lot from this meeting and of course

I will come uh here every year and I wish you can attend as many as possible as you and Mr. Char Charlie Mer the most respectful people have inspired me and my father a lot. I wish you happy and healthy and maybe one day in the future we can make the world more prosperous all together like you said. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Yes. Uh well I think uh your dad your dad said it best. um he highlighted that to become part of uh uh Berkshire to own some Bergkshire shares you're going to have to

work hard and I think uh hard work takes all of us a long ways in life and and I would never diminish that you know there's a lot of things that matter in life but if you start with a great uh work ethic and have that attitude that you're you want to contribute you're going to go a long ways in life and and that'll and and you'll you'll find great enjoyment because as Warren said, you'll then if you work hard, you're going to find the things you love in life and it'll lead to that. And

uh we we truly uh look forward to the day you're part of Berkshire. Thank you. Yeah. Keep keep a lot of curiosity and read a lot as Charlie would say. Okay, Becky. Uh, this question comes from Matthew Teisac in Leighton, Utah. He said, "Please discuss your strategy on how to protect our company from future liabilities due to wildfires blamed on our electric utility companies out west." Well, that's a very good question and uh uh we've we we made some mistakes in the past when we bought Pacific Corp. In 200 what five U yes Warner Scott

and and David Sol and myself three guys who were capitalists at heart and had had uh but we're dealing with our own money but we uh we made a mistake by not carving it up into the seven states that we were buying. And uh it came it came with an aggregation uh where it wasn't state by state and we we kept the same the same structure and that was a that was a big mistake. Uh there are well every part of the country is going to need electricity and there are going to be places where

where public electric or privately held electric utilities would be very foolish to operate and how that gets resolved in a democracy we will find out but uh uh those are the facts as they stand now I would say Greg. Yeah, the the reality the risk around the wildfires i.e. that do the wildfires occur are they're not going away and and we know that and the risk probably goes up each year. So, but what we can do to reduce the risk of it impacting our system and our underlying assets and the unfortunately the liabilities that come

with such events. We can change that and manage that. We can't eliminate the risk, but we can reduce it. And that's where we've got uh our teams in the in the west, but we really are approaching it across all our energy infrastructure because the the reality is the wildfires have now occurred in uh Texas. They've had a variety of them throughout the US and and we're all very focused on how we manage that risk. How we manage it is we start by addressing the actual assets, how we're maintaining them um and where we invest them,

invest into them. So we try to make sure that they're either not causing the fire or potentially even hardening the system as to what can they withstand. So it's very much uh we start with the operational folk uh focus. We then take it even further, and this is something Warren and I've discussed many times, is that the utilities started to recognize when we have these unusual weather events, and Warren touched on what's been happening in Nebraska with storms, but they're equally occurring uh or or significant events occurring uh west. But when we have those, we've

gotten very very good at saying, okay, we have to manage the system differently. will potentially deenergize because there's likely to be an event. But the one thing we hadn't tackled, and this is very relevant to the one significant event we had back in 2020 in Pacific Corp, is we didn't deenergize the system as the fire was approaching. Uh because our our employees and the whole management team have been all their lives trained to keep the lights on and the last thing they want to do is turn those lights off and and have a system deenergized.

And after those events and as we um really looked at how we're going to move forward in in managing the the assets and reducing that risk, we we have clearly recognized as as a team that we have to deenergize those assets. So now as we get fires encroaching at a certain uh number of miles, we deenergize cuz we do not want to contribute to the fire nor obviously harm any of our consumers or contribute unfortunately if there's a death. And and that's really where we had to take our team that we're managing a different risk

now. It's not around keeping the lights on. It's around protecting the general public and ensuring the fire does not spread further. So, we've gone as far as that and I would I'll stand corrected on this one, but we're probably the one uh utility or across our utilities that does that today and we strongly believe that. Becky, can I just follow up on that? Yeah. Doesn't that open you up to other risk if you shut down your system, a hospital gets shut down, somebody dies? we're we we've uh you know fortunately that's something that we do

deal with a lot because we have power outages that occur by accident. So when we look at critical infrastructure because it's excellent point and we're constantly re-evaluating it and we do receive a lot of feedback from our customer groups as to how do we manage that? But that is something we deal with on a a more routine basis than we'd ever like. The lights go out. They have to make sure the hospitals stay on emergency units can respond and all that. Uh but there is risk there. So then we spend a lot more time educating

the consumers and our consumer groups, our customers. Okay, this is what will happen. We need to understand your unusual situations and how can we best tackle that again so we just don't take on another liability. So there's a lot around uh deenergization. And then just to take it to the last step and Warren's touched on that just in general on energy policy, we have to work with our states and our regulators to ensure this was never risk we took on or or envisioned when we were investing in utilities. Nor would any of the investors who've

invested in other energy companies. you earn a you you earn a very set return for taking on a very set defined risk associated with that asset and this has gone well beyond that. We don't earn the type of returns nor can you earn a large enough return to take on these risks. So it's it's not just about solving the return side. We really have to solve the risk side which means we work with our regulators. We're working with our state legislators to get to the right answer. And that's really just that'll be an ongoing process.

There are not silver bullets out there, but every day our teams across utilities are working hard to reduce that risk, recognizing the fundamental risk of the wildfires is not going away. Yeah. But there's some problem. Yeah. There's some there's some problems that can't be solved and we we shouldn't be in the business of taking your money, investors money and and and tackling things that we don't know the solution for. And um uh and you can present the arguments, but it's a political decision when you are dealing with states or the federal government. And uh uh

if you're in something where you're going to lose, the big thing to do is quit and you you present your case as well as you can and everything else, but uh if you don't hold the pen in the end, uh you know, we don't have any business taking your money and uh doing dumb things with us and and we can do our best to explain what the intelligent things are, but uh it's your money. And uh uh so it's it's very hard to tell how to to handle the questions of politically determined decisions that are

going to go to court in many cases. But you know that that it just doesn't it doesn't make sense. We we know what we think a sensible system would be, but and we ought to explain what what what we think it is and and uh uh you know do the best to get our position because it's pro social to have the right solution to have it. But uh the right solution for example in the interstate wasn't to let 48 states each decide on their own way of doing it and award contractors the jobs based you

