No. of Recommendations: 7
Greg Abel’s 2026 Letter to Shareholders
Published on March 2, 2026
“We concentrate on quality, not frequency. If a significant issue arises, you will hear from me, but it will not be through quarterly commentary, given our long-term horizon.”
— Greg Abel, 2026 Letter to Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders
I often say that Berkshire Hathaway is a “low maintenance” investment because all a longtime shareholder needs to do in order to stay abreast with the business is to dedicate one weekend each year to careful study of the annual report. Those who like to get “into the weeds” might spend an additional day with each quarterly report, although that is not strictly required. It takes a long time to understand Berkshire at first, but ongoing “maintenance” of this understanding is not very demanding.
Berkshire is often criticized for failing to hold quarterly conference calls and provide “guidance” to analysts. Those who were anticipating a change in this policy had their hopes dashed when Greg Abel reaffirmed his commitment to maintaining Berkshire’s traditional policy of annual communications from the CEO. Reading an annual letter from Mr. Abel should be sufficient, and if there are serious adverse developments, he will likely issue press releases as Warren Buffett has done on rare occasions over the years. Demanding quarterly letters from the CEO along with conference calls only serves as a massive distraction.
While I am always interested in Berkshire’s business results, this year I was even more focused on the tone that Mr. Abel set in his letter regarding the company’s culture. When I wrote about Mr. Abel’s unique challenge last year, I focused on culture before turning my attention to quantitative matters. This is because Berkshire’s historical success was founded on a seamless web of deserved trust, and an evaporation of that culture would, over time, erode the company’s foundation. I doubt that anyone would seriously question Mr. Abel’s abilities as an executive capable of managing the business, but the big unknown has been whether he has the unquantifiable ability to maintain something as amorphous as culture.
The truth is that we cannot know for sure whether Mr. Abel has the capacity to maintain Berkshire’s culture over the two decades that he hopes to serve as CEO. That will only be apparent in the fullness of time, perhaps not until a full decade has passed. A good culture is like a large bank balance and can continue for some time in a progressively depleted state before the “account” is fully exhausted. Few people who have been willing to comment publicly know Mr. Abel well enough to opine on whether he has what it takes to keep the culture, but Charlie Munger certainly thought so in 2021 when he inadvertently disclosed Berkshire’s succession plan. That was obviously a huge vote of confidence.
As I read the letter, I was happy to see that Mr. Abel chose to focus on “Culture and Foundational Values” before he discussed the business. This section took the form of excerpts from a letter he had sent to Berkshire’s employees emphasizing the importance of culture. His intent was obviously to communicate a sense of continuity to make sure that Berkshire’s nearly 400,000 employees realize that a management transition will not be accompanied by a radical change in how the business has operated in the past."
https://rationalwalk.com/greg-abels-2026-letter-to...
