<div id="readability-page-1"><span></span><div><p><em>(This is the Warren Buffett Watch newsletter, news and analysis on all things Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway. You can sign up </em><em>here</em><em> to receive it every Friday evening in your inbox.)</em></p><p>Just one week after Berkshire Hathaway's revelation last Friday that it purchased 17.8 million Class A shares of Google's parent, <span id="SpecialReportArticle-QuoteInBody-3">Alphabet<span><span id="-WatchlistDropdown"></span></span></span>, in the third quarter (July-September), that position has increased in market value by $415 million to almost $5.35 billion.</p><p>GOOGL gained 8.4% this week while its biggest tech rivals fell significantly as <span id="SpecialReportArticle-QuoteInBody-6">Nvidia's<span><span id="-WatchlistDropdown"></span></span></span> strong earnings failed to overcome fears of an &#34;AI bubble.&#34;</p></div><div><p>Alphabet shares started the week with a 3.1% boost on Monday, apparently in reaction to the news of Berkshire's purchase.</p><p>Wednesday's release of Google's new Gemini 3 AI model, which is receiving positive reviews, gave the stock another push higher.</p><p>(Google's AI momentum is reportedly beginning to worry Sam Altman at OpenAI.)</p><p>While the full evaluation of the move obviously can't be made until months or years from now, someone in Omaha is probably smiling right now.</p><p>Warren Buffett is getting the credit in a lot of headlines, as he usually does, with many publications assuming he is responsible for everything Berkshire does.</p><p>We know that's not the case, however, since portfolio managers Ted Weschler and Todd Combs are able to act as &#34;free agents.&#34;</p><p>As I noted last week, Alphabet doesn't feel like Buffett's &#34;kind of stock.&#34;</p><p><em>CNBC.com's</em> Yun Li writes the investment &#34;likely&#34; was the work of Weschler or Coombs, noting they have been behind many of Berkshire's &#34;tech-leaning&#34; investments, including its <span id="SpecialReportArticle-QuoteInBody-13">Amazon<span><span id="-WatchlistDropdown"></span></span></span> stake, now worth $2.2 billion.</p><p>(Even before that position was first disclosed in 2019, Buffett went out of his way to tell CNBC's Becky Quick it wasn't his decision and &#34;no personality change has taken place.&#34;)</p></div><div id="ArticleBody-InlineImage-108140428"><div><div><p>Warren Buffett and Greg Abel walkthrough the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Shareholders Meeting in Omaha, Nebraska on May 3, 2025. </p><p>David A. Grogen | CNBC</p></div></div></div><div><p><em>Bloomberg Opinion</em> columnist Nir Kaissar recalls Buffett's famous refusal to invest in a business he doesn't fully understand, which kept him out of the internet bubble in the late 1990s, calling AI &#34;orders of magnitude more complicated than selling books or pet food online.&#34;</p><p>He adds, &#34;Combine opaque technology with premium valuations, and you're sure to lose Buffett.&#34;</p><p>Kaissar says he has the impression CEO-designate Greg Abel may have just shown us a &#34;very different approach than Berkshire's shareholders are used to – notably, a new willingness to pay more now for potentially higher growth down the road, a chance Buffett rarely took, if ever.&#34;</p><p>Berkshire has not responded to my midday email asking for clarification on who decided to make the Alphabet purchase. The company almost never reveals who bought what.</p></div><h2>BUFFETT AROUND THE INTERNET</h2><div><p><strong>Some links may require a subscription:</strong></p><ul><li>Reuters on MSN: Buffett-owned utility reaches $150 million Oregon wildfire settlement</li></ul><ul><li>CNBC Inside Wealth: How Byron Trott became the favorite banker of Warren Buffett and America's wealthiest families</li></ul><ul><li>Fortune: Warren Buffett's exit is 'leadership at its most selfless,' McKinsey CEO whisperer says. It's a powerful lesson in Fortune 500 succession</li></ul><ul><li>The Times of London: What you can learn from Warren Buffett's goodbye letter</li></ul></div><h2>HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE ARCHIVE</h2><h2>Buffett on what 'understanding' a business means (2000)</h2><p>Warren Buffett explains that when he says he doesn't understand tech stocks, he means he doesn't understand where the tech industry will be in ten years.