271 Billion Reasons Warren Buffett May Be Ready to Buy Stocks

With the stock market ripping, Warren Buffett and his company Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A)(NYSE: BRK.B) are likely enjoying profits in their $300 billion-plus equities portfolio. But they haven't added many new positions. Through the first six months of the year, Berkshire has only purchased $4.3 billion of equities versus $97 billion of sales. This pales in comparison to the $16.5 billion of equities Berkshire bought in 2023 and the nearly $68 billion in 2022. However, all this could be about to change, and there are 271 billion reasons why.It has been well documented that Berkshire has built up a massive hoard of cash and short-term Treasury bills. At the end of the second quarter, Berkshire had nearly $37 billion of cash and roughly $236.4 billion of short-term Treasuries, for a total of roughly $271 billion in cash and cash equivalents. This is up from $163 billion of cash and cash equivalents at the end of 2023.Recent analyst reports suggest Berkshire may be looking in the Far East to Japan, a country that Buffett and Berkshire have made moves in before. In August 2020, Berkshire purchased a 5%+ stake in each of Japan's five largest trading companies -- Itochu, Marubeni, Mitsubishi, Mitsui, and Sumitomo. In June 2023, Berkshire increased its position in each of these companies to between 7.5% to 8.6%. Buffett has previously said that Berkshire intends to hold these companies long-term and will not purchase more than 9.9% of either company.Continue readingWeiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei MotleyFool Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei MotleyFool