know there's just there's some problems that can't that can't be solved and we are not in the business of trying to solve insolvable problems. Yeah. I'd even go for but then the problem you have of course is that the people that work for you that's it's their job. So they they they they want to have reasons to keep going and uh that's a that's a it's those are tough choices if you're managing but that's what's that's why they have managers. And Warren, I was just going to add because you touched on something really important there

that um effectively is for example with the utilities and the wildfires. Um we c we can't just become the insurer of last resort and that we're going to cover any cost and all costs irrespective of what occurred. And that's a little bit of the situation we're in right now with our largest uh challenge, a 2020 wildfire where there were one of four fi there were four fires occurring at a a challenging time. One we've always asserted was a lightning strike that was not inside our service territory. the fire burnt into our service territory and we

became responsible for that fire effectively through the courts and we've continue to hold firm that we're not responsible for that um rightfully I mean we didn't contribute to it uh and we didn't initiate it nor did we feel we ever contributed to it um but it's getting uh again if you look at the risk that's there we have to manage through things like that we'll get through that litigation. We're happy to report, for example, on that one after 5 years, the Oregon Forestry Department has come out and said the the the fires the other fires

we did have that we were able to manage and extinguish did not contribute to that fire. And that fourth fire is the largest fire of the four. It can it's 60% of the claims. We're 5 years into effectively getting that information into the courts. Now, that will outline our legal strategy obviously going forward, but it's things we're dealing with, but we continue to learn from this as a as utility industry. So, we're in very much each of the legislators, as I said, making sure we get clear definition where liability falls, what can the economic damages

be, but most importantly, what can the non-economic damages be? And again with the thought we can't be the insurer of last resort. We just can't be responsible for everything that happens in in a state. Yeah. If we want to do it with our own money, we we can do it, but we're not going to we're not going to do things with your money that we think are stupid. I mean, you ought to get rid of us if if if if we do it. And uh it's easy to it's easier to do stupid things with other

people's money than it is with your own money. That's one of the problems government has just generally. We don't want to bring it to private enterprise. But it is important that the United States have an intelligent energy policy just as it was important during World War II that we learned how to make ships instead of cars extremely fast. And we figured out the answer. We combined private enterprise with with with with the power of the of of of government. And uh but what how feasible that is in a in a democracy and you know it

it was clearly obvious during World War needed to be done and we did it. But it's not so clear when when uh you get 330 million people all arguing their own self-interest and and of course deciding what'll happen and and and having the people often who are making the decisions reacting as they did 20 years earlier. uh you know when they don't really bear the responsibility for the decision. But u anyway that's management and um we'll do our best station 11. Hello my name is Alitia Burk and I'm from Poland but I currently live in

Chicago. This question is on behalf of an inspiring man that I know Wid Ahmed who's here with us today. Mr. Buffett. Nearly 74 years ago, on a cold Saturday in January 1951, you traveled 8 hours by train from New York to Washington. You won all the way on nothing but hope that some might teach you more about the insurance industry. Arriving at Geico's office to find the doors locked, you persisted until a janitor let you inside. You credit that meeting with Lori Davidson for the insurance float that was the rocket fuel behind Berkshire's success. In

2011, when I was 15, I wrote you with similar determination asking to meet. You kindly wrote back saying you had only 3,000 days left and more pressing priorities. Well, Mr. Buffett, it's now been 5,000 days since you replied. And so inspired by your persistence in 1951 and the tenacity of Mrs. B, I humbly renew her my request for just a quarter of the time Davey gave you a single hour in your office. Oh well, you may wonder why must it be you? You have often shared an anecdote about Polish Jew who survived Ashvitz who said

to you once, Warren, I'm very slow to make friends because when I look at someone I ask myself would they hide me? You said that the number of people would hide you was the best test of life well lived. Well, I believe that the at this meeting you have four you don't have 40,000 trail holders, but you have 40,000 people who would hide you. You are testament to a life extraordinarily well-lived yet even you have not fully witnessed this transformative power of a I'll let you write I'll I'll let you write my biography but I

I think I've got the point of your question. So respectfully I ask again Mr. Buffett before father time wins will you please grant will lead Ahmed an hour of your time or any time you can dedicate. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you. And and I will say this I grant an hour to everybody of the 40,000 here. Well will we'll have an interesting I'll have an interesting time the rest of my life. But I will I will I'll give you one tip. Uh I found that when I was very young and uh

I would I would drive around to various companies all over the country and uh because I was very young and these were companies were offbeat and they didn't have investor relations departments then almost every CEO would see me cuz they figured I'd never they'd never see me again. And uh uh and they didn't they weren't getting calls like that. And I would ask them two questions. I I would I would explain to them. It's not a bad idea. Incidentally, uh if you're going to walk into somebody's office and you say you want 10 minutes of

their time, take a u hourglass and stick it on the on the desk of the person you're talking to and turn it up so it's going to go for 10 minutes and you say you're going to you're going to leave in 10 minutes unless they ask you to stay. And uh uh that sets the terms. But then once you have that, you if if they're in the coal business, we'll say, which happened to be one that I was interested in 70 years ago or so, uh you just ask them one question that if they were

to be stuck on a desert island and they had to own only one of their competitors stock during the 10 years they were going to be on that island, which one would it be, and Why? And then after they give you that answer, you said the same thing. You were in the short uh your net worth while you were on the island. Which would it be? And why? Because every manager likes to talk about their competitors. They're they're they're like went to school kids, you know, when when they get into talking about their competitors. I

probably learned more about various industries by just making sure that they didn't think I'd stay too long and that in the meantime they would have the floor and talk about their competitors. I kept my own mouth shut in those days. Uh that's that's a lesson I've lost somewhere along the line. But the uh uh you're you're not you're you essentially they've outsourced uh or I shouldn't say outsourced, but they've they've departmentalized investor relations of all companies of size frankly now. So, you've got, you know, 3,000 companies or whatever they have and they all have departments

and each one of them has an investor relations department practically and their job is to say this is the best thing you can do today is buy our stock. Well, that the whole concept is total idiocy. Uh but it's a big business and it gets bigger and the investor relations department gets bigger and and uh you know and and it uh it's what we have now but do a little of your own work your own way but uh Bergkshire Hathaway has got plenty of material out there for you to read and when you get through

reading it all you'll know way more than most the people that work at Bergkshire. So, uh, you you don't need a personal interview. If we take it, if we take an hour times, even the 40,000 people we may have here, plus plus Becky's many listeners and viewers, uh, it just doesn't work. So, uh, I admire I admire your effort, but but, uh, but you'll just have to settle for that is the admiration that you get in this. Okay, Becky. Um, this is a question that you touched on in a lot of ways in the last

