From April 29 to May 1 (Beijing time, April 30 to May 2, Beijing time), Berkshire Hathaway will hold its annual shareholders' meeting in Omaha, Nebraska, the hometown of its founder Warren Buffett. It will be held offline for the first time since the outbreak in 2019.

The shareholders' meeting, also known as the "Spring Festival Gala of the investment community," attracted the attention of the global investment community. There were not only video shows and products from Berkshire subsidiaries, but also a rare opportunity for investors. You can hear legendary investors, Warren Buffett, 92, and Charlie Munger, 98, who usually take part in marathon Q & A sessions for hours.

It is estimated that more than 40,000 people may attend the scene. At that time, Buffett's retirement plan, company successors, future investment plans and views on the current market and the global economy will inevitably become the focus of attention of all shareholders and even the global market.

Buffett, who has a net worth of more than $100 billion, is known as the "prophet of Omaha". His Berkshire Hathaway Class A share price closed above $500000 for the first time in March this year.Set an all-time closing highIt has far outperformed the S & P 500, which has been falling this year.

Berkshire Class A shares are the first shares issued by the company. As the company persisted in not paying dividends and splitting shares, its price soared over time and eventually became one of the most expensive stocks on Wall Street. The company currently has a market capitalization of $743 billion.

Specific arrangements for shareholders' meeting

On Friday, April 29, local time, Berkshire Hathaway's shareholders' meeting will be held in CHI Health Center, north of Omaha.

Like the schedule of offline shareholder meetings in previous years, the event also included three full days of events: weekend parties, meetings sponsored by investment advisers, 5km jogging sponsored by Berkshire's Brooks Sports, and other shopping activities.

The specific arrangements for Friday, April 29 are: collection of attendance cards, shareholder shopping and shareholder exclusive shopping night.

The specific arrangements for Saturday the 30th are: the opening of the shareholders' meeting, the broadcast of the annual meeting convention film, the question and answer session of the shareholders' meeting, the formal business meeting of the company and the NFM Berkshire picnic.

The specific arrangements for Sunday, May 1 are: the "invest in yourself" five-kilometer race and the exclusive shopping day for shareholders.

This year's shareholders' meeting, the most eye-catching is undoubtedly the question and answer session. Shareholders on the spot will be selected at random, and CNBC reporters will sort out questions from shareholders who are unable to attend the meeting and pick the questions she thinks people are most interested in.

Buffett will give shareholders full freedom. Buffett said in the invitation that any shareholder who was drawn on the spot could ask questions simply by walking to any of the 11 microphones at the scene.

Will the "impeachment" retirement plan come true in old age?

Just last week, CalPERS, the largest state public pension fund in the United States, revealed that it planned to vote for Berkshire Hathaway's shareholder proposal to remove Buffett as chairman.

The fund holds more than $450 billion in total assets, including about $2.3 billion in Berkshire Hathaway shares. The National Center for Law and Policy, one of the company's shareholders, called for an independent chairman, saying the chairman and chief executive were held by the same official, weakening the company's governance structure.

Under the proposal, Buffett could continue as CEO. But Berkshire's board opposed the proposal to remove Buffett as chairman, saying last month that "as long as Buffett is Berkshire Hathaway's CEO, he should remain chairman and CEO".

The proposal seems to face an uphill struggle. In addition to the board's veto, Buffett himself holds 32% of the company's voting interests.

However, half a month ago, in an exclusive interview with Charlie Ross, a well-known former CBS host, Buffett admitted that age had begun to have some impact on him, occasionally "forgetting his name and not being able to read as fast as before." He calls himself a "rotting machine", but still "feels great".

As a result, some Wall Street analysts speculated that at this year's shareholder meeting, Buffett may give a retirement timetable and finally identify Berkshire's future successor.

Two potential successors appear at the shareholders' meeting for the first time

Not only Buffett and Munger will be partners again, but Greg Abel and Ajit Jain, who are seen by the industry as Buffett's "potential successors", will also attend.

In January 2018, Buffett promoted the two executives to Berkshire's board of directors.

