omahaholdem| Buffett's successor may be at the helm of Berkshire until age 80

Anyone who wants to retire at the age of 65 will be disqualified as chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway.

Greg Abel held the Berkshire Hathaway Annual meeting in Omaha, Nebraska in April 2022.

The Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting on May 4th was a big show for CEO Warren Buffett (Warren Buffett).OmahaholdemBut the spotlight is also on his possible successor, Greg Greg Abel. If he succeeds Buffett, he will be able to hold the company's top job for decades, exercising considerable power.

Buffett's comments on Abel also raised questions about the future roles of Ted Ted Weschler and Todd Combs. The two investment managers currently manage about 10 per cent of the company's $370 billion equity portfolio.

Abel, 61, is vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway (Berkshire) and oversees the company's vast non-insurance business. He spent more than five hours onstage with Buffett. Charlie Munger, Buffett's former vice-chairman, old friend and adviser, died in November at the age of 99.

Abel answered a series of questions, including the company's power company business and the Burlington Northern Railway Santa Fe Railway. He confidently discussed these situations, especially the wildfire risk of Western Utilities, declining railway profit margins, and strategies to solve these problems.

Mr Abel said Burlington's results were "disappointing" and that "a lot of work still needs to be done" to improve its cost structure.

Buffett, 93, expressed strong confidence in Abel, saying he thought Abel would become a long-term leader. Speaking of the CEO position, Buffett said: "We have indeed solved this problem for the next two decades, unless there is an adverse situation."

In his annual letter to shareholders earlier this year, Buffett wrote that Abel was "ready in all respects to become CEO of Berkshire Hathaway tomorrow."

Buffett has long said that Berkshire Hathaway executives are expected to exceed the traditional retirement age of 65. "for example, I would say that anyone who wants to retire at 65 will be disqualified as chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway," Buffett said on Saturday.

If Buffett could serve three more years as chief executive (based on his current actuarial life expectancy), Abel might have turned 65 when he became chief executive, and he would have been 62 in June.

At the shareholder meeting, Abel did not talk about Buffett's remarks about the next two decades, which means he may still be at the helm of Berkshire in his mid-80s. A spokesman said Mr. Abel declined to comment on Mr. Buffett's comments.

Buffett also talked about the allocation of capital, a key role he has played since he took over the company in 1965. He has said that if he is no longer chief executive, who should be responsible for making the best use of Berkshire's capital will depend on the Berkshire board.

"I will hand over the responsibility of capital allocation to Greg," he told thousands of attendees at the annual meeting.

Buffett went on to talk about the portfolio, he saidOmahaholdem"I used to have different ideas about how to deal with this problem, but I think the responsibility should rest with the CEO."

Many Berkshire observers, including Barron Weekly, speculated that Weschler and Combs would manage the portfolio in the post-Buffett era. That still seems possible, but if the board adopts Buffett's advice, the two of them will report to Abel.

"A lot of people are talking about Buffett's loss of faith in Ted and Todd," he wrote, commenting on Berkshire Hathaway's tweet The Rational Walk. "I think it completely misread Buffett. Ted and Todd should have reported to Greg, or what? "

(by Andrew Barry / tr. by Robert Taylor)

Editor | Yu Zhou

This article was first posted on the official account of Wechat: Barron Weekly. The content of the article belongs to the author's personal point of view and does not represent the position of Hexun. Investors operate accordingly, at their own risk.