answer, um, from before, but I did get this question from a few different people. So, I'd like to ask it. Ricardo Bri, a longtime shareholder based in Panama, says that he was very happy to see Berkshire acquire 100% of BAG. Um, it was done in two steps. One, in late 2022, 1% was purchased from Greg Ael for $870 million, implying a valuation of BHE of $87 billion. And then two, in 2024, the remaining 8% was purchased from the family of Walter Scott Jr. for $3.9 billion, implying a valuation of $48.8 billion for the enterprise. That

second larger transaction represented a 44% reduction in valuation in just 2 years. Ricardo writes that Pacific Corp liabilities seemed too small to explain this. Therefore, what factors contributed to the difference in value for BHE between those two moments in time? Well, we don't know how much we'll lose out of Pacific Court and decisions that are made, but we also know that that certain of the attitudes demonstrated uh by that particular example have got analoges throughout the utility system. and and uh we there's a lot of there's a lot of states that that so far have

been very good decent to operate in and there are some now they're rat poison as Charlie would say to operate in and uh that knowledge was was accentuated when we saw what happened in the Pacific Northwest and it's extent accentuated by what we've seen as to how utilities have been treated in certain other situations. Uh and then on top of that so that it wasn't just a direct question of what was involved at Pacific Corp. It was an extrapolation of of a societal trend. And secondly, we uh uh also had a decision we didn't expect

out at all in the real estate uh business. And and and those kind of things can change values and courts can change values. And it's a lot easier to make those decisions when you just own marketable securities than when you own businesses. uh and I've made plenty of those decisions as I've watched what have happened in various industries and companies and over 70 years but uh Greg made the decision which was fine with us to get out while and he had no knowledge of what was going to be happening in either the real estate field

or the utility field and uh uh we would we We're not in the mood to sell any business, but but Birkshire Hathaway Energy is worth considerably less money than it was two years ago based on societal factors. And that happens in some of our businesses. It certainly happened to our textile business and it's it's happened. It's the public utility business is not as good a business as it was a couple of years ago. And uh if if anybody doesn't believe that they can look at Hawaiian and electric and they look and look at the Edison

in the current wildfires situation in California and and uh there's societal trend trends that are uh oh I just got a note here on my monitor says the books are now sold out. So uh you'll have to spend your money on other things. Here's fudge. This is what I'm eating. something. Uh but that's the explanation that values change and they don't always change upward. And uh when we made the deal with with Greg, we would have would happy to buy out uh Scott family at that price. And when we made a deal with the Scott

company, we wouldn't have been happy to pay Greg the price that he received. But that that's like Bergkshire shares. We bought in stock at X and we buy in stock at at less than X if if if conditions change poor and we pay over the years we pay more and more because it builds in value but it doesn't do it in a straight line. And I would say that our enthusiasm for buying public utility companies is different than it now than it would be would have been a couple years ago. That happens in other industries,

too, but it's pretty dramatic in public utilities. And it's particularly dramatic in public utilities because they are going to need lots of money. So, if you're going to need lots of money, you probably ought to behave in a way that encourages people to give you lots of money. And and uh we will see where we go. it. We'd like to see public utilities do well, but we our responsibilities to the shareholders of Burggerway. Okay. Station, station one again. Dear Warren, dear Greg, dear fellow owners, it's such a pleasure to be here. My name is Revie

Panida. I was born in communist Albania, but I'm now teaching economics in London, England. Uh, the wonderful writing of Warren and Charlie has significantly shaped my thinking and teaching. I thank you both very much for the many insights over the years. Warren has often written about the importance of Bergkshire's earning power to owners. My question is, what was in your estimate Burks's earning power in the latest fiscal year? It would be great if you can comment on any significant items that either increased or decreased the earning power as compared to reported net uh income measures

for Bircher. Thank you. Yeah. Well, I think our underlying earning power was affected negatively here a while back by what happened in the utility field. I think that our earning power was not is not enlarged by any large acquisitions that come along but they come along periodically. So we will see something at some point that that uh well could be you know on the one that was 10 billion we would have added to earning power. I mean why else would we do it? Uh uh so that's that's very uh situational and of course it depends

so much on what the general market is doing and what interest rates are doing and what psychology is doing. We will make our best deals when people are the most pessimistic. You know that's been true ever since I was 1930. born in 1930. When I was born, things got much more attractive over the next two years and apparently I didn't do anything about it there. But uh you know that was the opportunity of a lifetime and and I blew it by, you know, worrying about the kid in the next crib or something. But uh uh

over my lifetime, you know, I've had fabulous opportunities sometimes and and they happen because humans are human and uh I don't, you know, I'm fearful of all kinds of things. I don't want to try and, you know, be one of the Wendas and walk on a tiny strip between couple of twin towers or something or whatever it may be. But I don't get I don't I I just I I don't get fearful by things that that other people get are afraid of in in in the financial in a financial way that uh you know the

idea that if Bergkshire went let's say Bergkshire went down 50%. uh next week. I would regard that as a fantastic opportunity and and it wouldn't bother me in the least. And and most people aren't they just react differently. Uh and so it doesn't it's not that I don't have emotions, but I don't have emotions about the prices of stocks. I mean, I actually those decisions get all the way to my brain, whereas emotions can get bogged down some other place. So uh uh Bureau will increase its earning power over time as we retain money. I

mean we we are doing things making decisions every day. People are working. We're retaining earnings. We we will build the earning power but it won't be coming in in any even stream. And it certainly won't be matched dollar for dollar on either the upside or the downside and market prices and but that's what makes it a good business. You know the investment business is that everything isn't properly appraised and and the seller other people get the better your opportunities get. Okay, Becky, this question comes from Achie Patel and it's about the big cap technology stocks.

