Warren Buffett, the Chief Executive of Berkshire Hathaway, said he would resign from that position towards the end of the year.
Mr Buffett, 94, transformed Berkshire Hathaway, once a textile company, into a powerful business investor, who earned billions along the way.
Here is a retrospective of some of the determining moments in his life.
August 30, 1930
The ‘Oracle of Omaha’
In August 1930, Mr. Buffett was born in Omaha from Leila and Howard Buffett, an investment banker and future Republican Congressman.
At the age of 9 he started studying the stock market.
“I used to mapp all kinds of stock, the more figures better, the better,” he said The New York Times Magazine in 1990.
He studied at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Nebraska and Columbia Business School before returning to Omaha.
1959
Meet Charlie T. Munger
In 1959 Mr. Buffett met Charles T. Munger After a doctor in Omaha introduced them to each other. Shortly thereafter they started doing business together and worked together for more than 50 years.
In 2015, Mr Buffett credited Mr. Munger, who became vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway in 1978, with the creation of the structure of the company.
“The blueprint he gave me was simple: forget what you know about buying honest companies at great prices; instead buying great companies at fair prices,” Mr Buffett wrote in a letter that looked back on the first 50 years of the company.
Mr. Munger died in 2023.
1963
Beyond a salad oil sparkling
The share for American Express Company cratered in 1963 after the public had learned tens of millions of dollars In warehouse vouchers for salad oil that did not exist via a warehouse subsidiary. Inspectors were fooled by tubs of water covered with salad oilAnd coupons were forged.
Mr Buffett, who was not well known at the time, saw an opportunity and brought $ 13 million to American Express because it had strong assets in addition to the entities involved in the salad oil scandal.
The purchase is considered one of his first investment successes. Berkshire Hathaway is now The largest shareholder in American Express.
1965
Textile trading for companies
Mr Buffett bought shares in Berkshire Hathaway for the first time, then a textile company, in December 1962. He kept buying shares over the years and formally took control of the company in May 1965, which transformed it into a conglomeraGaatholding.
In the letter to commemorate the 50 -year anniversary of the company, Said Mr Buffett He regretted spending so much money on the Berkshire shares that he had acquired in the early sixties. He closed the textile company in 1985.
1993
A ‘horrible’ blunder
Mr Buffett has been open about his investment errors, and in his 50th birthday letter he called the purchase of Berkshire Hathaway from the Dexter Shoe company in 1993 in 1993 ‘the most horrible’ mistake.
Berkshire Hathaway bought Dexter Shoe, a shoe manufacturer located in Maine, for $ 433 million, and its value quickly dropped to zero.
“As a financial disaster it deserves a place in the Guinness Book of World Records,” he wrote.
Mr. Buffett was one of the world’s richest people when he said in 2006 That he was planning to donate most of his fortune to the Gates Foundation and four other philanthropics.
Four years later, Mr Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates employed other rich Americans to make similar obligations.
Mr. Buffett told the Wall Street Journal in 2024 That the foundation would no longer receive his money after his death. Instead, the money goes to a charity, under the supervision of his daughter and two sons.
May 3, 2025
Buffett leaves
At the annual shareholders’ meeting of Berkshire on SaturdayMr. Buffett announced that he was resigning.
Mr. Buffett said he wanted Gregory E. AbelThe vice-chairman of Berkshire’s non-insurance companies, to take over as Chief Executive towards the end of the year.
Mr Buffett, the largest shareholder in Berkshire with an interest of around 14 percent that is worth around $ 164 billion, remains chairman of the company.