Source: Barron's

$Berkshire Hathaway-A (BRK.A.US)$/$Berkshire Hathaway-B (BRK.B.US)$According to the 13-F file submitted on Tuesday (11/14), Berkshire liquidation in the third quarter$General Motors (GM.US)$It also proposed that the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) keep one or more of its positions confidential, and did not disclose these positions in the 13-F document.

These “mysterious” holdings are likely to be financial stocks. Berkshire revealed in a recently submitted 10-Q document that it increased its holdings of financial stocks by 1.2 billion US dollars in the third quarter, while the increase in financial stock holdings was not disclosed in the 13-F document.

When Berkshire increases its stock holdings and does not want to disclose this information to the market, Buffett occasionally asks the SEC to keep it confidential. This happened at the end of 2020, when Berkshire increased its holdings$Chevron (CVX.US)$with$Verizon (VZ.US)$ 。

It is worth noting that Buffett's proposed confidential holdings account for only a small portion of Berkshire's $350 billion stock portfolio, which may be worth around $1 billion. Buffett is generally unwilling to reveal too much about Berkshire's operations in the stock market. It is not common for large investors to request that their positions be kept confidential, and sometimes the SEC will not approve such requirements.

According to the 13-F document, Berkshire no longer held GM shares at the end of the third quarter. Since the beginning of this year, GM's stock price has fallen 16%, and the company has recently experienced a large-scale workers' strike.

Berkshire has also cleared some of its smaller holdings, including$Procter & Gamble (PG.US)$,$Mondelez International (MDLZ.US)$with$United Parcel Service (UPS.US)$At the same time, Berkshire reduced its holdings$HP Inc (HPQ.US)$and Chevron.

Berkshire opened positions in the third quarter$Liberty Live-A (LLYVA.US)$ have the right to vote) and$Liberty Live-C (LLYVK.US)$ (No voting rights), holding a total of 16 million shares. These two positions are the result of the Liberty SiriusXM spin-off in August. Berkshire holds about 63 million shares of Liberty SiriusXM, and shareholders receive 0.25 shares of Liberty Live for every Liberty SiriusXM share they hold.

According to long-term researchers in Berkshire, the investment in Liberty SiriusXM was initiated by Ted Weschler (Ted Weschler), one of Buffett's two deputies. Weschler and Buffett's other deputy, Todd Combs (Todd Combs), manages about 10% of Berkshire's stock portfolio, and the two usually make investment decisions independently.

Berkshire opened positions in the third quarter$Sirius XM (SIRI.US)$ Valued at $44 million, the stock rose 8% on Wednesday. This investment may also have been initiated by Weschler.

The 13-F file shows that Berkshire has still opened positions$Atlanta Braves-C (BATRK.US)$ The number of shares held is about 223,000 shares. These shares may have come from the Liberty Formula One spin-off held by Berkshire.

The spin-off was planned by Liberty Media, owned by media mogul John Malone (John Malone).

In the third quarter, it accounted for 50% of Berkshire's investment portfolio$Apple (AAPL.US)$The value of its position fell from 176 billion US dollars to 157 billion US dollars, but Berkshire did not make any adjustments to its positions. Also, Berkshire hasn't adjusted$Bank of America (BAC.US)$,$American Express (AXP.US)$with$Coca-Cola (KO.US)$The position of equal-weight stocks.

In the third quarter, Berkshire sold 7 billion US dollars of shares and bought 1.7 billion US dollars of shares. In the first nine months of this year, the company had a net sale of about 23 billion US dollars in shares. In comparison, it had a net stock purchase of 49 billion US dollars in the first nine months of 2022.

By the end of September, Berkshire's cash and equivalents reached a record $157 billion, up from nearly $10 billion at the end of June. Berkshire also bought back $1.1 billion in shares.

One thing investors who want to invest like Buffett can learn from him is that failure is part of success, and even Buffett's company sometimes makes mistakes, such as investing in GM stocks.

Perhaps Buffett's greatest secret to success was being able to withstand the market downturn and learn from his mistakes. Morgan Housel (Morgan Housel) pointed out in the book “The Psychology of Money” (The Psychology of Money) that the vast majority of Buffett's wealth was obtained after he was 65 years old, and this wealth was the result of his continuous investment for over 70 years.

This is Buffett's true wisdom — as long as you stay in the game long enough, it becomes easier to become a winner.

Editor/jayden