The seasoned investor has always been searching Warren BuffettFor simple, predictable business at competitive prices, which means he has largely shunned tech companies throughout his career. But the 91-year-old investor’s approach disagreed with Apple, which turned out to be the most profitable bet of his life, and one of the best investments in history.
Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway company owns 887 million shares of Apple stock, as of September 30, giving it a 5.4% stake in the iPhone maker. That stake — assuming no change — soared in value to a record $162 billion on Monday, when Apple achieved a $3 trillion market value for the first time, Business Insider calculates.
Berkshire Hathaway has now nearly quadrupled the value of its Apple stock holdings, spending regarding $36 billion to purchase just over 1 billion Apple shares between the beginning of 2016 and mid-2018, adjusted in 2020.
Buffett’s company has sold 12% of the stake for regarding $13 billion since then. With its remaining stake in Apple worth more than $160 billion, it reaped nearly $140 billion in realized and unrealized gains.
Buffett admitted at a shareholder meeting at Berkshire Hathaway last year that cutting back on investments in Apple “may have been a mistake”. He added that his partner, Charlie Munger, had advised him not to sell.
However, Berkshire Hathaway’s stake in Apple represents a significant portion of the conglomerate’s value, equaling 24% of Berkshire’s $675 billion market capitalization, and representing 43% of its $293 billion stock portfolio at the end of the third quarter of 2020.
Buffett praised Apple and announced his stake in the company several times. He described the holding as a “family jewel” in his letter to shareholders last year. He also praised the consumer electronics giant as “probably the best business” he’s ever known in a 2020 interview.
