Wednesday, November 19, 2008

How much of ConocoPhillips did Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway hold, as of Sept. 30?



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Question: How much of ConocoPhillips did Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway hold, as of Sept. 30?


Answer: 84 million shares

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Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Sharply Boosts ConocoPhillips Stake

Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway sharply increased its stake in ConocoPhillips this spring and summer, accumulating a total of 84 million shares as of the end of the third quarter on September 30, according to Berkshire's just-released quarterly portfolio filing with the SEC.

That makes Berkshire the biggest holder of Conoco shares, with 5.6 percent of the shares outstanding.

In mid-May, Berkshire reported holding 17.5 million shares as of March 31. That means Berkshire's stake in Conoco increased almost five-fold over six months.

Its Conoco holdings were kept confidential and not included in its portfolio snapshot released in mid-August for the end of the second quarter. A separate filing tonight reveals that Berkshire held 59.7 million shares as of June 30.

At today's closing price of $47.39, Berkshire's stake in Conoco is worth almost $4 billion, and accounts for 7.3 percent of its U.S. stock portfolio. Conoco's stock has dropped almost 32 percent since September 30. At that point, the stake was worth just over $6 billion.



Today's filing for the third quarter also reveals a new 2.9 million share stake in Eaton Corporation. That stake was worth about $163 million as of September 30. The stock has dropped 23.5 percent since then, bringing the market value of the holdings down to just under $120 million. Eaton describes itself as a "diversified power management company."

Berkshire increased its holdings in NRG Energy to 5 million shares from 3.2 million shares, an increase of 54 percent. Berkshire first started buying NRG shares during the second quarter of this year.

Aside from those three stocks, Buffett wasn't doing any buying for Berkshire through the end of September. Stock market declines accelerated in October, and in the middle of the month Buffett wrote in the New York Times that he'd been enthusiastically picking up U.S. stocks for his personal account. We'll almost certainly have to wait until Berkshire's December 31 snapshot is released in mid-February to see if he was also buying after September 30 for the company's portfolio.

Several stakes were reduced between June 30 and September 30.

Berkshire's stake in Bank of America was almost cut in half during the third quarter, dropping 45 percent to 5 million shares from just over 9 million.

Carmax dropped to 18.4 million shares from 21.3 million, a decline of 13.4 percent.

Berkshire stake in Home Depot dropped by 11.5 percent, to 3.7 million shares from 4.2 million.

Lowe's was trimmed by 7.1 percent to 6.5 million shares from 7 million.

Here are the details from tonight's Berkshire Hathaway portfolio snapshot as of September 30, compared to the filing for June 30.

ADDED STAKE

Eaton Corp. added at 2,908,700 shares.
INCREASED STAKES

Comdisco stake increased slightly to 1,538,377 shares from 1,537,866 shares.

ConocoPhillips stake increased 40.7% to 83,955,800 shares from 59,688,000 shares.

NRG Energy stake increased 54.4% to 5,000,000 shares from 3,238,100 shares.

US Bancorp stake increased 6.3% to 72,937,126 shares from 68,631,026 shares.


DECREASED STAKES

Bank of America stake decreased 45.1% to 5,000,000 shares from 9,100,000 shares.

Carmax stake decreased 13.4% to 18,444,100 shares from 21,300,000 shares.

Home Depot stake decreased 11.5% to 3,700,000 shares from 4,181,000 shares.

Lowes Companies stake decreased 7.1% to 6,500,000 shares from 7,000,000 shares.

UnitedHealth Group stake decreased 0.3% to 6,379,900 shares from 6,400,000 shares.

Wells Fargo stake decreased 0.1% to 290,407,668 shares from 290,654,868 shares.

Wellpoint stake decreased 0.5% to 4,777,300 shares from 4,800,000 shares.


UNCHANGED STAKES

American Express unchanged at 151,610,700 shares.
Anhesuer-Busch stake unchanged at 13,845,000 shares.


Burlington Northern unchanged at 63,785,418 shares.
(Berkshire reported holding 64,610,418 shares as of October 28.)


Coca-Cola unchanged at 200,000,000 shares.


Comcast unchanged at 12,000,000 shares.


Costco Wholesale unchanged at 5,254,000 shares.


Gannett unchanged at 3,447,600 shares.


General Electric unchanged at 7,777,900 shares.


GlaxoSmithKline unchanged at 1,510,500 shares.


Ingersoll-Rand unchanged at 5,636,600 shares.


Iron Mountain unchanged at 3,372,200 shares.


Johnson & Johnson unchanged at 61,754,448 shares.


Kraft Foods unchanged at 138,272,500 shares.


M&T Bank unchanged at 6,715,060 shares.


Moody's unchanged at 48,000,000 shares.


Nike unchanged at 7,641,000 shares.


Norfolk Southern unchanged at 1,933,000 shares.


Procter & Gamble unchanged at 105,847,000 shares.


Sanofi Aventis unchanged at 3,903,933 shares.


SunTrust Banks unchanged at 3,204,600 shares.


Torchmark unchanged at 2,823,879 shares.


USG unchanged at 17,072,192 shares.


Union Pacific unchanged at 8,906,000 shares.


United Parcel Service unchanged at 1,429,200 shares.


Wabco Holdings unchanged at 2,700,000 shares.


Wal-Mart Stores unchanged at 19,944,300 shares.


Washington Post unchanged at 1,727,765 shares.


Wesco Financial unchanged at 5,703,087 shares.

Current Berkshire stock prices:

Class A:

Class B:

Questions? Comments? Email me at buffettwatch@cnbc.com

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