Berkshire Hathaway Spent About $9.6 Billion on Its Own Shares Last Quarter, Four Times What It Put Into Other Companies' Stocks

In September, Berkshire Hathaway bought 7.7 million of its own Class B shares at an average of $506.64 each, and 1,983 Class A shares at an average of $758,332.88. That one month cost about $5.4 billion, by our arithmetic from the table in its quarterly report for the third quarter, which the company signed on Saturday, 7 November.

Across July, August and September, Berkshire spent about $9.6 billion buying back its stock. The company itself said it acquired $14.4 billion of treasury stock in the first nine months of 2026, including September purchases that settled in October. Its second-quarter report put the first-half figure at $4.8 billion. In 2025 it bought none.

How big is $9.6 billion for Berkshire?

It is the most in any quarter in the filings we checked, which go back to 2018. The nearest are the third and fourth quarters of 2020, when the company paid about $9.0 billion in each, according to its 2020 annual report and third-quarter report for that year. It is also more than Berkshire spent on buybacks in any full year from 2018 to 2025 except 2020 and 2021.

Berkshire Hathaway share repurchases (billions of dollars)

Annual figures are cash paid, from each year's cash flow statement. Quarterly figures for 2020 and 2021 are this publication's arithmetic from the year-to-date totals in the quarterly reports. The third-quarter 2026 figure is the shares bought multiplied by the average prices reported for each month, and so includes September trades that settled in October.

The buying shrank the share count by 1.3 per cent in nine months. Berkshire had the equivalent of 1,418,900 Class A shares outstanding on 30 September, against 1,438,223 at the end of 2025.

What price did Berkshire pay?

About 1.4 times book value. Shareholders' equity was $761.4 billion on 30 September, or roughly $536,600 for each Class A equivalent share. The average Class A price paid in the quarter was about $751,300, by our arithmetic, and the average Class B price about $503.68, which is the same multiple once the 1,500-to-1 ratio between the two classes is applied.

Berkshire no longer sets a numerical ceiling. Its rule, repeated in the filing, is that the chief executive may buy back stock when he believes the price is below Berkshire's intrinsic value, "conservatively determined", after consultation with the chairman, and that repurchases will stop if they would cut cash, cash equivalents and Treasury bills below $30 billion. The chief executive is Gregory Abel, who signed the 2025 annual report's shareholder letter in that role in February. Every repurchase this year has been made with him in the role.

Where else did the money go?

Much less went into other companies' shares. Berkshire's purchases of equity securities were $41.8 billion in the first nine months and $39.4 billion in the first six, according to the cash flow statements in the two reports. That leaves about $2.4 billion for the third quarter, against about $23.5 billion in the second. Sales of equities were about $2.8 billion in the third quarter. So the company bought roughly four times as much of its own stock as of anyone else's.

Its five largest holdings at the end of September were Alphabet, American Express, Apple, Bank of America and Coca-Cola, which together made up 65 per cent of the value of its equity portfolio, the filing says.

The company also spent cash on whole businesses. It paid about $9.4 billion for OxyChem, Occidental Petroleum's chemicals arm, on 2 January, and about $6.8 billion, or $72.50 a share, for the homebuilder Taylor Morrison on 24 July. Taylor Morrison produced about $1.1 billion of home sales between the purchase and the end of September. Homebuilders were selling into mortgage rates above 7 per cent in October, as PulteGroup's falling orders showed.

The cash pile is still huge but no longer growing. Berkshire's insurance and other businesses held $352.3 billion in cash, equivalents and Treasury bills, net of unsettled purchases, on 30 September. The figure was $369.0 billion at the end of 2025, $373.5 billion at the end of March and $359.2 billion at the end of June, according to the annual report and the three 2026 quarterly reports.

How did the businesses do?

Unevenly. Net earnings attributable to shareholders fell to $22.1 billion in the quarter from $30.8 billion a year earlier, mostly because investment gains, which Berkshire calls "often meaningless" for judging a period, fell to $9.4 billion from $17.3 billion. Without those gains, after-tax earnings from the operating businesses and insurance investment income came to about $12.7 billion, down 5.8 per cent, by our arithmetic from the company's table.

The railroad and the factories did well. BNSF's earnings rose 19.3 per cent on higher volumes, and manufacturing, service and retailing rose 11.8 per cent. Insurance did not. Underwriting earnings fell 42.9 per cent, with all three underwriting groups earning less, and investment income from the insurers fell 14.1 per cent, which the company put down to lower interest income.

What to watch next

The next test is the 10-K, due in late February, which will show whether the buying continued through the fourth quarter and what Mr. Abel says about it in his second shareholder letter. The company does not announce repurchases in advance, and it is not obliged to buy any amount. The record shows only that, at about 1.4 times book, its chief executive judged the stock cheaper than almost anything else on offer.

Monthly repurchases, average prices, net earnings by business, cash and Treasury bill holdings, equity purchases and sales, shares outstanding, shareholders' equity, the OxyChem and Taylor Morrison acquisitions and the repurchase policy are from Berkshire Hathaway's Form 10-Q for the quarter ended 30 September 2026, dated 7 November 2026, and its 10-Qs for the first and second quarters of 2026. Repurchase totals for 2018 to 2025 and for the quarters of 2020 and 2021 are from Berkshire's annual reports and 10-Qs for those years. Gregory Abel's title is from the 2025 annual report. All documents were retrieved from berkshirehathaway.com on 9 November 2026. Dollar values of the third-quarter repurchases, quarterly figures derived from year-to-date totals, the price-to-book multiples and the operating earnings total are this publication's arithmetic. The analysis is our own.

Topics businessshare buybacksearningsSEC filings