Buffett sitting on $122B

[LRDave]

Read this article this AM. Two interesting charts: Wiltshire 5000 vs. quarterly GDP and hours of labor required to buy the S&P - both at peaks as you might assume.

The author of the charts and associated commentary says: “Wake us up after the above charts regress to their means, about 40% lower”.

Yes I know this is Marketwatch, but one has to wonder what the oracle is going to do with all that cash.....

(Mods: please move if in the wrong forum - thanks.)

 

[gerntz]

OK. Thanks - I guess.

 

[Totoro]

According to morningstar in 2018 Berkshire had ~30 billion in cash
https://www.morningstar.com/stocks/xnys/brk.b/financials

Still quite a lot, but only ~10% of total equity, which is pretty typical as far as I understood from Berkshire historically.

 

[dirtbiker]

I have been putting all of my regular biweekly contributions into a high yield savings instead of the market, and adjusted my AA to about one third stocks, one third bonds, and one third cash, and the cash pile is growing. Usually I'm close to 100% diversified equities. I'm not completely out of the market, but I'm keeping cash on hand for when (not if) the market corrects. Some may call this market timing, and maybe it is, but I call it not buying when valuations don't make sense to me. And if the greatest investor of our lifetime is hoarding cash, who am I to think I can outsmart him?

 

[aja8888]

I have been putting all of my regular biweekly contributions into a high yield savings instead of the market, and adjusted my AA to about one third stocks, one third bonds, and one third cash, and the cash pile is growing. Usually I'm close to 100% diversified equities. I'm not completely out of the market, but I'm keeping cash on hand for when (not if) the market corrects. Some may call this market timing, and maybe it is, but I call it not buying when valuations don't make sense to me. And if the greatest investor of our lifetime is hoarding cash, who am I to think I can outsmart him?

I'm set up about the same with 30% equities and the rest in municipal bond funds and CDs/Cash. Of course, I am 76 and really don't want to see the market go south for too long. I'll add to equities on dips, but not being aggressive at it.

 

[nancyfrank232]

If there’s nothing interesting for the investor to invest in, it’s natural to store cash and keep looking

Outside of my mandatory company pension which goes into the S&P index, the rest goes to cash unless something interesting comes up

The good news is that booms and busts work on an inevitable cycle

 

[GravitySucks]

Warren Buffet is running a business. I'm running a life. We require two different cash positions as well as different AA altogether.
But now I'm thinking, most companies we have and equity stake in carry operating cash. Maybe I should average that up and consider it as cash in my AA.

 

[dirtbiker]

Warren Buffet is running a business. I'm running a life. We require two different cash positions as well as different AA altogether.
But now I'm thinking, most companies we have and equity stake in carry operating cash. Maybe I should average that up and consider it as cash in my AA.

You can't control how that cash is spent and don't have any access to it, so I wouldn't consider it cash in my AA. An equity is an equity, regardless of how much cash the business is holding.

 

[nancyfrank232]

You can't control how that cash is spent and don't have any access to it, so I wouldn't consider it cash in my AA. An equity is an equity, regardless of how much cash the business is holding.

I agree

I have Berkshire Hathaway shares but I still store my own cash

During down markets, being an investor with cash is priceless

However having said that, it’s unlikely that Berkshire’s share price will move much unless that astronomical cash horde is deployed

 

[calmloki]

Buffett sitting on $122B

So he's sitting on a 12"x12.5" stack of $100 bills 375 feet high? He best be careful - I get shaky just being up on a 24" extension ladder.

 

[Cassius King]

Buffett's Elephant gun is turning into an Elephant cannon!

He's probably hoping to make that last big acquisition of his career and everything is overpriced or outbid.
I'd like to see some buybacks and a div put in place.

 

[nancyfrank232]

I'd like to see some buybacks and a div put in place.

+1 agreed!

 

[nancyfrank232]

Berkshire Hathaway stockpiled $128b cash

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/02/war...hathaway-reports-a-128-billion-cash-pile.html

 

[NW-Bound]

Buffett sitting on $122B

Then, how high does he sit?

From the Web: "A billion dollars in $100 bills would weigh 22,000 pounds, over 1,100 cubic feet of bills".

$122B in $100 bills would have a volume of 134,200 cubic feet. If stacked into a cube of equal dimension on all sides, the pile of money would be more than 51 feet high.

If done with $20 bills, the cube is 88 feet high.

With $1 bill, the cube is 238 feet high.



PS. I just saw that Calmloki had the same idea. However, our numbers do not jibe, in terms of the volume of the stack!

Buffett sitting on $122B

So he's sitting on a 12"x12.5" stack of $100 bills 375 feet high? He best be careful - I get shaky just being up on a 24" extension ladder.

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

$122B in $100 bills would have a volume of 134,200 cubic feet. If stacked into a cube of equal dimension on all sides, the pile of money would be more than 51 feet high.

If done with $20 bills, the cube is 88 feet high.

With $1 bill, the cube is 238 feet high.

Well, duh, you don't make a cube, how would you get on and off of it? You make a step pyramid, like the Mayans did!

 

[NW-Bound]

Very good point!

So, I recompute, and here are the heights of a pyramid with a side slope of 60 degrees.

With $100 bills: 67 ft high
With $20 bills: 114 ft high
With $1 bills: 310 ft high

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

Very good point!

So, I recompute, and here are the heights of a pyramid with a side slope of 60 degrees.

With $100 bills: 67 ft high
With $20 bills: 114 ft high
With $1 bills: 310 ft high

That's an impressive ziggurat of cash!

 

[Arizona1]

I’ve been keeping about $180g in cds since 2013 to buy on the dip. I timed it perfect in 2000 but really missed the upside this time.

 

[street]

NW-Bound >>> LOL, I like that.

 

[NW-Bound]

What will be interesting is for us peons to compute what we can do with our stash?

Do we have enough to make a stepping stool like this?

Better build it out of $1 bill or $20 instead of $100 to be safe.