Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. on Saturday reported a net loss of nearly US$50 billion in the first quarter due to a drop in investments.
The company called the setback “temporary” but said it could not reliably predict when its many businesses would return to normal or when consumers would resume their former buying habits.
Berkshire said: “As efforts to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated in the second half of March and continued through April, most of our businesses were negatively affected, with the effects to date ranging from relatively minor to severe,”
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Buffett is considered one of the sharpest investors. His fortune of $72 billion is the fourth-largest in the world, according to Forbes, and in normal years, the company’s annual gathering in Omaha is a high-point of the calendar for investors, a “Woodstock for capitalists.”
Berkshire Hathaway Inc’s annual meeting in Omaha, Nebraska was held virtually for the first time, without shareholders, because of the pandemic.
Buffett was joined by Vice Chairman Greg Abel, 57, who has day-to-day oversight of Berkshire’s non-insurance businesses, and is considered by many analysts and investors as a top candidate to eventually succeed Buffett as chief executive officer.
In documents filed on Saturday, Berkshire noted that until mid-March, many of its companies were posting “comparative revenue and earnings increases” over the same 2019 period.