The Oracle of Omaha is adding to his already large stake in Apple Inc.
Warren Buffett, 88, likes the technology giant because of its devoted customers, and has built up his stake in the company by “just a little” since his last regulatory filing, he said Aug. 30 in an interview with CNBC. The Berkshire Hathaway Inc. chairman and chief executive officer said his company also bought back some of its own stock recently, without saying how much.
“They’ve got to keep having the product that this huge clientele regards as indispensable,” Buffett said of Apple. For customers, “the iPhone is enormously underpriced” compared with the utility it offers, he said.
Berkshire has been piling more money into Apple, increasing that stake to 252 million shares, as of June 30. The investment is worth more than $50 billion and makes Berkshire the third-biggest shareholder in Cupertino, California-based Apple, with a more than 5 percent stake, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Buffett has expanded his company into a conglomerate with a $520 billion market cap and footholds in the railroad business, insurance industry and energy sector. With the help of deputies Todd Combs and Ted Weschler, the billionaire investor also oversees a $180 billion stock portfolio that includes a stake in Wells Fargo & Co.
Earlier this year, Buffett teamed up with JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s Jamie Dimon and Amazon.com Inc.’s Jeff Bezos to create a venture that’s aiming to change how health care is provided to the three companies’ employees. In June, the group named Atul Gawande to lead the initiative, which will be based in Boston. While exact details on the venture are scant, Buffett has previously said that the goal is to go beyond just squeezing middlemen and actually lower costs and deliver better care.
Gawande is in the process of adding staff now.
“He’s hiring people,” Buffett said in a subsequent interview with Bloomberg Television on Aug. 30. “Not very many people, but he will be hiring people.”
The initiative won’t succeed if it’s just a cost-cutting measure, Buffett said. “We’d like to be in a hurry but we’re not going to try and do something faster than it can be done,” he said.
Buffett was in New York on Aug. 30 to dine with the winner of his annual lunch auction, which benefits the San Francisco-based charity Glide. The winner paid $3.3 million for the opportunity to bring guests to eat with Buffett at the Smith & Wollensky steak house in Manhattan.
Friends Read Free