Warren Buffett Says Berkshire's Apple Investment Shows The 'Power Of Repurchases'
Berkshire Hathaway Inc (NYSE: BRK-A) (NYSE: BRK-B) CEO Warren Buffett over the weekend wrote his annual letter to shareholders and highlighted the “power of repurchases” using Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) as an example. What Happened: Buffett said that Berkshire began buying shares of the iPhone maker in late 2016 and by early June 2018 owned more than one billion shares (adjusted for splits). “Saying that, I’m referencing the investment held in Berkshire’s general account and am excluding a very small and separately-managed holding of Apple shares that was subsequently sold. When we finished our purchases in mid-2018, Berkshire’s general account owned 5.2% of Apple,” wrote the veteran investor. The cost for acquiring that stake was $36 billion and since then Berkshire has enjoyed regular dividends averaging about $775 million annually and has pocketed an extra $11 billion in 2020 by selling a small part of its holdings. The company repurchased .3 billion worth of stock in the period. Since Berkshire also repurchased its own shares during the past two and a half years, its shareholders now own a full 10% more of Apple’s assets and future earnings than they did in July 2018, wrote Buffett.
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