Warren Buffett Made Some Surprising Buys And Sells For Berkshire Hathaway In Q4

Warren Buffett Made Some Surprising Buys And Sells For Berkshire Hathaway In Q4


Warren Buffett bought shares of Kroger(KR) andBiogen(BIIB) in the fourth quarter, but the investing legend further pared his Apple(AAPL) and Wells Fargo(WFC) stakes,Berkshire Hathaway's (BRKB) latest quarterly 13F filings with the SEC showed.

Individual investors use the regulatory data to gauge where the "smart money," including the Oracle of Omaha, is placing its bets. The 13F filings show holdings at the end of each quarter, so big institutions and hedge funds may have made changes to stock positions since then.

Warren Buffett Buys Kroger Stock, Pares Apple Stock
Berkshire Hathaway reduced its stakes in Apple(AAPL) by 3.7 million shares, or a 1% cut; in Wells Fargo(WFC) by 55 million shares, a 14% cut; and in Bank of America(BAC) by more than 2 million shares, a fractional cut.

It leftstakes in other top 10 stocksin its portfolio unchanged. The 13F filings showed Berkshire Hathaway also leftAmazon(AMZN), which it first bought in Q1 2019, unchanged.

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In Q4, the Warren Buffett-run company took new positions in Kroger and Biogen. It bought nearly 19 million shares of Kroger, worth around $549 million, and roughly 649,000 shares of Biogen, worth $192 million.

Berkshire grew its stake inIBD Leaderboardstock RH(RH), formerly Restoration Hardware, by 41%, after first picking up RH stock in Q3. It grewOccidental Petroleum(OXY) by 153%, after also picking up the oil giant in Q3. In 2019, Berkshire Hathaway invested $10 billion in Occidental to help secure funding for its $38 billion acquisition of Anadarko Petroleum.

Buffett began building a stake in Apple after that stock sold off at the start of 2016. Berkshire steadily grew its Apple stake until modest trims in the final two quarters of 2019. In Q3 2019, Berkshire Hathaway had sold shares of both Apple and Wells Fargo.

This Remains The Top Warren Buffett Stock
But Apple stock remains the No. 1 stock in Buffett's portfolio at 29% of assets, as per 13F filings tracked byWhalewisdom.com.

Apple also ranks as one of the best investment decisions Buffett has made in his five decades running Berkshire Hathaway. Berkshire Hathaway is estimated to have paid an average $149.26 per Apple share.

Apple stock closed near 325 on thestock market today. Kroger stock surged 6% in late trade after closing down 1.4%. Biogen stock was not active late.

Meanwhile,top hedge funds boughtAmazon(AMZN) and soldMicrosoft(MSFT) in Q4.

https://www.investors.com/news/warren-buffett-buys-kroger-biogen-sells-apple-q4-2019-13f/

 

Buffet had been holding large amount of cash... saying, "can't find anything worth buying at current valuations".

But at the start of the 4th quarter, Powell started his "Not QE, QE"... and Buffett recognized this as "money pumping again, regardless of what Powell called it".

Mystery solved.

 

Jim Simons, who founded Renaissance Technologies said psychology was useless and instead used math. His signature Medallion Fund average 66% per year since 1988. No one – not even Warren Buffet, George Soros, Peter Lynch, Steve Cohen or Ray Dalio even come close.

 

His net worth is below Buffett though. He had to share a lot of it with the other smart people who helped him. Buffett can make billions by himself just by using his reputation and making phone calls. I think he wins.

 

Buffett cutting exposer to banks and holding cash is the “canary in the coal mine”.

 

It could just mean that he is no longer betting on interest rates to rise.

 

Sure.
Just seems a little less likely than packing sandbags for the coming crash. Then he’ll put that money right back to work finding the value companies that got taken down in the panic.

 

Buffets return is a cagr. Medallions are arithmetic. The fund returns significant amounts of capital to its investors in order to keep its size small. Comparing the two is the institutional equivalent of comparing a successful elitetrader to SAC.

 

you are right: Buffett $88.9BB vs Simons $15.5BB; not sure Buffett works alone; reported 150 work in his investment staff.

 

Don't understand your points. Are you saying if Buffett returns significant amounts of capital to his investors in order to keep his size small, his # would be as good, like when he started investing in his early partnership years?