Berkshire's Biggest Repurchase in Nearly Two Years Shrank the Share Count by 0.4%

Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRKA)(NYSE: BRKB) spent about $4.5 billion repurchasing its stock in the second quarter, the company said in Saturday's earnings report. It was Berkshire's biggest quarter of buybacks in nearly two years -- and 19 times the $235 million it spent in the first quarter. Measured against the company's roughly $1.12 trillion market value, three months of buying retired about 0.4% of Berkshire.

That market value comes from the 1,431,693 Class A equivalent shares Berkshire reported outstanding on June 30 and Friday's $521.80 close for the Class B shares (each equal to 1/1,500th of an A share).

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The pace is what's new -- and to me, it's the story. Berkshire repurchased no shares at all in 2025, Warren Buffett's final year as CEO. Not only did buybacks resume in March under CEO Greg Abel, but they accelerated sharply in the second quarter.

Berkshire's buyback rule leaves the decision to one person's judgment: The CEO, after consulting the chairman, must believe the shares sell for less than the company is conservatively worth. Abel evidently believes it, even with the stock trading near its 52-week high of $525.

The buying didn't stop when the quarter did. The new 10-Q filing lists share counts as of July 29 on its cover page. They show about 4,600 more Class A equivalent shares retired after June 30 -- shares worth about $3.6 billion at Friday's close.

Could the buying keep scaling? The program's only hard limit is liquidity: No repurchases can be made if they would pull Berkshire's cash, cash equivalents, and Treasury bills below $30 billion. That war chest stood at about $365.5 billion on June 30, down from about $397 billion three months earlier, as Abel found other uses for it. So the binding constraint is Abel's judgment of value, not cash.

Berkshire pays no dividend, so repurchases are the one way the company returns cash directly to its shareholders. For a shareholder, the arithmetic so far is modest. Retiring 0.4% of the shares in a quarter -- likely 1.5% to 2% a year if that pace holds -- nudges per-share figures rather than transforming them.

Of course, buybacks near a 52-week high can look like bad timing if the judgment on value is wrong. But Abel has kept at it, from the first purchases in March into July. That, more than the 0.4%, is probably the thing worth remembering from Saturday's report.

Daniel Sparks and his clients have positions in Berkshire Hathaway. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Berkshire Hathaway. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.