Warren Buffett is stepping down as chief executive officer of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., the company he built alongside his late partner Charlie Munger for the past six decades. It’s a final show of humility by a man many consider the greatest investor of all time.

Operating in an era replete with purported Wall Street soothsayers, the 94-year-old Buffett always rejected the idea that anyone — even him — could predict the future. Nicknamed the Oracle of Omaha (a misnomer perhaps), he credited his success to patience and insisting on only buying the businesses he understood. From the early years of Berkshire, those included a textile business, insurance company GEICO, the Buffalo News and See’s Candies. After delivering a 20% annual compounded annual gain between 1964 and 2024, about double that of the S&P 500 Index, the business is now a behemoth valued at more than $1.16 trillion, more than 390,000 employees and a cash hoard totaling $347.7 billion.

Buffett gave credit to the people around him, including vice chairman for non-insurance operations Greg Abel — his chosen successor — and of course Munger, a lawyer by training and poker player. With the influence of Munger, Buffett slowly moved from a philosophy of buying “cigar butt” investments — as he’d learned from his mentor Ben Graham — to a style of investing that might best be characterized today as “quality”: buying great companies at the right price. The key example of that worldview in Berkshire’s portfolio became Apple Inc. “I am embarrassed to say that Tim Cook made more money for Berkshire than I ever did, so credit should be given to him,” Buffett said Saturday, with Apple CEO Cook in the audience.

Buffett’s legend grew during the 2008 global financial crisis when he opportunistically scooped up investments in Goldman Sachs Group Inc., General Electric Co. and Dow Chemical Co. He managed to do so because he had stockpiled cash in the runup to the crisis — much as he’s done in recent years. Yet he always dismissed the notion that he had any great foresight or that anyone in the investing business had such capacity — a theme that he returned to Saturday when asked about the current state of financial markets and the economic risks of the moment. In Buffett’s telling, he always just waited for the right opportunities to present themselves, and passed on anything less.

In a way, humility was Buffett’s brand. Though he worked briefly in New York early in his career, Buffett ultimately returned to build Berkshire in Omaha, Nebraska, where he was born and has lived in the home he bought in 1958 for $31,500. He always insisted on treating Berkshire’s shareholders as co-owners in the company, an ethos that was always on display at his sprawling annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, dubbed the Woodstock of Capitalism, in which Buffett would sit for hours taking questions from the audience.

Despite Berkshire’s incredible run, Buffett’s conservative tendencies may have also contributed to the company’s lagging performance in recent years — an era in which cheap and easy money often pushed valuations to extraordinary levels. Since the financial crisis, Berkshire is only keeping pace with the S&P 500, a benchmark that any investor can mimic through shares of an exchange-traded fund. Some of that may underscore the ways in which the investing industry has changed and become more democratized — but also harder to outperform even for the most gifted investors. Others would say that the equity market values are too high relative to historical levels and are set for a correction, and that cash-rich Berkshire may ultimately come out on top.

As for Buffett’s personal fortune of $168.6 billion, he owes at least some of it to his long career and life and the magic of compound investing, as he’s frequently admitted. Although Buffett’s announcement Saturday was unexpected, Abel, 62, has long been groomed as the Oracle’s successor. Buffett, starting to sound every one of his 94 years, said he would recommend to the board of directors that Abel become the new chief executive.

Earlier in the day, Buffett — with his signature folksy humor — dismissed the idea that Berkshire’s sizeable cash stockpile was somehow a gift to Abel to make him look good. “I wouldn’t do anything nearly so noble as to withhold investing myself just so Greg could look good,” he said. He wasn’t totally joking. As much as Buffett valued relationships, his first allegiance in business was always to Berkshire’s shareholders, something that he demonstrated once again when he laid the groundwork for his succession to begin.

Jonathan Levin is a columnist focused on US markets and economics. Previously, he worked as a Bloomberg journalist in the US, Brazil and Mexico. He is a CFA charterholder.

 

DALLAS — If Robert F. Kennedy Jr. were your electrician, you’d get a shock every time you touched a light switch. As U.S. Health and Human Services secretary, he is dangerously steering us away from one of the greatest public health victories in human history.

His disregard of facts about infectious disease is unacceptable as measles spreads. In North Texas, residents could soon witness firsthand the needless suffering caused by rejecting safe, effective vaccines.

Kennedy visited a farm outside Hillsboro last week, and during a brief session with reporters, he claimed that a Gaines County child whose funeral he attended didn’t die of measles (she did) and that Europe had 127,000 cases of measles last year (sort of). He also said news media organizations focus too much on measles and not enough on autism and chronic disease.

Where do we start? Yes, the child died because she had contracted measles. About 1 in 20 children with measles develop pneumonia, and 1 to 3 of every 1,000 infected children die of respiratory or neurological complications of the viral disease.