In the 2017 annual meeting, you said Warren, you really don't need any money to run these companies and referred to them as ideal businesses, referring to the big tech companies Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Amazon. With all of those companies now announcing massive capital investment endeavors and a around AI ambitions, have you rethought the above comment just in terms of them being asset light and what you think of them as a result? Well, it's always better to make a lot of money with without putting up anything uh than it is to make a lot of money

by putting up a lot of money. And so a business that takes no capital to speak of um Coca-Cola it the the finished product which has gone through bottling companies and everything that takes a lot of capital but in terms of the selling the syrup or the concentrate that goes to it doesn't take a lot of capital. So, one is a fabulous business and one is a, you know, it depends where it is and everything like that. Coco is popular every place, but some places it, I mean, if you're in the bottling business, it costs

real money. You have real trucks out there and you have all kinds of machinery and and and you have capital expenditures coming up. And you know, we've got businesses that take very little capital that make high re really high returns on capital and and the ones the politicians talk about as making high returns actually aren't making high returns usually in terms of capital. Uh uh insurance, property casual insurance is kind of a rare business because you need capital as a guarantee fund that you will keep your promises but you can use it to buy other

low intensive capital business. I mean you can you can buy a whole you can buy Apple and that would support that business. So, uh, that can be a pretty good business and it's one of the reasons we've done well over time. Uh, but, uh, [Music] the well, it'll be interesting to see how much capital intensity there. Certainly, there's more capital intensity going on with the Magnificent 7 than there were was a few years ago. I mean basically Apple uh has not really needed any any capital over the years and it's repurchased shares that a dramatic

amount of reduction whether that world is the same in the future or not is something Hollywood's answer was always to get their their money from other people to put up the capital it uh a lot of people have gotten very rich in the country by essentially figuring out how out how to get others put up the capital. Uh and that's what people do in the in the money management business and they get very very rich because they they get an override on other people's capital. Uh, and incidentally, if if all of you were paying 1%

for investment management fees at Berkshire last year, you would have paid $8 billion uh for managing and and you really wouldn't have had to do it. But uh you know investment management is a very good game because other people put up the capital and you you charge them for the capital whether they do well or not and then you charge them a lot more if they do well. I mean it uh it it uh it's uh it's a welldesigned business for the people who practice it uh and who can blame them. I mean that's that

is capitalism but uh and I I saw that in operation when I was working at Solomon but I didn't need to see it. I I knew what existed anyway. The trick in life is to get somebody else's capital and get an override on it. Uh Charlie and I decided it wasn't too elegant a business after a while. We we weren't we were not criticizing the efficacy of it. We were just it just didn't appeal to us after a while. I did it for 12 years though or something like not really. The the one difference that

Charlie and I did from other people is we put all our own money in into it. So, so we really we did share the losses in with our own capital, but we got an override on other people's capital and that's been people have made advances where they get the override on other people's capital without putting up any of their own capital to speak of. And that's that's a very good business. But uh it it it leads it it can lead to a lot of abuse. Greg, you've watched capital management in the United States and would

you say that Canada's behind or ahead in this respect? Well, I think when it comes to their capital system, Warren, it it it is very comparable. There's no question. Other than as as we know, I mean, I think the US as far as having uh a capitalist system, it would it would be tough to be touched by uh any country. And I think when I think of Canada, there's just certain responsibilities or the or obligations that the government wants to take on and aren't going to leave with the public sector. And that's just a a

decision that's made by society or by the by the Canadian people or if you look at another country, Australia, wherever it may be. But so there's it's different. But when you think when I think of capitalism that that drive is there and and and and the desire to you know allocate capital properly it's very similar it it's produced wonders in the United States if you think about it but uh originally uh with the Rockerfellers and Kennedy and and and Carnegies and all they actually put up money to build steel mill you know, whatever it may

have been with with Roger refineries and pipelines and all that sort of thing, they they put up money to do it. Now, the trick is to use other people's money basically. and and uh and you know you can't you can't blame human be beings for behaving like humans but you should be aware of what their motivations are. It's a capitalism in the United States has succeeded like nothing you've ever seen. But it has the what it is is it's a combination of this magnificent cathedral which has produced an economy like nothing the world's ever seen

and then it's got this massive casino attached. So you got the cathedral and the casino and in the casino everybody's having a good time and there's lots of money changing hands and everything but the cathedral is what got to make sure the cathedral gets gets fed too because the temptation and the temptation's very high now is to go over to the casino where people say you know we've got magic boxes and all kinds of things that'll do wonderful things for you and that's where people are happiest. That's where you get the most promise to you.

That's where the most money is for the people that are pushing things. and uh you know the balance between the capital casino and the u and the cathedral are it's very important that that uh the United States in the next hundred years make sure that the cathedral is not overtaken by the casino cuz people really like to go to casinos and it's just so much more fun and they they bring bells and when you win and you know they they bring you drinks and everything else and and uh uh it's it's designed to move money

from one pocket to another. But um and in the cathedrals they basically are designing things that will be be producing goods and services for 300 and some million people like it's never been done before in in history. Uh, it's an interesting system we've developed, but it's worked. It it it dispenses rewards in what seems like a terribly capriccious manner. I mean, it the idea that people get what they deserve in life. And it it's hard to make that argument. Uh uh but if you argue with it any other system where it seems to work better,

the answer is we haven't found one. So I'll leave it to the next generation to to send me the answer and then by Ouija board or whatever works. Okay. Station two. Hi, my name is Patrick Nester. I am 13 years old and from Tampa, Florida. I'm here with my brother John, who's 15, and my dad. Thank you for hosting this meeting. This is my first ever shareholder meeting. My question is, what high school class or activity helped influences you to who you are today as the greatest investor of investor of all time? Well, that's good

question. uh the the teachers you get in your life have this incredible impression and on you and and a lot of it are the formal teachers you have but some are informal teachers too I mean I learned from certain employers you know so much uh you really hope you're learning from everybody you find who's well-intentioned and has had a lot of experience in And I I had a lot of good luck in that. But I would I would say that uh what what well where I was really lucky was my dad was in the investment

business. So I would go down on Saturday and I'd wait for him to go to lunch with and I'd read the books that were around there that nobody else ever read. And uh uh and they just they talked to me. numbers talk to me. Uh and uh uh I could never get my fill of them. And then I discovered the public library and I read every book there was on investments literally in the Elmo public library at 19. And uh uh you know I just I I enjoyed learning about that unlike Charlie. If Charlie was

reading about electricity, he would want to have known everything that Thomas Edison knew and more and and goes through the same thought processes and understand how everything worked. I didn't care whether how it worked. I just cared whether it worked. And that's a limitation. I'm I'm I'm confessing here. I'm not bragging. Uh uh but I you know the as as Charlie would say I mean people would always say if you could only have lunch with one person living or dead who would it be and Charlie said I've already had lunch with all of them because

