Please don't assume anything undeclared about anyone's background, or if you do then keep it to yourself.
- Manlobbi
Halls of Shrewd'm / US Policy
No. of Recommendations: 1
No. of Recommendations: 3
"Berkshire Hathaway now owns a 34% stake in Occidental, according to a filing late Wednesday. It previously held a 27.7% stake following its most recent purchases in late December."
Wow even Barrons is running with this. Just read my last post. Berkshire needs to file a Form 4 if they buy any shares. Maybe they are buying a few this week but nothing has been disclosed yet.
No. of Recommendations: 0
good morning nola, if these percentage reports are material to you, call Marc Hamburg at brk, he's very nice and he can explain the accounting if these reports are in fact, incorrect, and you have it right. I would call him but I doubt I would be able to coherently explain his response. Good luck bud.
No. of Recommendations: 16
good morning nola, if these percentage reports are material to you, call Marc Hamburg at brk, he's very nice and he can explain the accounting if these reports are in fact, incorrect, and you have it right. I would call him but I doubt I would be able to coherently explain his response. Good luck bud.
Marc is just following filing instructions. It is the press that doesn't know how to read the report and writes headlines like the Barron's headline "Berkshire scoops up more..."
I know Marc and email with him periodically, he is unbelievably good at what he does for a living. BRK is lucky to have him and his team.
No. of Recommendations: 0
" Barron's headline "Berkshire scoops up more..." your expectations of the press might be too high, they got the direction correct, no ? What a country.
No. of Recommendations: 0
None of my business, but how do you know Marc?
I don’t know him, but I find it interesting that a poster here is friends with the CFO of Berkshire. That’s quite the contact!
No. of Recommendations: 4
well I wouldn't say we are "friends" - we know each other through corresponding about Berkshire related stuff over many years. He doesn't send me Christmas cards or anything.
No. of Recommendations: 9
Nola is right, of course.
Careless reporting from sites like Barron's and Gurufocus say that Berkshire just bought 80m+ shares on one day at the end of December, despite the fact that only about 10m shares are traded a day.
This is what yesterday's 13G actually says:
SHARED VOTING POWER
327,574,652.81 shares of Common Stock (83,858,848.81 of which represent shares underlying the Berkshire Warrants (as hereinafter defined))
In other words, there are 327,574,652.81-83,858,848.81=243,715,804 actual shares owned, and warrants to buy another $5b worth at about $57. The warrant price is gradually increasing, as it is adjusted downwards based on dividends paid out. Thge warrants were originally issued on August 8, 2019, for 80,000,000 million shares at an exercise price of $62.50 per share (80m*62.50=5000), but the number of warrants keeps changing, as the exercise price decreases, which accounts for some (not all) of the confusion in how it's reported.
It is true that it is a nightmare trying to figure out what is happening with recent purchases, from the archaic SEC documents and from Occidental's and Berkshire's minimal disclosures. And it is true that Buffett has been buying shares, in addition to owning these warrants, usually at prices near below $60 or just above. But there has not been a big jump upwards in the number of shares, and it is not 34%, even if the warrants were exercised (if they were exercised, the denominator of the number of Occidental shares would have to be adjusted, to, and their total shares would go up from about 880,370,837 to 880,370,837+83,858,848.81, in other words almost 10%.
dtb
No. of Recommendations: 12
"good morning nola, if these percentage reports are material to you, call Marc Hamburg at brk, he's very nice and he can explain the accounting if these reports are in fact, incorrect, and you have it right. I would call him but I doubt I would be able to coherently explain his response. Good luck bud."
What does Marc Hamburg have to do with incorrect press reports? It would be silly to call him over media misreporting the calculation. It would be like calling Buffett when a news report spells his name with only one T.
I thought Nola was very nice in taking the time to correct the misunderstanding you had about what percentage of OXY that Berkshire owns. He tried to educate us all by describing what factors go into the calculation. Better luck.
No. of Recommendations: 1
"" What does Marc Hamburg have to do with incorrect press reports? It would be silly to call him over media misreporting the calculation. It would be like calling Buffett when a news report spells his name with only one T."" You don't think Marc can call Barrons and offer to explain how to correctly report brk filings and press releases ? In fact, I'm sure nola can text Bary if it's important to him. Yo nola, I'll send you a Christmas card next year.
No. of Recommendations: 7
The warrant price is gradually increasing, as it is adjusted downwards based on dividends paid out. 2 corrections:
(i) the warrant price is gradually decreasing (and the number of shares that would be issued is increasing), as the rest of the sentence implies. The only thing that stays the same is the $5b that would be paid out to get the shares, likely .
(ii) the adjustment is not based on dividends, it is based on the issuance of further warrants or shares. This is the explanation in the Form 4 from March 2022:
19. The warrants contain provisions that adjust the exercise price and the number of shares of the issuer's common stock issuable on exercise upon the occurrence of certain events. As such, the exercise price and the number of shares of the issuer's common stock issuable on exercise as reported on this form are subject to change upon the occurrence of future events in accordance with the terms of the warrants. The warrants were initially for 80,000,000 shares with an initial exercise price of $62.50 per share. On June 26, 2020, the issuer's board of directors declared a distribution to its common shareholders of warrants to purchase additional shares of common stock, which distribution resulted in an anti-dilution adjustment to the warrants, which lowered the exercise price to $59.624 and increased the number of shares issuable on exercise of the warrants to 83,858,848.81.https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/315090/000...One other note: the warrants can be exercised any time, but they expire a year after the Series A preferred shares will have been repurchased by Occidental, at least that's how I understand it:
20. The warrants were issued on August 8, 2019 and are exercisable at the applicable holder's option, in whole or in part, until the first anniversary of the date on which no shares of the issuer's series A preferred stock remain outstanding, at which time the warrants expire.Occidental has now paid down $1.51b of these $10b in preferred shares (with a 10% premium to Berkshire), and they can do so in amounts that correspond to the excess in distributions (which they define as the total of dividends and repurchases) paid out to regular shareholders in excess of $4 per share.
dtb
No. of Recommendations: 1
Nola622,
Even if not friends per se, that’s still pretty cool IMO.
No. of Recommendations: 19
If you really want to be impressed, one time I asked Debbie Bosanek a question over email and she printed my email out, put it on Warren's desk, he answered my question by circling the answer on the print-out and then she scanned the printed out email and sent it back to me.
https://imgbox.com/vkb0VIX8(screen shot of Warren's circle LOL)