Kennedy’s statement about measles in Europe was — perhaps unintentionally — misleading. The 27 member countries of the European Union had 35,212 measles cases in 2024. That is tens of thousands fewer than he said, but almost 10 times more than in 2023. The number he cited probably came from a World Health Organization report. It included measles cases in countries like Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, which are usually considered part of central Asia rather than Europe.

We also dispute the notion that chronic diseases don’t receive much news coverage or publicity. Talk shows, newspapers, magazines, podcasts, social media and websites constantly push out health information and advice — good, bad and insane — about diet, exercise and chronic conditions.

In contrast, when was the last time you saw a television ad or heard a snappy jingle for the MMR vaccine? Probably never. Before this outbreak, how often did talk show hosts discuss measles or news sites post stories about it? Infectious diseases that were eliminated in this country, as measles was in 2000, only make news when they reappear.

Toward the end of the Q&A in Hillsboro, Kennedy said his agency is developing a new worksheet to instruct doctors how to treat measles. That’s like suggesting alternative firefighting techniques when a simple burn ban could prevent the wildfire.

The traditional approach to measles — two doses of the MMR vaccine for young children — works. Before the South Plains outbreak, the last U.S. death from measles was in 2015.

Since the Gaines County measles outbreak began, it has grown to 702 cases, with 91 patients sick enough to need hospitalization and two deaths. We’ve exported the disease to New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas and Mexico. Kennedy’s approach to the ongoing outbreak, and to infectious disease in general, is indefensible. It just makes Americans get measles again.

— The Dallas Morning News

Alayeto, the only Bronx-based candidate who aims to secure the City Council seat representing East Harlem and the South Bronx, is officially on the ballot for the Democratic primaries, judges ruled on Wednesday.

Community Board 1 Chair Clarisa Alayeto, who is running for the local City Council seat. (Photo courtesy of DREAM/X.)

A version of this story was originally published by the Mott Haven Herald, a student-powered news outlet at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism covering the Bronx neighborhoods of Mott Haven, Melrose and Port Morris.

Clarisa M. Alayeto, the only Bronx-based candidate who aims to secure the City Council seat representing East Harlem and the South Bronx, is officially on the ballot for the Democratic primaries, judges ruled on Wednesday.

The Mott Haven Herald previously reported Alayeto’s legal challenges in securing her ballot spot after an April 28 decision from the state Supreme Court upheld her removal from the primaries. Now Alayeto, who chairs Bronx Community Board 1 and co-chairs the NYC Public Health Advisory Council, has won a complicated legal battle to defend her candidacy. So far, she has secured the most campaign donations from Bronxites in the highly competitive race.

Alayeto did not respond to multiple requests for comment. 

Since filing her petition with the New York City Board of Elections on April 2 to be in the June primaries, Alayeto encountered trouble. Her lawyer, Jorge Luis Vasquez, first submitted a cover letter with the incorrect zip code of her residence.

Vasquez rectified the error by submitting a new cover letter after the Board of Elections prompted him to do so, but there was yet another mistake: her name was misspelled as “Claris” instead of “Clarisa.” The BOE disqualified Alayeto from the race on April 11 given that “the amended cover sheet had errors not present in the original filing.” Soon after, several legal challenges ensued. 

The Appellate Division ruled against an April 28 decision by Judge Jeffrey H. Pearlman, who had rejected Alayeto’s attempts to overturn the BOE’s decision and her claims that the objections from members of the Ending Homelessness and Building a Better NYC PAC (EHBB) “lack standing.” 

RELATED READING: Group Funded by Wall Street Mogul Violates Regulations, Spends Big on South Bronx Council Candidate

Notably, given the central role typographical errors appeared to play in Alayeto’s disqualification, Pearlman’s written decision to keep her off the ballot was riddled with misspellings of her last name as “Aleyto” instead of “Alayeto.” 

The Appellate Division judges sided with Alayeto on Wednesday and rejected the BOE’s grounds for removing her from the ballot in the first place. They noted the cover letter’s errors were not “fatal defects” but rather a “scrivener’s error“—the sheet itself “substantially complied with the Election Law.”

Alayeto’s back-and-forth with the BOE and elections commissioners for the City of New York only grew more complicated when the Wall Street-backed political action committee, Ending Homelessness and Building a Better NYC, entered the fray.  

Tomás Ramos, the PAC’s founder and CEO, first filed objections on April 7 against Alayeto and four other candidates in the District 8 race: Elsie Encarnacion, Nicholas Reyes, Raymond Santana and Federico Colon.

The PAC endorses Wilfredo López, one of Alayeto’s competitors, and has spent $145,143 in digital ads and mailers for his campaign. It also endorses four other City Council candidates across the city. It has not yet filed any objections outside of District 8, the BOE’s objection ledger shows. 