I've read all their books you know basically and and so and he really did it. I think having curiosity and and actually finding sympathetic teachers is very useful. I I I ran into a couple of teachers that uh both in high school and college. In fact, I would say that I went to three different higher, you know, three different universities and I went to high school in Washington and at each place I found about two or three really outstanding people and uh and I just spent my time with them and didn't pay much attention to

the other classes and uh and I was lucky to find something that that really fit me very early uh on if my ambition had been to become a ventriloquist or you know whatever the hell it might have been and it wouldn't have worked you know I' I'd have spent hours and hours and hours and I wouldn't have been any good when I got through so I don't believe that I think there was that book that talked about spending 10,000 hours at something I could spend 10,000 hours at tap dancing and and and you'd throw up

if you watched me, you know, but but if I spent if I spent a 10 hours reading Ben Graham, I would I would be damn smarter when I got through. So minds are really really different. I watch great bridge players and I watch great physicians, great I mean people really really really have different talents and uh you know I don't know I think you're supposed to have 88 billion cells in your brain. I'm not sure that all of mine are flashing bright lights but but you are different than anybody else. That's what my dad always

used to to tell me that uh essentially that you know you're something different. It may not be good at the moment but but uh you you find your own you find your own path and you will you will find the people in schooling that that want to talk to you. people that teach in general, they love having uh a young student who's actually really interested in the subject and they'll spend extra time with you. They'll do all kinds of things that and I I ran into that. I had Graham and Dodd at at uh Columbia.

Well, Dave Dodd treated me like a son basically. And uh uh but I was interested in excuse me, I was just in what they were saying and and they found it kind of entertaining that I was so interested and uh so I would just I would I I would look around at you and you know what really fascinates you. I wouldn't try and be somebody else. And then I would u you you'll find the teachers uh at a school and and you'll find some outstanding people that that are teachers. I' I've had at least 10

people that have had huge impacts on my life and every one of them was positive, you know, because I got to select in a sense and and uh and a a number of people really like helping younger people, you know. I found that in school and probably helps to look a little bit lost and all that like you need help. Uh but I I uh I would say my school experiences were good but were really very good but I attribute it much more to the individual than to the institutions. Okay. I've already told you more

than I know. So we'll go on to uh Becky. You're next. This question comes from Scott Williams in Portland, Oregon. He said, "Do you think the net benefit of Doge will be positive or negative for the long-term health of the United States?" Well, why don't you give me a hard one? I think that I think that bureaucracy is something that is amazingly prevalent and contagious even in our capital system. And that big corporations, you know, overwhelmingly most of them look like they could be run better. I'm sure Bergkshire does in many way many respects and

uh it it uh you know and government is the ultimate so it it it it really doesn't have any checks on it. Uh and that's why it scares you to some extent about uh about uh what the future of the currency will be because they can print currency and and if you have people that get elected by promising people things and that doesn't mean that that they aren't sincere about all kinds of items, but there's no politician that says to anybody that at least if they have money that you know I really think you have

bad breath and if you don't mind would you step over away from me it just doesn't happen they uh and so I I think the problem of how you control revenue and expenses in government is the one that is never fully solved and has had really hurt dramatically certain many civilizations and I don't think we're immune from it and we've come close to it. Uh but if you tell me how in in in a democracy you go in and really change things, you know, we're we're operating at a fiscal deficit now that is unsustainable over

a very long period of time. We don't know whether that means two years or 20 years that because there's never been a country like the United States but uh you know that if something can't go on forever it will end to quote Herbert Stein famous uh economist and uh we are doing something that is unsustainable and and it has the it has the aspect to it that it gets uncontrollable pull able to a certain point. I mean, essentially, you just give up on it and uh Paul Vulker, you know, kept that from happening in the

United States. Uh but we came close. We've come close multiple times and uh you know the we've still had very substantial inflation in the United States, but it's never been run away yet. And and that's not something you want to try and experiment with because it feeds on itself. So I I wouldn't want the job of of trying to correct what's going on in revenue in the expenditures of the United States with roughly a 7% gap when probably a 3% gap is sustainable and then the further away you get from that the more you get

to where the uncontrollable begins and Uh, I well I I think that it's it's a job I don't want, but it's a job I think should be done, and Congress does not seem good at doing it. Well, it sounds like you should quit while I'm ahead. It it's it's and well we've got a lot of problems always as a country but but this is one we bring on ourselves. I mean it it we have a revenue stream, a capital producing stream, a brains producing machine like the world has never seen. And if you picked a

way to screw it up, it would involve the currency. And and that's happened a lot of places. And and the incentives plus the checks. Uh well, there aren't any there aren't any real checks. You got in theory, you would make it so there was substantial downside for the anybody that screwed things up. But but there isn't downside, there's upside. And so it uh it's the the problem of the most successful company in the history of the country in the history of the world. And uh at this point, we got a little room to go in

in solving. And then with that, I'll shut up and go on to station three. Hello Mr. Buffett. My name is Saskia from Gon Germany and first of all I want to thank you because you made such a great impact in my life and the life the people I love and that's priceless. Well, thank you Mr. Buffett. Imagine it's 1776 and you're sitting alongside Benjamin Franklin helping to shape the foundation of a new nation. What core economic principles would you advocate for building a far fair, resilient, and opportunitydriven capitalism society? one that supports longtime prosperity for

future generations. Well, I I probably that's a good question, but I would probably say to Ben Franklin, you just keep thinking and don't talk to me because you'll you'll come up with some better ideas than I will. He was, you know, incredibly remarkable person. I mean that he would say he's almost probably the last person to almost have a grasp of every every aspect of of uh of activity in the country. He he invented all kinds of things and he incidentally we were talking about uh power of compound interest and that sort of thing. He

he left a will that that left a sum of money to Philadelphia and another sum to Boston that would serve as a example for a couple hundred years, you know, of the power of compounding and all all kinds of things. I he he was so far ahead of his time that that the best thing I could do if I was under that tree with him was be to to get out get out of his way and let him just keep thinking. Uh but uh it it he saw the problems that success could bring to a

society as well as other problems. I mean more immediate problems that that uh uh in all kinds of fields but the problems of how how to cause how to take 8 billion people because there's no way we can separate ourselves from the rest of the world. We can be example to the rest of the world and I think it it behooves us since we have had all this good fortune in this country and we do have a pretty good system. I don't think it I don't think you get I don't think you get very far

