Warren Buffett emphasizes the “shame of capitalism” by criticizing Biden and praising the virtues of Coca-Cola.

In his annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders, released on Saturday, Warren Buffett lauded the virtues of Coca-Cola, dealt a clear blow to President Joe Biden and expressed frustration at “one of the shames of capitalism.”

Berkshire’s CEO spoke about his firm’s wins over the years, highlighting its $1.3 billion bet on Coca-Cola in 1994 and $25 billion at the end of 2022. He noted that the dividend rose to $704 million from last year, up from the first year, writing, “The rise has been every year, as true as birthdays. All [Vice Chairman Charlie Munger] and I was required to cash Coke’s quarterly dividend checks. We expect these checks to likely rise.”

The legendary investor also defended the buyback. Last year, the US government introduced a 1% tax on them, a late addition to the Inflation Reduction Act, and Biden has signaled his support for raising it.

“When you are told that All buyouts hurt shareholders or country, or the CEO is especially profitable, you are listening to either an economic illiterate or an eloquent demagogue (characters who No mutually exclusive),” he wrote.

His firm has been one of the largest buybacks in the US in recent years, buying back almost $8 billion of its own shares in 2022, $27 billion in 2021, and about $25 billion in 2020.

“There are many hundreds of Berkshire millionaires and, yes, billionaires who have never studied our financials,” he wrote. “They just know that Charlie and I – along with our families and close friends – continue to invest very heavily in Berkshire, and they trust us to treat their money as they would their own.”

Buffett also drew attention to the financial tricks that managers often use to beat analysts’ expectations.

“Even current The profit margins we maintain can be easily manipulated by managers who want to do so,” he warned. “Such interference is often considered sophisticated by CEOs, directors and their advisors. Journalists and analysts also welcome its existence.”

He called the activity “disgusting,” adding: “It doesn’t take any talent to manipulate numbers: it only takes a deep desire to deceive. “Bold creative accounting,” as a CEO once described his deceit to me, has become one of the shames of capitalism.

Berkshire Hathaway has been one of the most respected companies in the US for decades. Running such a firm seems to correlate with the longevity of CEOs, and Buffett has been in that position for more than half a century.

This story was originally published on Fortune.com.

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