No. of Recommendations: 1
AdrianC, let me ask you a hypothetical. In 1999 if a shareholder me , asked Buffett and munger, please look out 25 years, pretend Brk has a market cap of one trillion dollars and 35 percent is cash , t bills, and brkb is trading at 1.7 xs BV, what would you do?
Wait for it to get to <1.4 x book (might be pretty close already) and buyback aggressively. It's the most tax-efficient way to "return cash" to shareholders.
I've been a keen watcher of Berkshire for those 25 years. What we're seeing now isn't typical since 2008. From 2008 to 2025, the average year end price to book is 1.34. There will be opportunities for significant buybacks. I didn't think there ever would be while Buffett was still around, and I expect Buffett thought the same, but there was: nearly $80 billion bought back. It will happen again, probably very soon.
An ongoing small dividend does nothing to "help" with the cash pile.