“In the course of Ending Homelessness and Building a Better NYC’s standard review of petition submissions to the Board of Elections, we found various instances of filing irregularities that do not abide by election law and in some cases align with serious allegations of election fraud,” wrote Michael Brady, spokesperson for the group, in an emailed statement. “This is about protecting the integrity of our elections—not just for this race, but for every race moving forward.”

The latest ruling from the Appellate Division noted that EHBB members “did not comply with Election Law” while filing the specifications of their objections and that the Supreme Court “erred in dismissing” Alayeto’s petition after she did not mention the PAC as respondents in her previous appeal to reinstate her name on the primary ballot.

The PAC’s allegations against Alayeto include that her campaign collected invalid signatures for her petition to be on the ballot. The PAC made similar allegations against other District 8 candidates, including Nicholas Reyes and Federico Colon. No objections have been filed against López, according to a BOE objection ledger. 

Reyes, an East-Harlem native vying for the City Council seat, said the legal challenges set by the PAC have been troubling. 

“I want to say to all the candidates who are going through this—listen, hold your head up and we’re going to do this together,” said Reyes. “Some of the actions that have transpired towards my campaign through legal actions have been downright evil, in my opinion, and that’s something we cannot have—we cannot have an elected official that’s willing to go that far.”

EHBB’s challenges against Alayeto and the four other District 8 candidates have not been successful, THE CITY reported.

To reach City Limits’ editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

The post Clarisa M. Alayeto’s Bid for City Council is Officially on the Ballot, Judges Rule appeared first on City Limits.

Now it’s a playoff series.

An old saying suggests a series isn’t a series until the road team wins a contest on the opponent’s home floor. That actually occurred in Game 1, when the Warriors won at Target Center.

But a truer indication that things are up and running are what occurred Wednesday, when both head coaches started to complain about the officiating.

That didn’t take long.

Wolves coach Chris Finch fired first. Asked about Golden State’s rebounding the day after the Warriors grabbed 10 more boards than Minnesota, Finch said the Warriors “do a lot of fouling, shoving, holding, pushing and tacking Rudy (Gobert.)“

“That’s clear. We sent a bunch of those clips into the league,” Finch said. “In fact, I’m not sure I know another player in the league with Rudy’s pedigree that is allowed to be physically beaten on the way he is. And so we’ve got to address that one way or another.”

Finch said the Timberwolves will “try to take justice into our own hands whenever we can.”

“I think that’s the nature of a physical sport, but by the same token, my God, you should see some of these clips,” Finch said. “They look like pulling guards and linemen out there just taking shots at Rudy.”

Throughout the Lakers series, Finch noted Minnesota wasn’t going to worry itself with the officiating. But that’s easier done when a team is in the driver’s seat of a series. The second a coach senses a disadvantage, he’s likely to bring it to the forefront.

When made aware of Finch’s comments Wednesday, Golden State coach Steve Kerr jokingly responded, “I didn’t see a single foul on any of those plays.”

“No, yeah, there’s a lot of physicality in the lane, for sure,” Kerr added, “and they definitely could have called a couple of those.”

But Kerr has his complaints, as well. The coach noted he was upset for the opening 10 minutes of Tuesday’s bout as he watched Minnesota get ultra-physical with Steph Curry as the star guard tried to move away from the ball, a continuation of what Houston did to Curry during Golden State’s first-round series.

Kerr said Curry “hasn’t had any freedom of movement” throughout the playoffs.

“Everybody’s fouling each other. I just feel like (the officials) have a really hard job because playoff basketball is — yes, it’s physical and they’re going to allow more, but I think they could have called a foul six, seven straight possessions with them guarding Steph. So, I’ve got my complaints, too. Trust me. We all do,” the Warriors coach said. “And this is how it works in the playoffs.

“We watch the tape, we see all the fouls on them that aren’t called. They watch the tape, they see all the ones on us that weren’t called. It’s a physical game. It’s just going to be, and both teams have to adjust. I’m getting ready to send my own clips in to the league.”

Kerr said he watches teams consistently “bear-hugging” Curry, and there is no whistle. He also cited a play in which Donte DiVincenzo was constantly bumping Jimmy Butler when Butler was posting up on the interior.

“I’m sure Chris’ complaints are warranted, just like mine are,” he said. “Both teams are going to have a lot to complain about at the end of every playoff game. I don’t know what the solution is, other than what I just said: Can you call stuff early to set a tone and try to get both teams to understand where the line is? And that’s the best that the officials can do because, like I said, you call every foul, it’s a parade to the foul line, nobody wants to watch that, either. So, they have a very difficult job.”

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