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Warren Buffett’s new annual letter to shareholders is out. This is a far different read than a year ago. Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-B, BRK-A) said its annual shareholder value rose by 19.8%, a figure which would be great most years but was short of the return of the S&P 500 Index. Book value per share rose to $84,487.00… yet the stock ended at $99,200.00 on December 31, 2009. The large premium was in part due to the pending mega-merger of Burlington Northern Santa Fe.
The good news here is that Warren Buffett is less cautious than in the past and is far less pessimistic and depressed compared to how he sounded a year ago. Buffett claims to have added at least 650,000 shareholders to the 500,000 or so already on Berkshire’s books. What is going to be different here is that Buffett is appealing to the new shareholders to understand what the company is and what it is not by directing holders to its principles…. Buffett notes, “Berkshire has adhered to these principles for decades and will continue to do so long after I’m gone.”
And there are many more zingers and explanations throughout, along with constant references to Charlie Munger.
Nortel Networks Corp. (NRTLQ) is just about wound down in its bankruptcy. The company’s operations have effectively all been sold off, at extreme discounts. In this bankruptcy there is one last sale or group of sales still remaining. Nortel’s vast patent portfolio is the last piece of the puzzle. The ultimate value of the patents remains up for debate, but there are more than 3,000 patents and some feel the value may be around $1 billion.
We already gave a full run-down position by position in the Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-B, BRK-A) holdings as of December 31, 2009. What is interesting is that this round of 
This is the list of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A)(BRK-B) public equity holdings as of December 31, 2009…. so these are his positions going into 2010. We have broken these into 3 groups for ease and these are the holdings listed in the group of ‘R to Z.’
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-B, BRK-A) has just filed its year-end holdings for 2009, so these are Warren Buffett’s most recent holdings going into 2010. We have already seen some holdings get trimmed even since that cut-off date. We broke these holdings out into 3 groups of ‘A to F’ and ‘G to P’ and ‘R to Z’ so it is more concise and clear. Here are Warren Buffett’s holdings and accompanying notes for the group ‘G to P’ and we included some non-equity positions here which Buffett holds large stakes in.
Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-B, BRK-A) has shown its holdings as of the close of business for December 31, 2009, so that being said these are Warren Buffett’s most recent holdings going into 2010. We have already seen how some holdings have been trimmed, and some of these holdings will have been further cut even since the end of the year. These have been broken down into 3 groups of ‘A to F’ and ‘G to P’ and ‘R to Z’ so it is more concise and clear. Here are Warren Buffett’s holdings and accompanying notes for the group ‘A ot F.’
A war is beginning to take place over Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS). Ron Burkle, a well-known activist investor who heads various activist investor funds under the name Yucaipa, is trying to go after the Riggio family for control of the troubled Barnes & Noble book store chain. An SEC filing from Yucaipa shows that the beneficial ownership of Barnes & Nobel common stock held by Barnes & Noble is now 10,741,213 shares of common stock. This comes to labout 18.7% of the common stock. And Burkle wants more stock and more from the company….
When was the last time that Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) (NYSE: BRK-B) was one of the more unusual volume movers? It is today, and you’d have to ask yourself when the last time a split had come out for that answer. Today is a first, virtually anyhow. The A-shares are still above the $100,000.00 per share level. But the B-shares are now trading ex-split to reflect the 50-for-1 stock split and down in the $70’s to aid in the game-changing Burlington Northern Santa Fe (NYSE: BNI) buyout.
It seems that every investor cares about initial public offerings. And everyone still seems to care about what T. Boone Pickens thinks about the price of oil and what his views are on fixing the US dependence upon on foreign oil. It turns out that T. Boone Pickens actually has an IPO of an energy fund. This one is called the T. Boone Pickens Energy Fund. The fund might not be the easiest for access by American investors as this is being launched in Canada. This is on the heels of Pickens calling for $90 oil this week.
Cablevision Systems Corporation (NYSE: CVC) has approved the spin off of Madison Square Garden to Cablevision shareholders. Madison Square Garden is the home venue of the New York Knicks and Rangers, but is also home to concerts, boxing events, tennis, and other events. You have to be a holder of Cablevision to receive the shares, at least that is the case before the regular trading takes place. Cablevision said tonight that the share distribution will take place on February 9, 2010, and that distribution will be made to Cablevision’s shareholders of record as of the close of business on January 25, 2010 (i.e. settlement date on or before).
There are many companies that deserved to be on this weekend’s slate of unusual suspects that have key current developments to watch in this coming week. Some are unusual trading activity, some are earnings related, and some are event related. This week’s unusual suspects are Alcoa, Inc. (NYSE: AA), Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC), J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM), Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A), Cyclacel Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: CYCC), Genzyme Corp. (NASDAQ: GENZ), Immunomedics Inc. (NASDAQ: IMMU), MannKind Corp. (NASDAQ: MNKD), QUALCOMM Inc. (NASDAQ: QCOM), and Stillwater Mining Co. (NYSE: SWC).
Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) has made one of its more unusual press releases. The company said that it has voted “no” on Kraft’s proposal to authorize the issuance of up to 370 million shares to facilitate the acquisition of Cadbury. This is on the heels of Kraft Foods Inc. (NYSE: KFT) paying more to acquire Cadbury plc (NYSE: CBY).
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) is still unloading more Moody’s Corp. (NYSE: MCO) stock. A filing from last night shows that another 87,992 shares were sold at a weighted average price of $26.77 on December 18, 2009. This is a fraction of what has been sold before and was a mere $2.35 million worth of stock, and Buffett still holds some 31,814,610 shares of the independent ratings agency.
It wasn’t that long ago that we gave a list of stocks that Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) needed to dump to help pay for its Burlington Northern Santa Fe (NYSE: BNI) acquisition. Moody’s Corp. (NYSE: MCO) was one of those stocks. He had already lightened up some since, and on Monday evening came a filing at the SEC confirming that Buffett was dumping more stock.
The hedge fund industry is back to having assets worth more than $2 trillion in November, according to Hedgefund.net. The gain of 3.39% came to $2.037 trillion for the hedge fund sector, making this the first time that hedge funds have tallied a $2 trillion handle since November 2008. Of the gains, $26.3 billion was in new capital commitments and $40.5 billion of the gains came from higher values in assets and investments. This also marked the seventh consecutive month of increasing assets.
You might think that companies tend to repurchase fewer and fewer shares in their share buyback plans when shares rise and rise. When you compare the moves from the March 9 close, the price moves seem astronomical. Yet many shares are still under or close to where they were a year ago, and this seems to be keeping the flow of stock buyback announcements steady. We have tracked the major buyback announcements seen in November, and some are mere updates on what was reported along with the earnings reports seen this month.
We recently discussed the changes that have taken place inside Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) as Warren Buffett has gone higher up the food chain. In his 
This was an important week for investment guru and billionaire watchers to see which gurus were holding which stocks. The 
A broker noted something about this yesterday as a gold bug, and frankly it seemed far-fetched considering the size of the move we have already seen in recent weeks and months. But the talk was about John Paulson, the great bank and financial short seller who cleaned up betting against housing and financials, opening a gold fund. We noticed he held some miners, but after the chase up in gold bullion prices this seemed and still seems late to the party even if there is room to run. Today’s 
This is the list of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A)(BRK-B) public US equity holdings as of September 30, 2009. As noted in the “A to F” and “G to O” lists, there have been changes since the cut off date and those have been noted where applicable. Here are Warren Buffett’s holdings and accompanying notes for the group ‘P to Z.’
