Buffett stings hedge funds anew in annual letter

Berkshire’s net worth grew $27.5 billion, or 10.7%, in 2016 to $172,108 per Class A equivalent share, according to the Omaha, Neb. -based firm’s annual shareholder letter released Saturday. Aggregate underwriting profits increased this past year to $2.1 billion from $1.8 billion.

In fact, Buffett told CNBC’s Becky Quick that his company more than doubled its Apple position since December 31, to a massive 133 million shares.

“Ajit has created tens of billions of value for Berkshire shareholders”, Buffett wrote. That makes Buffett, who for most of his career has shunned tech stocks, Apple’s fifth largest outside investor, and probably its most active. The deal created a new company, Kraft Heinz, listed on the New York Stock Exchange and Berkshire again played financier.

Buffett has always been bullish on prospects for businesses in the U.S. and few have benefited more than he from the nation’s economic prosperity, Bloomberg said. Berkshire previously bought shares in Q3 and Q4, when Apple was hit by fears of slowing smartphone sales.

“Charlie and I have no magic plan to add earnings except to dream big and to be prepared mentally to act fast when opportunities present themselves”, he said.

The 2016 letter details growth in the company’s relatively new excess and surplus lines unit, again argues that its reinsurance operations are well-positioned even if a major catastrophe were to strike, but also expresses some regret over the dilution in Berkshire Hathaway stock following its purchase of General Reinsurance Corp. almost 20 years ago.

But back in 2008, Buffett used his letter to label airlines as the worst kind of business because they grow rapidly and require significant investments to grow but earn little.

Profit at BNSF, Berkshire’s largest purchase before Precision Castparts, fell 8 percent to $993 million.

“If they can get to the Sweet 16, if there’s only one of them, whoever it is, he or she gets a million dollars a year for the rest of their life”, Warren Buffett said Monday on CNBC. “That’s up from 2.5% in 1995, the year Berkshire acquired control of Geico”.

Mr. Buffett talked about share repurchases at length, although he seemed to not say anything on the topic that would revise his past statements.

BRKa closed Friday’s trading session at $255,040.00. And with the market at record highs and lots of political uncertainty, many investors are on edge.

The shares outperformed the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index including dividends by 11.4 percentage points in 2016, after lagging by 13.9 percentage points in 2015.