by lecturing the world on how you're the the one that you tell them what they should do with our lives. I think I I think you get a certain amount of resentment when just a few hundred years ago uh a whole different group of countries were running the world and and now you start giving them advice and that I I think it's a it's a real mistake in communication or in persuasion to uh to lecture a bunch of people who you've just won the game. I mean that's uh but anyway uh I I would say

that I would advise Ben to figure out how to win the game and keep a certain amount of humility at the same time. And uh I would tell him to try and design a system that doesn't invent too many things that can destroy the planet. uh you know that become uncontrollable once you get them out there. There was no alternative to us developing the atom bomb but but but the expansion of the number of people that have the ability from one to eight and and nine probably pretty soon with Iran. I mean that that's a

mistake that society just could not afford to make. I mean solving the problem with nine variables instead of simply one. Now it's totally understandable. My dad was in Congress when when the atom bomb was uh first used. It's amazing how how uh uh Sam Raburn kept the House of Representatives uninformed because they they're supposed to appropriate all the money and had 435 congressmen there and they had no idea they were appropriating money for for uh Los Alamos or what was going on in Chicago or what was going on in at uh Tennessee. But anyway, uh

uh we we we do have a society that is far beyond anything that Ben Franklin dreamt of. It's achieved some of the or is achieve it's moving toward in the right direction toward solving some problems where we made kind of broad declarations about all men being created equal and and etc. And then we did some of the things we did but generally speaking we moved in the right direction. Uh but we face problems that I don't know what how how Ben Franklin would would uh uh attack the problem of of what you do once you

get weapons of mass destruction in many hands. And when you essentially look at the world as something where there are winners and losers and that the winners are, you know, humiliate the losers and do all kinds of things. I it but I'll I'll let the people are a lot younger to figure out the answers on that. But it's it's still the most wonderful. There's never been anything you could dream like what has happened in the United States. So we still it's it's the best place and the best time to be alive by by miles in

the street. Just think of a couple hundred years ago and somebody, you know, yanking out a few of your teeth and pouring whiskey down you doing. I mean, the subsistence and and particularly in this Midwest, just imagine waiting till the Missouri froze over every year just to see whether you can get your wagon across and maybe have a pregnant woman in the back. you know when who it is just amazing what has happened of a positive nature during my lifetime and then the question is is how do you how do you keep it and how

do you improve it and uh uh I I I do think that fundamental to all of it though is having a uh is having a currency that that does not get debased what that does to the stability of a society where all the people that trust their government get screwed and all the people that figure out ways to profit off of it become rich or richer. I I I I don't think you want a society that operates in that manner. So anyway, Let's see. That was section three. So, we're going to Becky. Is that right?

Yep. That's right. Um, Greg, this question is for you. It comes from a shareholder named Jay Milroy, uh, who writes, "Mr. Buffett has a hands-off approach to managing the operating subsidiaries. How would you describe your approach?" better. Well, we've got our managers over there and it I I would say going back to 2018, it's been a it's been very fortunate to be in this role because one, I had to learn a lot of the businesses and there's no question as uh Warren bought the businesses, had that general knowledge. I absolutely had to engage with each

of them and they've been great in uh sharing their their business models, their approach, their thoughts around where the risks and opportunities are and I think as we went through that there's no question um I had questions and wanted to engage with them and Warren talks about the curiosity being important as you go through things. that would be my style to have questions and comments around their business, their frameworks. Um, at the same time, they have great businesses and and they run them very autonomously and that that remains in place. But if there's opportunities to

see where uh maybe seen something in another business or an opportunity I may see in their industry, we're going to discuss it and see if that's uh something we should pursue or are we properly addressing the risk. And I found all our managers to be absolutely engaging on that and and and want to have those dialogues. And I'd say that's a reflection of of my approach. I'd also say that um when you think of our managers, again, very autonomous. They they run their businesses. They know it better than I ever will. But if I see

an opportunity that it's well worth their time to talk to another one of our managers, if it's Geico and they've gone through a technology transformation, um they're not by themselves that need to be thinking that way. We want to make sure the right folks are talking and figuring out how we can benefit from the prior experiences. So, it's um I would say more active uh but it hopefully in a very positive way and they and we got an exceptional group. So, it's worked out exceptionally well as uh as I've gone through that period of time.

It's working way better with Greg than with me because uh you know I I just um I didn't want to work as hard as he worked and and and I could get away with it because uh we've got a basically good business, very good business. And uh and I wasn't in danger of you firing me by virtue of both ownership and the fact that we would do pretty well. Uh but uh the fact that you can do pretty well doesn't mean you couldn't do better. And and and Greg can do better at many things. Many

people want to be managed, need help in being managed. Some don't. Some you just leave alone. Uh you know, we've had managers it would have been crazy to uh started giving instructions to cuz they just quit. And and I wouldn't blame him cuz I'd be the same type myself. But uh a lot of people I mean people really do welcome direction and help and and and uh you know and particularly when they're getting it from somebody like Greg that really lives the life himself and doesn't just come down on from a high and say you

know here's what you do while I do something else you know and a manager that behaves differently than than what he's asking asking uh the people beneath them to behave. It it's it just doesn't work over time. And uh people want a manager that they that they admire and they're not going to admire them if those people profess to behave in one manner and behave in another manner. It's easier. This is a sad thing, but it's it's easier for an organization to see its quality move downward than it is upward. I mean, it it if

if the boss behaves badly, uh it causes everybody to to behave. I mean, it it it that is really catching. It's not as a c catching on the way in upper management. But if the manager is doing a lot of little things to grease his own situation, pretty soon, let's say you're running a retail establishment. Pretty soon all the employees are a lot of the employees are telling their friends that they they get a discount, you know, with the retail operation and if they want they want if their friend wants something, they'll put it on

their account and then get the discount. What once you start deviating downward, it is really contagious and it is hard to rebuild. So, you really need someone that that uh behaves well on top and is not playing games for their own benefit. And and we get a lot of managers that bend over backwards not to do that sort of thing. And then we get a few that bend over forwards. And uh and if you get enough companies, you're going to get a lot of different forms of behavior. and Greg does something about it and I

