Greg Abel exited positions including Visa, Mastercard, Amazon, and UnitedHealth while boosting Berkshire's Alphabet stake to almost 58 million shares
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Berkshire Hathaway $BRK.B CEO Greg Abel exited 16 stock positions and increased the company's stake in Google $GOOGL parent Alphabet by 224% during his first quarter running the conglomerate, according to a 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
At year-end 2025, Berkshire's Alphabet position stood at 17.8 million shares valued at $5.6 billion; by March 31, that figure had grown to nearly 58 million shares worth approximately $17 billion, according to Fortune. The stake is now among Berkshire's five largest disclosed equity holdings, according to Yahoo Finance.
Among the full exits were Visa $V, Mastercard $MA, UnitedHealth $UNH Group, Domino $DPZ's Pizza, Amazon $AMZN, Aon $AON, Pool Corp., Heico, Liberty Formula One, Charter Communications, Lamar Advertising, Allegion $ALLE, Diageo, Liberty Latin America Series C, and Atlanta Braves Holdings; Constellation Brands $STZ was reduced by 95% rather than sold outright, according to CNBC. The combined value of the eliminated positions was about $14 billion, according to Barron's.
A likely explanation for the selloff is the exit of portfolio manager Todd Combs, according to Barron's. Combs departed for a role at JPMorgan $JPM Chase in December and had been responsible for approximately 5% of Berkshire's equity book — a share that aligns with the roughly $14 billion in positions that were unwound.
A new 39.8 million-share position in Delta Air Lines, worth roughly $2.8 billion, marks Berkshire's return to the airline sector for the first time since early 2020, when Buffett exited all of the company's carrier holdings at a loss as Covid-19 collapsed air travel demand, according to CNBC. The company added a small new position in Macy's $M worth about $55 million and tripled its stake in The New York Times to 15.1 million shares, according to CNBC.
Net of its trading activity — $16 billion in purchases against $24 billion in sales — Berkshire ended the quarter with an equity portfolio valued at more than $300 billion, according to Barron's. The company's total tax bill related to equity sales in the quarter was about $2 billion, according to Barron's.
By historical standards, the quarter ranked among Berkshire's busiest ever for trading activity, according to CNBC. Abel took over as CEO on Jan. 1, 2026, after Buffett retired from the role he had held for decades. Buffett remains chairman of the board.
As Berkshire's first-quarter operating earnings showed, the company held $397 billion in cash at the end of March. Abel has signaled a cautious approach to deploying that capital, telling shareholders the company would pursue artificial intelligence "only where it could demonstrate genuine value."
The Alphabet expansion could indicate that Abel is prepared to take concentrated positions in major technology companies — territory Buffett largely steered clear of, citing an inability to identify durable winners over the long run, according to Fortune.
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