Berkshire Hathaway‘s shares went up on Monday after Warren Buffett’s company reported a big increase in earnings from its businesses and also had a lot of cash saved up.
The Class A shares of the company went up by 0.3% in the morning, while the Class B shares went up by about 0.4%.
This happened after Berkshire announced that it made $11.22 billion in profits in the first quarter, which is 39% more than last year. Most of this money came from the insurance business. When we say “operating profit,” we’re talking about the money Berkshire makes from all its different businesses.
Berkshire’s insurance businesses, especially Geico, made a lot of money because more people are buying insurance and the prices are higher. They made $2.598 billion from insurance, which is 185% more than last year. Geico alone made $1.928 billion, which is 174% more than last year.
Berkshire now has a lot of cash saved up because it hasn’t found any good companies to buy recently. They have $188.99 billion in cash, which is the most they’ve ever had.
Warren Buffett talked about this at the annual shareholder meeting in Omaha, Nebraska. He said, “We made a lot more money from insurance this year, and we also made more money from our investments because interest rates went up.”
Berkshire’s shares have been doing well this year. They’ve gone up by more than 10%, while the S&P 500, which is a measure of how well the stock market is doing, has gone up by only 7%.
The Class A shares reached their highest price ever in March, hitting $634,440. On Friday, they closed at $603,000. The Class B shares were at about $402.60 on Monday, which is about 4% lower than their highest price of $420.52, also in March.
Experts are positive about Berkshire’s future. One analyst from UBS, Brian Meredith, thinks Berkshire’s stock is a good buy because it made more money than expected, and Geico is improving its technology. He thinks the price of Berkshire’s shares could go up to $734,820, which is 22% higher than where they were on Friday.
Another analyst from Edward Jones, James Shanahan, thinks Berkshire’s stock is already priced fairly. But he still thinks Berkshire will keep making good money from its different businesses.
