Warren Buffett built Berkshire Hathaway in one of the largest companies in the world. During his annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, in Neb., Companies belonging to Berkshire, whose Marmon, use the image of Buffett to announce their products to its shareholders.
Maria Aspan / NPR
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Maria Aspan / NPR
Omaha, Neb. – Raven Connelly stolen from London. Katherine Schaaf has taken Amtrak de San Francisco. And Bill and Carol Thatcher led several hours of Fort Dodge, Iowa – 26,000 inhabitants.
They were only a few of the tens of thousands of people who went on Omaha last weekend to pay tribute to the billionaire investor Warren Buffett-and, he turned out to be assisted for his retirement announcement on Saturday.
“One of the great pleasures of this business is that people trust you,” said Buffett to his audience delighted during a long Q&R, a few hours before announcing his retirement: “Why (other) works at 90 years, when you have more money than anyone who could count?”
At 94, “the Oracle of Omaha” won this confidence – as well as returns for its shareholders. He is one of the giants of American capitalism, in part to make the “value” of common sense, investing accessible to people outside of Wall Street.
Buffett bought Berkshire Hathaway in 1965, when it was a textile factory in difficulty. Sixty years later, he transformed it into one of the largest companies in the world, operating companies ranging from insurance and railways to Dairy Queen and Duracell batteries. Its success has made buffett, worth $ 162 billion according to Bloomberg, one of the richest people in the world.
He also seems to be one of the most appreciated – at least according to his faithful shareholders. They come from around the world to attend the annual party of Berkshire Hathaway nicknamed Woodstock for the capitalists.
Buffett’s question and answer session, where he answers the shareholders’ questions for hours, is the centerpiece.
“It is spiritual and morally uplifting,” said Rosalyn Trumm d’Omaha, who has witnessed the annual meeting since 1995. “I think it is remarkable to hear Warren talking about what business and society and values should be.”
This kind of devotion is a remarkable achievement today, in particular given the distrust of the generalized public towards many other billionaires. For example, the CEO of Tesla, Elon Musk, has unprecedented political power in the United States as an advisor close to President Trump – and becomes largely unpopular for this.
Buffett “is capitalist, but he is also a responsible citizen and a decent human being”, explains analyst Cathy Seifert, who covers Berkshire for research on ACFR.
“When the general public denigrates the billionaires,” she adds, “I don’t think they denigrate Buffett.”
Buffett is famous humble. He is also very warned of the media
Buffett’s decision to retire as CEO was both surprising and not. He spent years preparing Berkshire for life after him and, in 2021, he publicly appointed Vice-President Greg Abel as his possible successor. In 2023, Buffett also lost its long -standing trading partner and close friend, Charlie Munger, who died at the age of 99.
However, his news has always amazed the crowd on Saturday. It was perhaps supposed: Buffett had answered the shareholders’ questions at that time for almost five hours, while on stage by Abel and his beloved cans of Coca-Cola.
Buffett had started the day with promising shareholders that his 60th annual meeting of Berkshire Hathaway would be “the biggest, and I think it will be the best to date”.
And then, with less than five minutes to play in his promised speaking time, he revealed his news with a development. “The time has come when Greg should become the head of management of the company at the end of the year,” he said-adding later that the news was also a surprise for Abel himself.
Delivery was pure buffett: both informed of the media and relatively human.
The billionaire is famous for its humility, as oxymoronic as it may seem. He has lived in the same five -bedroom house since 1958, and he claims to survive Coke, the candies of See and McDonald’s.
Buffett also spent decades to give his fortune and publicly encourage other billionaires to do the same, in particular with the guarantee of donations, which he started with Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates.
Just this week, Bill Gates said he wanted to “give almost all my wealth” over the next 20 years. He also called buffett “one of my greatest influences … which remains the ultimate model of generosity”.
But Buffett was also very deliberate on marketing itself as a folk Midwesterner. During this gigantic three -day party, he organizes his own honor every year, his hours of television commentary is the main event. It has a close relationship with Business-News Channel CNBC, which has set up an entire pavilion in this year’s exhibition hall to cover the weekend. And it attracts both shareholders and journalists around the world to hang on to each of their words.
So, Buffett was extremely clever both both both with regard to its billionaire intimidation pulpit and the development of its public image. And either he did not give up either, despite his scheduled retirement as CEO: this week, the company said that Buffett would remain president.
When they were asked why they went to Omaha last weekend, several Berkshire shareholders spoke of the contrast between Buffett and the current generation of high level billionaires.
“Even with the money he has, he knows how to give back to the world. And you don’t see that with people like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos,” said Jeff Pollak, a Berkshire shareholder who traveled from Orange County, California, for the weekend.
Around the arena, the reception of the festival, a local shop sold t-shirts, coffee cups and records. Most slogans raised on his products were decidedly progressive, including Trump and Musk criticisms. However, a t-shirt on a prominent exhibition sang that “the most beautiful billionaire lives in Omaha”.
A panel next to the shirts has made the link with another famous billionaire who also works hard to control his own image: “Warren Buffett: The Taylor Swift Of The Stock Market”, he said.
Arthur Jones of the Public Media Nebraska has helped postpone the reports.
