Of Permanent Value:The Story of Warren Buffett/2020 Elephant Edition (English, Spanish, French, Italian, German, Japanese, Russian, Ukrainian, ... ... and Gujarati and Bengali and Korean Edition) - Hardcover
Synopsis
Although Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway began life as a textile firm that eventually went under, Berkshire today has a stake in Apple stock worth more than $70 billion, largely because Apple soared 90% in 2019. That size stake is called "an elephant," the kind of big investment that Buffett wants to bag. Apple is not the only large animal in the Berkshire portfolio. Among other jumbo-size investments are National Indemnity, the largest property/casualty company in the world. Plus, ownership of the GEICO car insurance firm has boosted Berkshire's intrinsic value by about $50 billion. A big energy business has swung billions to Buffett's company. Another elephant wandering in the Berkshire forest is more than $200 billion in stocks with some $80 billion in bank stocks, namely in Bank of America, Wells Fargo and JP Morgan -- all buying back stock and raising dividends. On top of that, there's a pile of more than $100 billion in cash and more than $100 billion of "float" from insurance premiums. From its many businesses, more than $100 million arrives at Berkshire's doorstep every working day. Buffett won financial control of Berkshire on May 10, 1965, long before its slow demise by 1985. The business was cheap and became cheaper. By extension in the early days, Berkshire acquired two more failing companies -- the retailer Hothschild Kohn in Baltimore and a trading stamp business, Blue Chip, in California. So, in its early going, Berkshire was running not one, not two, but three doomed businesses. Not a promising start. Before the textile business vanished, Buffett and Charles Munger shifted directions and moved what little money was left to new endeavors, essentially into stocks and insurance. Now Berkshire is one of the world's largest companies. This new, fully revised book has more than 20 stories about Berkshire shareholders among its 322 nugget size chapters. One is about the family of Bill Ruane, an important early friend of Buffett's. Spliced throughout the book are 2400 photos, most of which are in living color.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author
Andrew Kilpatrick is a 1965 graduate of Washington and Lee University. He served in the Peace Corps in India for two years, earned a master's degree in English from the University of Vermont, and was a U.S. Navy officer for three years. His 20-year career in newspapers in Birmingham, Alabama, included eight years as a business reporter. From 1993 until he retired in 2010, he was a stockbroker with Wells Fargo in Birmingham. Since then he has continued to write and write -- and collect photos.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.