I've generally been laxed in doing something about it, but he's done a way better job at that than I have. Okay, station four. Hello, Mr. Buffett and Mr. Ael. My name is Kansas Lomire. I am a junior at Elkrin South High School and was born and raised in Omaha. My question is directed to Greg Ael. Birkshshire Hathaway is the second largest utility provider in the United States and a 2025 Reuters investigation found that is the coal fleet is the dirtiest in the nation. There is currently no concrete plans to retire coal and fully transition to

renewable energy. I'm 17 years old. Considering that, what do you have to say to young people like me who will live with the consequences of climate change con by companies like Birkshshire? [Music] [Applause] Thank you for your your your both your question and your comments because it is it is important to to understand uh say Berkshire Hathway Energy but also um how they operate and and maybe using Iowa at least as a starting example because I think that was one of the uh states cited in the report. One of the important things that I'd say

early in us acquiring our energy companies and I go back to when we acquired Mid American. We acquired it in uh 1999. Berkshire purchased uh Mid-Americ in 2000. Well, one thing that became very clear to uh myself and our teams was that what we do within our utilities is really driven in two fronts. one, we absolutely have to meet the requirements and the law that's laid out federally, but most importantly, we had to recognize we implement public policy across these states. And that was an interesting conversation when I go back to to Iowa. And again,

the report cited that as a a significant problem. Um it was early in the 2000s when for the first time in Iowa we were going to as a utility be short of power. So, we didn't have the energy and we entered into a a significant discussion with our governor at the time and and really sat down and said, "Where do you want us to go as uh as Mid-American and what resources do you want as as a state?" And at that time, we were predominantly a coal based state. Um and and we recognized that uh

obviously and and fundamentally personally viewed it as a risk but we we needed to have that conversation with our state and as to how we would manage that going forward. The interesting thing was that um as we had that conversation in uh the early 2000s again with the leadership of our state it was clearly decided we wanted to continue to be long power so i.e not be short for our customers. We discussed the type of resource and I I remember uh a very clear conversation around we wanted to stay balanced across a variety of energy

sources and and at that time it was really coal and natural gas and at that time we made the decision to build the largest uh wind project in the in the US in Iowa. So we undertook an effort to build three resources, a a coal plant, a gas plant, and a uh what was the first uh wind project we owned in Mid-Americ and again it was very consistent with what the state wanted. But we also laid some important groundwork there because we started to define the importance of uh renewable energy, non-carbon resources, but it has

to be consistent with what the state wanted. And we've gone on over the since that period of time um to deploy $16 billion into Iowa associated with renewable energy. Again, very consistent with what our state wanted us to do, i.e. the underlying policy. We don't get to make that decision and just spend 16 billion. Uh it's done in conjunction with our governors, our legislators, our regulators. And at the same time, um we've had the opportunity to retire five of the 10 coal units. Now, as the report highlighted, I I understand people would like those other

five coal units retired at this time, but to think we deployed 16 billion to retire five and and it's a very good outcome for our customers. We've been able to maintain our rates. They're the some of the lowest in the country. So, it's been done very efficiently. But the reality is we still need those five coal units to keep the system stable. Uh we cannot have a Spain Portugal situation. So we absolutely respect the input. We absolutely respect the process and will continue to work with each of our states to identify the path they would

like to chart and we work hard to ensure there's good balanced outcomes because we recognize uh um the challenges they're associated with um others other folks desires. So, I think you'll continue to see our utilities implement policy consistent with uh with the needs of of their stakeholders, their customers, and at the same time always respecting what uh what's required by any any of the federal standards. So, thank you for your for your comments. Okay, 31. Let's see. Becky, uh, this question comes from Billy D. Ross. He writes, "Mr. Buffett, as a nurse from New York

State, I've spent years struggling to secure good health insurance for myself, even while working on the front lines to save lives. In New York, accessing insurance means navigating a confusing state-run system that feels like it's designed to overwhelm. I'm curious what ultimately led to the end of your healthc care venture with JP Morgan and Amazon and given your commitment to value and long-term thinking would you ever consider taking another look at health insurance reform in the US? Yeah, we're we're spending close it's hard to get the precise figure but close to 20% of GDP on

health. And if you go back to 1960, there were a number of countries that were each spending around 5%. And uh then they the lines began to diverge dramatically, but the mathematical uh fact that there are only 100 percentage points in in the equation didn't change. So uh we tried that uh experiment with JP Morgan and Amazon and uh we had three people that didn't think they knew the answer and uh but thought that in my case I use the term that that it was a tapeworm in the economy and We also found out that

uh that the tapeworm was alive in every in every part of the country. I mean the the hospitals liked it. The hospitals had prominent people working with people people generally liked their doctor didn't like the but didn't like the system. I mean all kinds of things but in the end uh JP Morgan and Amazon and Bergkshire were not going to have any effect on changing that 20%. Now that 20% there are only 100 percentage points uh available and one other countries spend six or 7% and perhaps use our system to their advantage which is well

also very true. Uh you know that is an enormous percentage of of an economy and uh we simply it was too entrenched uh to really do much in the way of change. And uh we spent some money on it and we did some work and we learned a good bit about our own systems and we saw the degree to which the present system was ingrained in so many people's you know whether the health care providers whether everybody and these aren't evil people I mean they're just they're just going about something and trying to trying to

save lives. But but uh we found that whether it was in Canada or France or Britain or wherever it might be that if you looked at our costs that they were just far higher and to some extent we were subsidizing the rest of the world and people would come to the United States to do the really unusual or challenging uh aspects health in terms of operations and that sort of thing. uh but we we made no progress and uh uh there comes a point where the government's you know and I mean it's so involved in

the situation and health is so important to most to everybody and uh uh we couldn't we we uh we as I said to uh Jamie and Jeff I said well the tapeworm won and uh uh there are problems of society when you get 20% of your GDP going into a given industry the the degree of enthusiasm for changing that industry the political power that the industry will have and that doesn't mean they're evil it's and And you know everybody they just end up there and uh uh so I don't know the uh I we we

came to the conclusion we didn't know the answer three of us and uh uh we had the money to do it and we didn't know how to change how 330 million people felt about their doctor felt about our healthc care what they felt entitled to and you know and it's uh it it it won't change by itself and uh government is the only one that can change it and the only people in government that can change it are getting majority of 435 people and 100 people and and my dad lost one election in his life

in 1948. 8 and he he he was a very strong Republican and in 1950 he went back and beat the guy that beat him in 1948 and he got the doctors behind him and and uh uh he did very you know they're very well and they believe 100% in what they're doing. They're helping people every day. And during the pandemic, the sacrifices made by people save other people just incredible. Can you imagine working in in something where they're bringing in people that are, you know, going to die by the dozens and dozens and dozens and

