Warren Buffett speaks at Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, Nebraska on May 4, 2024.
CNBC
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Offloaded another chunk Bank of America This brings its total sales since mid-July to more than $7 billion and reduces its stake to 11%.
The Omaha, Nebraska-based conglomerate sold a total of 5.8 million Bank of America shares at an average price of $39.45 a share for about $228.7 million in separate sales over three days on Friday, Monday and Tuesday, according to new regulatory filings.
This latest move extends Berkshire’s selling streak to 12 trading days, matching the 12-day streak from July 17 to August 1.
Berkshire sold more than 174.7 million shares of the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank for $7.2 billion, leaving it with 858.2 million shares, or 11.1% of the shares outstanding. Bank of America has fallen to third place on Berkshire’s list of major holdings, behind Apple and American Express. Before the selling frenzy, Bank of America had long been Berkshire’s second-largest holding.
Moynihan talks about Buffett
Buffett famously bought $5 billion in preferred stock and warrants in Bank of America in 2011 in the aftermath of the financial crisis. He converted those warrants in 2017, making Berkshire the largest shareholder in Bank of America. The Oracle of Omaha then bought an additional 300 million shares between 2018 and 2019.
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan made a rare comment on the Berkshire sale on Tuesday, saying he was unaware of Buffett’s motives for the sale.
“I don’t know exactly what he’s doing, and frankly I can’t ask him, and I don’t want to ask him,” he said at the Barclays Global Financial Services conference, according to a FactSet transcript. “But in the meantime, the market is absorbing the stock…. We’re buying some of the stock, and life goes on.”
Bank of America
BofA shares are down just over 1% since the beginning of July but are up 16.7% this year, slightly outperforming the S&P 500.
Moynihan, who has led the bank since 2010, praised the 94-year-old for his wise investments in the bank in 2011 that helped shore up confidence at a time when it was struggling with losses related to subprime mortgages.
“He’s been a great investor in our company and has stabilized the company in a time of need,” Moynihan said.
To show how profitable Buffett’s investment was, Moynihan said that if investors had bought the bank’s stock on the same day that Buffett did, it could have traded for as low as $5.50 a share, which recently traded just under $40 a share.
“He had the guts to go for it in a big way and he did it. It was a great comeback for him and I’m happy he earned it,” Moynihan said.
— CNBC’s Alex Crippen contributed reporting.
