Warren Buffett speaks during Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, Nebraska, May 4, 2024.
CNBC
Berkshire Hathaway dumped more bank of America shares this week, making it six consecutive trading days that Warren Buffett’s conglomerate has reduced its stake in the bank.
The Omaha, Nebraska-based holding company sold an additional 18.9 million shares in trades on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday at an average price of $42.46, raising $802.5 million. new registration application showed.
Over the past six trading sessions, Berkshire has sold 52.8 million Bank of America shares worth $2.3 billion, reducing its stake to 12.5%. Berkshire still owns 980.1 million BofA shares with a market value of $41.3 billion, a distant second to its $172.5 billion stake in Apple.
Berkshire is required to announce its stock movements within two business days of making them when its stake in a company exceeds 10%.
Buffett may be scaling back his bet on valuation concerns after Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America outperformed the broader market this year. Bank stocks are up more than 25% through 2024, compared with nearly 14% for the S&P 500.
It was the first time since the fourth quarter of 2019 that Berkshire reduced its stake in BofA. In 2011, the Oracle of Omaha bought $5 billion worth of preferred stock and warrants from the bank to boost confidence in the lender as it struggled with losses from subprime mortgages in the wake of the financial crisis.
Last year, Buffett spoke highly of the leadership at BofA, even as he divested other financial names. In 2022, Berkshire exited a handful of legacy banking positions, including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo and US Bancorp.
“I invited myself many years before, and they made us a really good deal. And I like Brian Moynihan a lot, and I just don’t want it, I don’t want to sell it,” Buffett said in 2023 of loving BofA .