</p><div><p><strong>AUDIENCE MEMBER</strong>: In terms of these tech stocks, you say that you don't understand them... I can't imagine you not understanding something.</p><p><strong>WARREN BUFFETT</strong>: Oh, we understand the product. We understand what it does for people. We just don't know the economics of it 10 years from now.</p><p>That, I mean, you can understand all kinds -- you can understand steel. You can understand home building. But if you look at a home builder and try and think where it's going to be in five or 10 years, the economics of it, that's another question.</p><p>I mean, it's not a question of understanding the product they turn out or the means they use to distribute it, all of those sort of things. It's the predictability of the economics of the situation 10 years out. And that -- that's our problem.</p></div><h2>BERKSHIRE STOCK WATCH</h2><p><strong>Four weeks</strong></p><p><strong>Twelve months</strong></p><div><p>BRK.A stock price: $755,320.00</p><p>BRK.B stock price: $504.04</p><p>BRK.B P/E (TTM): 16.12</p><p>Berkshire market capitalization: $1,085,818,736,612</p><p>Berkshire Cash as of September 30: $381.7 billion (Up 10.9% from June 30</p><p>Excluding Rail Cash and Subtracting T-Bills Payable: $354.3 billion (Up 4.3% from June 30)</p><p>No Berkshire stock repurchases since May 2024.</p><p>(All figures are as of the date of publication, unless otherwise indicated)</p></div><h2>BERKSHIRE'S TOP EQUITY HOLDINGS - Nov. 21, 2025</h2><div><p>Berkshire's top holdings of disclosed publicly traded stocks in the U.S. and Japan, by market value, based on today's closing prices.</p><p>Holdings are as of September 30, 2025, as reported in Berkshire Hathaway's 13F filing on November 14, 2025, except for:</p><ul><li>Mitsubishi, which is as of August 28, 2025. Tokyo Stock Exchange prices are converted to U.S. dollars from Japanese yen.</li></ul><p>The full list of holdings and current market values is available from CNBC.com's Berkshire Hathaway Portfolio Tracker.</p></div><h2>QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS</h2><div><p>Please send any questions or comments about the newsletter to me at alex.crippen@nbcuni.com. (Sorry, but we don't forward questions or comments to Buffett himself.)</p><p>If you aren't already subscribed to this newsletter, you can sign up here.</p><p>Also, Buffett's annual letters to shareholders are highly recommended reading. There are collected here on Berkshire's website.</p><p>-- Alex Crippen, Editor, Warren Buffett Watch</p></div></div>

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<p>Berkshire Hathaway's recent purchase of 17.8 million Alphabet shares, now valued at $5.35 billion, suggests a potential shift towards higher risk investments for greater rewards. While Warren Buffett is often credited, the decision likely came from portfolio managers Ted Weschler or Todd Combs. This move may indicate a new approach under CEO-designate Greg Abel, contrasting Buffett's traditional caution with tech investments. The purchase has positively impacted Alphabet's stock, reflecting a broader acceptance of tech's growth potential.</p>

- Berkshire Hathaway's investment in Alphabet has increased in value by $415 million, reaching nearly $5.35 billion after purchasing 17.8 million Class A shares.  
- The rise in Alphabet's stock was influenced by positive market reactions to Berkshire's purchase and the launch of Google's new AI model, Gemini 3.  
- Analysts suggest that the investment may have been made by portfolio managers Ted Weschler or Todd Combs, rather than Warren Buffett himself, reflecting a potential shift in Berkshire's investment strategy.

Does Berkshire's big tech bet signal a new risk tolerance in Omaha?