you try to somehow keep your own morale up and keep working with them. So, you can't argue about the importance of it. But our costs are so different than any c country in the world that it's a it is just it's a huge element and we're a very rich country. So we can do other we can do things other countries can't do. and through our elected representatives and a whole variety of things over time, we've developed a system that is enormously resistant to any kind of major major change and it's important in every community that

it's in. So, I wish we had an answer for you, but but uh uh I was somewhat pessimistic going in. I was a little more pessimistic when we came out, but I'm I'm glad I'm glad we did what we did and and we learned something about our own failings uh in the process. So, Berkshire in effect got us money's worth, but we didn't kill the tapeworm. Okay. trying to change things in government is it's an interesting proposition in the country because uh uh you get self- selection in terms of the people that go into government

and continue in it and to some extent they keep they have to make decisions that they don't like as they go along and they learn to accept them or or rationalize them or whatever. whatever it may be, but it's still the best, you know, this country's worked out better than any country in the world. So, it uh you you can't argue it was a failure, but you can argue that there is that there are certain problems that are terribly tough to figure out ways to solve. And of course, one of them gets back to the

fiscal problem I mentioned before because it's it's easy to spend money and it's hard to cut people's receipts. And uh and if you get elected, you know, you are going to you're going to say to yourself, well, I can do more good if I stay and then if I really vote my conscience on this sort of thing. So you give away a little bit here and a little bit there and a little bit there and finally you don't recognize yourself in the mirror anymore and and uh that's I grew up in a political family but

but uh and I watched I watched how people behaved and and and they behave like human beings which is what you have to expect and I behave like human beings. Um uh we still manage to keep moving forward in dramatic way. It's so much better to live here than it was 100 years ago or 200 years ago. It's dramatic. So you can't say the system's a failure, but you can say that it is very difficult to make major changes in it. Okay. Station five. Hi Warren Gu. My name is Pig Huang Chen. I'm from Taiwan.

This is my seventh time here. First of all, I want to thank you Warren for your generosity of sharing your wisdom and lesson. You changed my life and you are my role model and my hero. And my question is Warren, you mentioned that Mr. Apple will be in charge of capital allocation near the future. And I'd like to know your perspective on is it easier for business operator to be an investor or for investor to be a business operator? Thank you. No, that's a good question. I see we call him Mr. Apple even. Thank you.

And I'll take it and uh uh it's a lot tougher to be an operator. I mean, it it is it's easier to sit in a room like I do and play around with money. Uh it's just an easier life. Uh that doesn't mean it's a more admirable life. It doesn't but it's been actually been a pleasant life for me. So I I don't complain to the least. and and I and I've I've been able to choose my friends which has made an enormous uh difference in my life. I've never had to work for anybody that

I really didn't admire. I mean that's a luxury in life. had five different people I worked for and uh you know I just they were fantastic whether it was with the manager of the local pennies which is located well it used to be located a couple miles from here and uh newspaper managers everything they have never been really disappointed by any teacher I've had so uh but I would I have to admit that that uh I have been able to choose what I do with my day to an extraordinary degree compared to to be a

business operator and and in many cases uh I wouldn't like to compete to be a top-notch business operator in terms of some of some of the some of the behavior that would might be forced upon me. I I am the master. I mean, I'm I' I've found myself in this position where I can I can run the kind of company I want to run. And and that that that's an extraordinary luxury. And with it with that, I should say that I'm getting a a section that says five minute warning, exclamation point, five minute warning, exclamation

point. So I would now like to turn to a subject that I want to discuss with you a few minutes and then when I'm through discussing this I'll let Becky ask me a question or two which may want you may want some elaborate questions that come to you as I I make these comments. Uh tomorrow we're having a board meeting of Bergkshire and uh we have 11 directors. Two of the directors who are my children uh Howie and Susie know of what I'm going to talk about there. The rest of them this will come as

news to. Uh, but I think it it's uh the time has arrived where Greg should become the chief executive officer of the company at your end. And I want to spring that on the directors effectively and give that as my recommendation. let them have the time to think about what questions or what structures or anything that they want and then the meeting following that uh which will come in a few months uh we'll take action on whatever the view is of the 11 directors uh I I think they'll be unanimously in favor of it And

uh that would mean that at year end Greg would be the chief executive or officer of Bergkshire. And uh um I would still hang around and could conceivably be useful in a few cases. That's good. But the final word would be what Greg said in operations, in capital deployment, whatever it might be. I could be helpful, I believe, in that in certain respects if we ran into periods of great opportunity or anything. Uh I I I think that Ber has a special reputation that when there's times of trouble for the government that we are an

asset and not a liability which is a position that very hard to have because usually the the um the public and and and and government get very negative on on business if there's a time like that. But so I think I could there might be a time when I I'd be hopeful. But Greg would have the tickets and uh uh and he would make like I said whether it's acquisitions. Uh I think the board would be more welcome to giving him more authority on large acquisitions probably if they knew I was around. Uh but Kate

would be the chief executive period and uh like I say the plan is to u and Greg doesn't know anything about this until what he's hearing right now but that uh yeah the uh uh the the board will be able ask me questions tomorrow as to a little more of the specifics of of what they should be thinking and all that. they they'll they'll they'll they'll digest it and then at the next board meeting after that uh if we as I would guess we would if they act then obviously we we have something to announce

to the world as a material change and perure and we'll go forward with that operation and and uh Uh I will play with a Ouija board or whatever and that comes out in terms of doing things but but I will not I have no intention zero of selling one share of Ber halfway get given away gradually It it just won't [Music] Hey, thank you. Hello. I Okay, drink your coke and calm down. I would I would say I would add this the uh the decision to keep every share is an economic decision because I think

the prospects of Bure will be better under Greg's management than than mine and and uh uh but you know I will I will come in and and uh and there may come a time when we get a chance to invest a lot of money and and uh and if that time comes, I think it may be helpful with the board the fact that they know I've got all my money in the in the company and that that I think it's smart and I've seen what Greg has done. So, uh that's the news hook for the

day, fell and thanks for coming. Yeah. Heat. Yeah, the in the the enthusiasm shown by that response could be interpreted in two ways, but I'll take a surprise. Thank you, sir. Yep. Okay. Heat.