Buffett admitted in an interview with CNBC on May 3 last year: "the directors agreed that if I left office, Greg Abel, vice chairman of Berkshire's non-insurance business, would take over as CEO." "

Abel, 59, has been working for a small power company called CalEnergy since 1992. He became president of the company in 1998 and changed its name to MidAmerican Energy Holdings. The company was acquired by Berkshire Hathaway in 2000 and is now Berkshire Hathaway Energy (BHE). Abel served as CEO of the company from 2008 to 2018 and is now chairman.

According to Forbes, Abel owns 1 per cent of Berkshire Hathaway Energy, worth about $480 million, accounting for most of his net worth. He also owns a trust fund in which he owns five Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares and 2363 Class B shares for family members. His Class A shares are worth about $2.8 million and Class B shares are worth more than $400000.

Wall Street mentioned earlier that, unlike Buffett and Munger, Abel, who is low-key by nature, doesn't like to be in the spotlight. In spite of this, he is still impressed by his outstanding performance in mergers and acquisitions. His friend once described it as: "his life is work, and he hides his talents behind his humble attitude."

Abel himself is not young. So it may be reasonable that Buffett wants him to be Berkshire Hathaway's CEO.

Another successor is Ajit Jain, vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway's insurance business.Buffett said frankly that Berkshire's board had reached a consensus on who should take over from CEO immediately:

If anything happens to me tonight, Greg will replace CEO the next morning. If anything happens to Greg, another vice chairman, Ajit, will take over.

How will Buffett explain the logic of investment recently?

Global markets have had troubled times so far this year. Since the outbreak of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Buffett, who is good at taking advantage of market turmoil to exploit opportunities, has continued to buy shares in western oil companies, with a cumulative shareholding of 136.4 million shares, accounting for 14.6% of the outstanding shares of western oil, worth more than $7.2 billion.

Soon after, Buffett stepped in again, buying insurance company Alleghany for $11.6 billion, Buffett's biggest acquisition in six years.

Buffett bought another 121 million Hewlett-Packard shares after buying oil stocks and buying insurance companies. The investment gives Berkshire about 11.4% of HP, making it the largest shareholder in the PC and printer maker.

According to Business Insider, James Shanahan, a senior equity analyst at investment firm Edward Jones, expectsThere will be two other deals next year. Berkshire Hathaway is likely to spend about $4 billion to increase its stake in Pilot Flying J, the largest truck rest station operator in the US, to 80 per cent in early 2023.

In addition, the company may soon acquire Walter Scott Jr. The family owns 8% of Berkshire Hathaway Energy. That would increase its shareholding to more than 99 per cent, Shanahan said.

That makes it possible for Berkshire Hathaway to invest more than $33 billion over 18 months, more than the $30 billion it invested in the stock market in 2020.

At the end of 2021, Berkshire Hathaway had $144 billion in cash on its books. But in any case, Berkshire may still struggle to reduce its cash reserves. Shanahan points out that the company generates about $33 billion in free cash flow every five quarters:

Unless there are other investments, Berkshire is likely to still hold $150 billion in cash by mid-2023.

This week, Shanahan downgraded the stock to "hold" and said its current share price already reflected that the stock could outperform its financial services peers this year.

At the upcoming shareholders' meeting, Buffett may give a more detailed response to the recent investment actions and reveal his investment prospects and plans for the future. Buffett recently called the meeting a "very, very important meeting".

The Prophet of Omaha is not a false name.

Buffett's repeated accurate predictions of stocks and markets earned him the nickname "Oracle of Omaha".

In 2011, Bank of America Corporation was hit by the aftershocks of the subprime crisis, and the share price fell to $7 from $19 the previous year. Buffett sensed the opportunity and bought $5 billion of Bank of America Corporation preferred stock.

The preferred shares are accompanied by warrants, and Buffett can buy 700m shares of Bank of America Corporation at $7.14m a share. When Buffett exercised power in 2017, he made $12 billion.

When the Dow fell below 600 in late 1974, Buffett told Forbes that he thought "now is the time to start investing." By the time the interview was published, the Dow had risen nearly 15% to 660 points.

This prediction particularly highlights Buffett's investment philosophy:

Fear when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are afraid.

Whenever Buffett speaks, the world listens with hold of breath. This time, let us focus on this legendary figure.