Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway sold nearly half its stake in Apple
Warren Buffett speaks during the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholders Meeting in Omaha, Nebraska on May 4, 2024.
CNBC
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway dumped nearly half of its gigantic Apple stake in a surprising move.
The Omaha-based conglomerate disclosed that its holding in the iPhone maker was valued at $84.2 billion at the end of the second quarter, indicating that the Oracle of Omaha offloaded 49.4% of the tech bet.
Buffett trimmed the Apple stake by 13% in the first quarter and hinted at the Berkshire annual meeting in May that it was for tax reasons. Buffett noted that selling ‘a little Apple’ this year would benefit Berkshire shareholders in the long run if the tax on capital gains is raised down the road by a U.S. government wanting to plug a climbing fiscal deficit.
But the magnitude of this selling suggests it could be more than just a tax-saving move.
Berkshire began buying Apple’s stock in 2016 under the influence of Buffett’s investing lieutenants Ted Weschler and Todd Combs. Over the years, Buffett grew so fond of Apple that he increased the stake drastically to make it Berkshire’s biggest and called the tech giant the second-most important business after his cluster of insurers.
Apple is still Berkshire’s biggest holding after the sale for the last two quarters.
The conglomerate’s Apple holding once became so big that it took up half of Berkshire’s equity portfolio.
Shares of Apple jumped nearly 23% in the second quarter.
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