Key takeaways from Berkshire Hathaway’s Q4 2024 13F Filing

Berkshire Hathaway has filed its Q4 13F which details the conglomerate’s buying and selling activity in the quarter. Here we’ll discuss the key takeaways from the report and examine what companies the Warren Buffett-led company bought and sold last quarter.

Berkshire Hathaway opened a new position in Constellation Brands and held 5.6 million shares of the booze company at the end of 2024, valued at $1.2 billion. Notably, Constellation Brands shares have lost over a quarter of their market cap this year and are trading near their 52-week lows amid concerns over tariffs on Mexico.

Berkshire Hathaway added Constellation Brands in Q4

Beer accounted for around 86% of Constellation’s sales in the first half of its current fiscal year and the company imports all its beer from Mexico. While President Donald Trump has delayed the tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico by a month, there are fears that Trump might reimpose the tariffs if his demands are unmet. Meanwhile, Constellation Brands shares are up sharply in post-markets after reports of Berkshire buying a stake in the company. Here it is worth noting that the buying might not have necessarily been done by Buffett himself. Two of his lieutenants Ted Weschler and Todd Combs also manage portfolios at Berkshire even as the quantum is much smaller than what Buffett manages.

Key additions to Berkshire Hathaway’s portfolio

Berkshire also added more shares of Domino’s Pizza and Pool Corp in Q4. The conglomerate first bought a stake in these companies in Q3 and added more shares in Q4. While Domino’s Pizza shares are up around 0.7% in post-markets, Pool Corp which distributes swimming pool supplies is unchanged. Since Berkshire first disclosed the stake in these two companies in November, Domino’s shares are up in double digits and are outperforming the markets while Pool is in the red.

Berkshire also added more shares of Sirius XM and Verisign in Q4. The conglomerate also added more shares of Occidental Petroleum, a decision that was quite likely Buffett’s. In 2022, Berkshire Hathaway received permission to increase the stake in Occidental Petroleum to 50% and Buffett has since been adding more shares gradually. Markets saw it as a sign that Berkshire intends to acquire the company eventually. However, during the annual meeting in 2023, Buffett denied that Berkshire intends to take full control of Occidental and said “There’s speculation about us buying control, we’re not going to buy control. … We wouldn’t know what to do with it.”

Key exits in Q4

During Q4, Berkshire exited Ulta Beauty completely. The company bought the shares only in Q2 but trimmed the stake in Q3 only to exit it fully in Q4. While it is usually quite unusual for Buffett and Berkshire to sell shares so quickly, we have seen several such actions over the last five years where the company has sold shares within a few quarters of buying them.

In addition, Berkshire exited the small positions in the Vanguard Index fund and SPDR S&P 500 ETF. The exit might sound perplexing as Buffett has advised retail investors to bet on index funds instead of active funds many of which fail to beat the benchmark despite charging higher fees.

Buffett continues to pare down Bank of America stake

Meanwhile, Buffett continued to pare down its stake in Bank of America and sold 117,000 shares in Q4. The conglomerate still holds an 8.9% stake in America’s biggest bank valued at around $32 billion and it is its third biggest holding after Apple and American Express.

Historically, Buffett has tried to keep Berkshire’s stake in banks below 10% to avoid regulatory scrutiny. He however made an exception for Bank of America and took regulatory approval to hike the stake beyond 10%. Berkshire invested $5 billion in the company’s preferred shares in 2011 and gradually increased the stake. Buffett had also invested in Goldman Sachs during the 2008-2009 financial crisis even as he passed over struggling names like Lehman Brothers.

Bank of America eventually became Berkshire’s second-biggest holding behind Apple. However, the Oracle of Omaha has been paring down stake in the company for the last many quarters.

Berkshire sells stake in Citi

Berkshire continues to sell stakes in financial companies and sold over 70% of its stake in Citi. The company bought Citi shares in 2022 amid the turnaround under CEO Jane Fraser. Citi shares have appreciated significantly since then.

Berkshire also sold 18% of its stake in Capital One Financial. It also trimmed stake in Brazilian fintech company Nu Holdings continuing the selling spree from the previous quarter. Elsewhere, Berkshire trimmed stakes in Charter Communications, T-Mobile US, and Louisiana-Pacific.

Berkshire seems done with Apple selling

Meanwhile, after selling Apple shares relentlessly for the last many quarters, Buffett did not sell any additional stake in the iPhone maker. The company holds 300 million shares of Apple valued at over $73 billion which is almost a quarter of its total portfolio.

Notably, Berkshire trimmed its Apple shares by 13% in Q1 2024, which Buffett said was due to tax reasons. The company is sitting on a massive gain on its Apple investment and would stand to lose if capital gain taxes rise in the US as the federal government strives to cut the country’s burgeoning fiscal deficit.

“It doesn’t bother me in the least to write that check and I would really hope with all that America’s done for all of you, it shouldn’t bother you that we do it and if I’m doing it at 21% this year and we’re doing it a little higher percentage later on, I don’t think you’ll actually mind the fact that we sold a little Apple this year,” said Buffett at last year’s shareholder meeting.

For context, Buffett started investing in Apple way back in 2016 and gradually built the stake into the largest holding in Berkshire’s portfolio of publicly traded securities. The “Oracle of Omaha” as Buffett is popularly known kept adding to Apple shares until the third quarter of 2018.

Later this month, Berkshire will release its 2024 earnings which would also include the annual letter from Buffett. The filing would also provide insights into Berkshire’s cash pile which might have only risen to a new record high after rising to $325 billion at the end of Q3.