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The End of an Era at Berkshire Hathaway

Warren Buffett has formally handed over the CEO role at Berkshire Hathaway to Greg Abel, closing one of the most extraordinary leadership tenures in modern financial history. After more than six decades at the helm, Buffett leaves behind not just a company, but an investing blueprint that many studied and few ever came close to replicating.

Buffett will remain chairman, but he has made clear that his public presence will diminish. For investors, the transition marks a psychological turning point as much as a managerial one. Berkshire is still Berkshire, but the voice that defined it for generations is stepping back.

Numbers That Redefined What Long-Term Investing Means

When Buffett took control of Berkshire in the mid-1960s, the company was a struggling textile manufacturer. Its shares traded at roughly $19. By the end of 2025, a single Class A share exceeded $750,000.

From 1964 through 2024, Berkshire delivered a compound annual growth rate of 19.9%, nearly double the S&P 500’s 10.4% over the same period. The cumulative result was a gain of more than 5.5 million percent, one of the most extreme wealth-creation records ever achieved in public markets. Berkshire added another approximately 10% in 2025, further extending the gap.

Few investors in history have sustained outperformance across inflation cycles, recessions, bubbles, and regime shifts in markets. Buffett did it while managing ever-growing amounts of capital, a challenge that typically compresses returns.

A Simple Formula Executed at an Unmatched Scale

Berkshire’s success was built on principles that sounded almost too simple:
use insurance float as low-cost capital,
buy businesses with durable cash flows,
avoid leverage,
and let time and compounding do the heavy lifting.

That discipline produced long-term holdings in companies such as Coca-Cola and American Express, while Berkshire expanded into wholly owned businesses including BNSF Railway, regulated utilities, manufacturing, energy, and consumer brands. The diversification provided stability, while centralized capital allocation in Omaha allowed Buffett to deploy cash opportunistically during crises.

Investors often overlook how rare the full equation was. The partnership with Charlie Munger, the patience to wait years between major deals, and the emotional discipline to buy aggressively when others were fearful formed a combination that market professionals widely view as unrepeatable.

What Leaves With Buffett

As Buffett steps back, investors are increasingly focused on what disappears with him.

His annual shareholder letters, written since 1965, became required reading for anyone serious about markets. Plainspoken, candid, and often humorous, they shaped how generations of investors think about risk, valuation, and human behavior. Going forward, those letters will be written by Greg Abel, with Buffett continuing only a shorter Thanksgiving message.

Equally influential was Berkshire’s annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, frequently called the “Woodstock for Capitalists.” Tens of thousands of attendees gathered each year for hours of unscripted Q&A, reinforcing Buffett’s role as a steady interpreter of markets during times of fear and excess.

Buffett also rejected much of Wall Street’s playbook. Berkshire never split its stock, avoided earnings guidance, discouraged short-term trading, and granted operating managers wide autonomy while keeping capital allocation tightly controlled.

The Balance Sheet Tells Its Own Story

At the end of September, Berkshire held $381.6 billion in cash, the largest reserve in its history. The hoard reflects both the company’s immense earning power and Buffett’s caution in a market he has repeatedly described as expensive.

Berkshire has also been a net seller of equities for 12 consecutive quarters, an unusually long retreat that underscores how difficult it has become to deploy capital at Berkshire’s scale without compromising return expectations.

Attention is now shifting to the future of Berkshire’s roughly $300 billion equity portfolio. With no obvious successor who carries Buffett’s public-market track record, some analysts believe Berkshire may gradually reduce active stock selection and lean more heavily on its operating businesses and passive capital deployment.

Greg Abel and the Question of Continuity

Greg Abel inherits a company with unmatched financial strength, a deeply embedded culture, and shareholders conditioned to think in decades. Insiders and long-time investors broadly expect strategy continuity, not reinvention.

Buffett himself has emphasized that volatility is not failure, reminding shareholders that Berkshire’s stock has fallen roughly 50% on three occasions during his tenure, only to recover each time.

The difference now is not operational but symbolic. Berkshire will still own great businesses, generate massive cash flows, and invest conservatively. What it will no longer have is the singular judgment, credibility, and moral authority that allowed Buffett to move markets with a sentence.

A Legacy That May Never Be Repeated

Buffett’s departure as CEO closes a chapter that reshaped modern investing. His record was not just about beating an index, but about doing so ethically, patiently, and at a scale that defied conventional limits.

As markets look ahead, Berkshire Hathaway remains a fortress. But the era of watching Warren Buffett compound capital, and wisdom, in real time has come to an end.