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WB

Warren Buffett

Chairman and chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway, 1970–2025

United States · b. 1930

Ran Berkshire Hathaway, a diversified holding company, from 1965 until stepping down as chief executive at the end of 2025. He studied under Benjamin Graham at Columbia Business School and has written an annual letter to Berkshire shareholders since the 1970s.

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What is the part of your job that people would be surprised is most of your job?
The extraordinary delegation of authority now existing at Berkshire is the ideal antidote to bureaucracy. In an operating sense, Berkshire is not a giant company but rather a collection of large companies. At headquarters, we have never had a committee nor have we ever required our subsidiaries to submit budgets (though many use them as an important internal tool). We don't have a legal office nor departments that other companies take for granted: human relations, public relations, investor relations, strategy, acquisitions, you name it. We do, of course, have an active audit function; no sense being a damned fool.

Recorded Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholder letter, Berkshire Hathaway Inc., 27 February 2015 source

What are bad recommendations you hear in your profession or area of expertise?
Most investors, of course, have not made the study of business prospects a priority in their lives. If wise, they will conclude that they do not know enough about specific businesses to predict their future earning power. I have good news for these non-professionals: The typical investor doesn't need this skill. ... The goal of the non-professional should not be to pick winners – neither he nor his "helpers" can do that – but should rather be to own a cross-section of businesses that in aggregate are bound to do well. A low-cost S&P 500 index fund will achieve this goal.

Recorded Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholder letter, Berkshire Hathaway Inc., 28 February 2014 source

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