Berkshire Cash Hoard Falls as Company Buys Nearly $20 Billion in Stocks

Berkshire Hathaway’s cash levels fell in the second quarter, but its reserves remained among the largest held by any U.S. company.

Berkshire Hathaway CEO Greg Abel is overseeing a more active deployment of the company’s massive cash reserves as the conglomerate increases stock purchases. [Photo: Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Hodrick Realty]

One reason for the decline was that Berkshire became a net buyer of nearly $20 billion of stocks in the second quarter, reversing its pattern of net stock sales in the previous quarter, Andrew Bary reported for Barron’s Daily.

Berkshire bought about $23 billion of stocks in the second quarter and sold just over $3 billion, compared with roughly $24 billion in stock sales during the first quarter.

The company’s cash and U.S. Treasury-bill holdings declined to about $365 billion at the end of June from roughly $380 billion at the end of March. Berkshire also spent about $4.5 billion on share buybacks during the quarter.

Berkshire reported net income of $25.67 billion for the second quarter, more than double the year-earlier figure.

The results included a $12.68 billion investment gain, largely reflecting changes in the market value of its equity holdings.

Berkshire generally urges investors to focus on operating earnings rather than net income because investment gains and losses can cause significant swings in reported earnings.

Todd Combs’ departure from Berkshire is also correctly dated to late 2025. JPMorgan Chase announced in December 2025 that Combs would leave Berkshire and join the bank in January 2026 to lead its Strategic Investment Group.