Berkshire Hathaway Inc. significantly reduced its stake in Apple Inc. by almost 50% as part of a massive second-quarter selling spree that boosted Warren Buffett’s cash pile to a record $276.9 billion. Berkshire sold $75.5 billion worth of stock on a net basis, with operating earnings rising to $11.6 billion.
Warren Buffett was unloading shares as the S&P 500 index rallied and set a record high in mid-July, but has since declined due to concerns about artificial intelligence euphoria. Weak labor data also underscored the risk of an economic downturn, causing the S&P 500 to dip 1.8%.
Berkshire has been paring its Bank of America Corp. stake by 8.8% since mid-July and has struggled to find ways to deploy its cash as share prices soared and deal activity stagnated.
Warren Buffett said he wasn’t in a rush to spend the cash “unless we think we’re doing something that has very little risk and can make us a lot of money.” Berkshire repurchased about $345 million of its own shares during the quarter, the least since 2018.
Since Berkshire first disclosed its Apple stake in 2016, Warren Buffett has accumulated a massive paper profit by riding the gains. His roughly 400 million shares of Apple were valued at $84.2 billion at the end of June.
Apple reported that sales to China fell 6.5% to $14.7 billion in the third quarter, missing projections from Wall Street. The results rekindled fears that Apple is losing ground in one of its most important overseas markets due to competition and government regulations.
Source: https://fortune.com/2024/08/03/warren-buffett-berkshire-hathaway-q2-earnings-report-stock-sales-apple-stake/