It is as difficult to sink a business without debt as it is sink a ship without holes.
- Manlobbi
Stocks A to Z / Stocks B / Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A)
No. of Recommendations: 4
Berkshire was forced to sell their stake down to 45% after DVA share buybacks reduced share count.
Feb 13 (Reuters) - Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (BRKa.N), opens new tab said on Thursday night it sold 203,091 shares of DaVita (DVA.N), opens new tab, reducing its holdings in the kidney dialysis services provider to about 35.89 million shares, a 45% stake worth nearly $6.4 billion.
In a regulatory filing, Berkshire said the February 11 sale was required pursuant to a share repurchase agreement, under which DaVita agreed on a quarterly basis to buy back enough shares to reduce Berkshire's ownership stake to 45%.
No. of Recommendations: 9
There will be a bunch of these sales each quarter going forward. One thing to note is that GEICO sold the 203,091 shares to DaVita at $156.011 / share on Feb. 11th but the market price of DaVita on that day was around $172-174 / share.
The share sales are once a quarter and the price is based on the VWAP that DaVita paid repurchasing their shares from the public during the applicable quarter. So this was a true-up based on Q4 2024 activity that finally pushed the BRK/Weschler group above 45%.
They say it's like creating your own dividend...
No. of Recommendations: 1
1/2 of 1% per quarter possibly.
No. of Recommendations: 11
1/2 of 1% per quarter possibly.
I'll be glad to see us owning less and less of this firm. Reputational risk.
Jim
No. of Recommendations: 1
I'll be glad to see us owning less and less of this firm. Reputational risk.
Is there a big difference between owning 45% of something and calling it a hundred shares and owning 45% of something and calling it ninety nine shares?
No. of Recommendations: 11
Is there a big difference between owning 45% of something and calling it a hundred shares and owning 45% of something and calling it ninety nine shares? If they stay at 45% ownership, it's a wash. But maybe building the habit of selling shares regularly will start a bit of thinking about how that isn't such a bad idea...
It embarrasses me to be an indirect shareholder. The litany of fines and sanctions and business malpractice is never-ending.
a random article on the general subject
https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/davita-pays-34-m...To date, that muck hasn't stuck to Berkshire, but with 45% ownership that may not be the case forever. Berkshire has been reputationally excoriated for things involving far less control.
Jim
No. of Recommendations: 3
If it makes you feel any better, Jim, half the DVA stock isn't owned by the BRK shareholders.
