🠈 Berkshire Hathaway 🠊
Berkshire Hathaway
Berkshire Hathaway is the primary investment tool of legendary investor Warren Buffet.
Amusingly, Mr. Buffett bought Berkshire Hathaway in a fit of anger at the management of the firm. Buffett started buying BRK at $7.5 with plans on selling during spikes. The stock rose and Buffett wanted a deal with the CEO in which he would sell his stock at $11 ½. Stanton tried to get Buffett to drop to $11 3⁄8. This made Buffett furious. He then bought the whole company and fired Stanton.
Buffett considered this impulsive buy to be the worst investing mistake of his career.
Apparently, the investment that made Buffett the most money was GEICO (Government Employees Insurance Company). This was an insurance company that was at risk of failing. Buffett bought GEICO on the cheap. GEICO raised rates and Buffett was able to use the massive funds of the insurance company to make billions.
Corporate History
Berkshire Hathaway makes numerous investments each year. In this section. Most of the early investments were partial equity stakes. I will only list investments that seem pivotal or that I encounter in other research.
- 1839: Oliver Chace established the Valley Falls Company in Valley Falls, Rhode Island to manufacture textiles.
- :1929: Valley Falls Company merged with Berkshire Cotton Manufacturing Company to create Berkshire Fine Spinning Associates
- 1889: Berkshire was established in Adams, Massachusetts.
- 1955: Berkshire merged with Hathaway Manufacturing Company of New Bedford, Massachusetts
- 1888: Horatio Hathaway established Hathaway with money gained from whaling and the China Trade.
- 1962: Warren Buffet began buying BRK at $7.50 hoping to sell on spikes as it closed mills.
- 1964: Buffett had a spat with Berkshire CEO Seabury Stanton over of 1/8 point difference in a sale price. Buffett then bought Berkshire and fired Stanton.
- 1967: Berkshire acquired National Indemnity Company based in Omaha, Ne.
- 1968: Berkshire acquired Sun Newspapers based in Omaha.
- 1969: Berkshire acquired Illinois National Bank & Trust Company of Rockford, Il.
- 1970: Berkshire bought controlling interests in Blue Chip Stamps
History of Blue Chips Co
Blue Chips issued incentive stamps.
- 1956: Chevron, Thrifty Drugs and several California based grocery stores formed Blue Stamps to compete against S&H Stamps.
- 1963: and again in 1967: Blue stamps was sued on Antitrust grounds.
- 1972: Blue Chip gained controlling interest in See's Candy Shops.
- 197?: Blue Chip bought 80.1% controlling interest in Wesco Financial Corporation.
- 197?: The insurance company GEICO was in trouble during th 1973-74 recession and Buffett began investing in the firm
History of GEICO
- 1936: Leo his wife Lillian Goodwin of Forth Worth, Tx built a business to sell insurance directly to federal government employees with the brand Goverment Employee Insurance COmpany with the acronymn GEICO.
- 1937: GEICO relocated to Washington DC to be closer to the center of power.
- 1974: GEICO had a $126 million loss during the recession of 1973-74 and the company was in trouble. As this was insurance for Federal Workers there was a big push to save the firm which is when Buffett moved in.
- 1975: John J. Byrne became the head of GEICO.
- 1996: GEICO became a wholly owned subsidiary of Berkshire.
- 1985: Berkshire sold off the last of the mills built by Berkshire Hathaway.
- 1995: Berkshire acquired RC Willey Home Furnishings based in Salt Lake City.
- 1999: John Byrne and his son Patrick purchased Overstock.com.
- 2000: Berkshire acquired CORT Furniture Rental
- 2008: Berkshire arranged Mars Incorporated's $23 billion purchase of Wrigley.
- 2009: Investors at Salida Capital paid $1.68 million in an eBay auction to have a lunch with Warren Buffet.
- 2005: Berkshire Partners and Weston Presidio acquire Party City for $360M to create a merger between Party City and Amscan.
- 2011: Berkshire began investing in the health care company DaVita Inc. and is now the largest stockholder.
- 2017: Berkshire began the acquisition of Pilot Flying J..
References:
- Wikipedia - Berkshire Hathaway (Drawn 9/2/2019)
- Funding Universe - Berkshire Hathaway (Drawn 9/2/2019)