Warren Buffett

Charlie Munger, Berkshire's Vice Chairman, and I have set a goal of attaining a 15% average annual increase in Berkshire's intrinsic value. If our…

Our outsized gain in book value in 1991 resulted from a phenomenon not apt to be repeated: a dramatic rise in the price- earnings ratios of Coca-Cola…

Coca-Cola and Gillette are two of the best companies in the world and we expect their earnings to grow at hefty rates in the years ahead. Over time,…

During the year, Berkshire's net worth increased by $1.52 billion. More than 98% of this gain came from earnings and appreciation of portfolio…

Those two objectives do not necessarily go hand-in-hand as an amusing but value-destroying experience in our past illustrates. On that occasion, we…

You will remember that our goal is to increase our per-share intrinsic value - for which our book value is a conservative, but useful, proxy - at a…

You should keep at least three points in mind as you evaluate this data. The first point concerns the many businesses we operate whose annual…

1. The first negative was produced by a change in Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) having to do with the taxes we accrue against…

3. Another 1993 change in GAAP affects the value at which we carry the securities that we own. In recent years, both the common stocks and certain…

4. Finally, we issued some stock last year. In a transaction described in last year's Annual Report, we issued 3,944 shares in early January, 1993…

Of course, it's per-share intrinsic value, not book value, that counts. Book value is an accounting term that measures the capital, including…

The problem is not that what has worked in the past will cease to work in the future. To the contrary, we believe that our formula - the purchase…

A fat wallet, however, is the enemy of superior investment results. And Berkshire now has a net worth of $11.9 billion compared to about $22…

We will continue to ignore political and economic forecasts, which are an expensive distraction for many investors and businessmen. Thirty years ago,…

But, surprise - none of these blockbuster events made the slightest dent in Ben Graham's investment principles. Nor did they render unsound the…

Our gain in net worth during 1995 was $5.3 billion, or 45.0%. Per-share book value grew by a little less, 43.1%, because we paid stock for two…

Even so, we do have a few advantages, perhaps the greatest being that we don't have a strategic plan. Thus we feel no need to proceed in an…

In making acquisitions, we have a further advantage: As payment, we can offer sellers a stock backed by an extraordinary collection of outstanding…

Concluding this little dissertation on acquisitions, I can't resist repeating a tale told me last year by a corporate executive. The business he grew…

Our gain in net worth during 1996 was $6.2 billion, or 36.1%. Per- share book value, however, grew by less, 31.8%, because the number of Berkshire…

The restatement was required because GEICO became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Berkshire on January 2, 1996, whereas it was previously classified…

I dwell on this rise in per-share book value because it roughly indicates our economic progress during the year. But, as Charlie Munger,…

For many years, we have listed these principles in the front of our annual report, but in this report, on pages 58 to 67, we reproduce the entire…

Given our gain of 34.1%, it is tempting to declare victory and move on. But last year's performance was no great triumph: Any investor can chalk up…

Gains in book value are, of course, not the bottom line at Berkshire. What truly counts are gains in per-share intrinsic business value. Ordinarily,…

For more explanation of the term, intrinsic value, you may wish to refer to our Owner's Manual, reprinted on pages 62 to 71. This manual sets forth…

In our last two annual reports, we furnished you a table that Charlie and I believe is central to estimating Berkshire's intrinsic value. In the…

It’s per-share intrinsic value that counts, however, not book value. Here, the news is good: Between 1964 and 2004, Berkshire morphed from a…

Despite their shortcomings, yearly calculations of book value are useful at Berkshire as a slightly understated gauge for measuring the long-term…

However the yearly comparisons work out, Berkshire’s long-term performance versus the S&P remains all-important. Our shareholders can buy the S&P…

Last year, Berkshire’s book-value gain of 10.5% fell short of the index’s 10.9% return. Our lackluster performance was not due to any stumbles by the…

Yet if precision is aided by Berkshire’s financial characteristics, the job of calculating intrinsic value has been made more complex by the mere…

We have attempted to ease this problem by clustering our businesses into four logical groups, each of which we discuss later in this report. In these…

Before we look at our individual businesses, however, let’s review two sets of figures that show where we’ve come from and where we are now. The…

In addition to these marketable securities, which with minor exceptions are held in our insurance companies, we own a wide variety of non-insurance…

We believe that $16.9 billion is a record for a one-year gain in net worth – more than has ever been booked by any American business, leaving aside…

Charlie and I measure Berkshire’s progress and evaluate its intrinsic value in a number of ways. No single criterion is effective in doing these jobs…

In our early years we put most of our retained earnings and insurance float into investments in marketable securities. Because of this emphasis,…

Over the years, however, we have focused more and more on the acquisition of operating businesses. Using our funds for these purchases has both…

That party is over. It’s a certainty that insurance-industry profit margins, including ours, will fall significantly in 2008. Prices are down, and…

Berkshire has two major areas of value. The first is our investments: stocks, bonds and cash equivalents. At yearend these totaled $141 billion…

Insurance float – money we temporarily hold in our insurance operations that does not belong to us – funds $59 billion of our investments. This float…

Berkshire’s second component of value is earnings that come from sources other than investments and insurance. These earnings are delivered by our 66…

The table on the preceding page, recording both the 44-year performance of Berkshire’s book value and the S&P 500 index, shows that 2008 was the…

By the fourth quarter, the credit crisis, coupled with tumbling home and stock prices, had produced a paralyzing fear that engulfed the country. A…

Take a look again at the 44-year table on page 2. In 75% of those years, the S&P stocks recorded a gain. I would guess that a roughly similar…

Most of the Berkshire businesses whose results are significantly affected by the economy earned below their potential last year, and that will be…

A more difficult decision for us was how to measure the progress of Berkshire versus the S&P. There are good arguments for simply using the change in…

We should note that had we instead chosen market prices as our yardstick, Berkshire’s results would look better, showing a gain since the start of…

Summed up, the table on page 2 conveys three messages, two positive and one hugely negative. First, we have never had any five-year period…

Just because Charlie and I can clearly see dramatic growth ahead for an industry does not mean we can judge what its profit margins and returns on…

A “normal year,” of course, is not something that either Charlie Munger, Vice Chairman of Berkshire and my partner, or I can define with anything…

Over time, the movement of goods in the United States will increase, and BNSF should get its full share of the gain. The railroad will need to invest…

Last year – in the face of widespread pessimism about our economy – we demonstrated our enthusiasm for capital investment at Berkshire by spending $6…

In Berkshire’s case, we long ago told you that our job is to increase per-share intrinsic value at a rate greater than the increase (including…

Your Board is equally enthusiastic about my successor as CEO, an individual to whom they have had a great deal of exposure and whose managerial and…

• Our major businesses did well last year. In fact, each of our five largest non-insurance companies – BNSF, Iscar, Lubrizol, Marmon Group and…

• In total, our entire string of operating companies spent $8.2 billion for property, plant and equipment in 2011, smashing our previous record by…

• Our insurance operations continued their delivery of costless capital that funds a myriad of other opportunities. This business produces “float” –…

But subpar it was. For the ninth time in 48 years, Berkshire’s percentage increase in book value was less than the S&P’s percentage gain (a…