00:00Warren Buffett announcing he is stepping down as chairman of Berkshire Hathaway.
00:03He becomes chairman emeritus, effective immediately.
00:06We're made on the company's board of directors.
00:08His eldest son, Howard Buffett, taking over as chairman for Bloomberg U.S. Insurance.
00:12For Alex Rajmundari joins us now here on set in New York.
00:16Bit of a surprise announced in classic Berkshire fashion.
00:19We get the release and then a note from the man himself.
00:22Right.
00:23It's a bit of a surprise, but at the same time, it's kind of been telegraphed a little.
00:27You know, he stepped down as CEO a year ago.
00:29He was chairman.
00:30He was involved in the day-to-day business with Greg Abel, but eventually he didn't appear at the annual
00:35meeting in May.
00:36Greg Abel was actually the one handling the reins of, you know, the company.
00:40So it's been long in the making.
00:43It's still a surprise, but this is not something that investors do not think of.
00:46We look at this as a process, this leadership transition.
00:49I look at the note that Warren Buffett had this morning.
00:51He's 96 years old, so again, to the point of surprise, he's a non-agenarian.
00:55Perhaps not a surprise in that way.
00:56But he says, my expectations for Greg Abel were sky high from the start, and he has exceeded them.
01:01Just give us the broader context here about how this transition has been going.
01:05As you mentioned, Warren Buffett not at that annual meeting.
01:07Greg Abel was there.
01:09The reviews are in.
01:10How was it?
01:11Investors were really convinced by Greg Abel.
01:13I mean, it was a very exhaustive business review of all of Berkshire.
01:17They got a lot of details that were not shared with investors before.
01:21It still is a change, you know, because the presence of Warren Buffett on stage was, you know, unparalleled.
01:28And this is something that will not exist for Berkshire Hathaway anymore.
01:32But, you know, Greg Abel has been making some changes.
01:34He resumed some buybacks, which is good news for investors.
01:37He did do some multi-billion deals, back-to-back deals, over the first part of the year,
01:42which is something that had not happened over the past years under Buffett.
01:45He kind of shied away from market valuations that he seemed to be deemed too high.
01:50So there are a few changes.
01:51But, again, it's more of the same.
01:53And that's the whole point of that very smooth transition is to ensure continuity.
01:58Very quickly here, Alex, introduce us to Howard, his son.
02:00As Warren points out, he's had a lot of on-the-job training.
02:03He's been on the board for a while.
02:04He's been on the board since 1993.
02:06He's been on boards of several other companies.
02:09He does run his own charity, one of the, you know, Buffett Kids charity,
02:14that have to deploy the $140 billion of net worth that he has now.
02:20So this is going to be, you know, his main job now.
02:24He will be in tandem with Greg Abel.
02:27He will be the guardian of the values of the company,
02:29which Warren Buffett said this morning in his letter
02:32that we're more than anything, more than anything on his balance sheet.
02:36So we'll see how it plays out.
Comments