While nowhere near as tumultuous as the transformational first quarter in Berkshire's post-Warren Buffett era which saw over a dozen names rotated in and out, in the second quarter there were a few notable changes under Berkshire's new CEO, Greg Abel.
In a quarter in which Abel spent a net $20 billion on other equities, and repurchased about $4.5 billion of its own stock, leaving it with $365.5 billion of cash at midyear, down from a record $397 billion at the end of March, Berkshire added to its holdings in Alphabet and Delta Air Lines as Greg Abel began tapping into the company’s massive cash hoard.
After years of relatively subdued deal activity under Buffett, who often bemoaned lofty market valuations, Abel oversaw back-to-back multibillion-dollar transactions in the period.
He spent $6.8 billion to buy homebuilder Taylor Morrison Home, a typical value bet, while also handing $10 billion to Alphabet to support its investments related to artificial intelligence as part of the company's unprecedented ATM offering; the deal represented a new area for the conglomerate which had historically stayed away from most tech names. Here are the other transactions disclosed changes in the Berkshire 13F:
New positions:
- D R Horton (DHI), a tiny new stake worth $580K as of June 30
Raises:
- Alphabet (GOOGL) 48.1MM shares added, or $21.1BN, to $37.8BN as of June 30, making it Berkshire's 3rd largest holding,
- Delta Air Lines (DAL), 17.5MM shares added, or $2.7BN, to $5.4BN
- Lennar (LEN), 3.1MM shares added, to $315.9MM, to $1.2BN
- New York Times (NYT), 553K shares added, or $$169.5MM, to $1.1BN
- Macy's (M), 4.3MM shares added, or $118MMM, to $173.0MM
Cuts:
- Ba
