The exact level of buybacks might not be clear, but what is clear is that it amounts to bugger-all in the context of BRK's cash balances. The finished the quarter with, what, $95 billion in cash and short term investments? So dropping a bil on buybacks hardly constitutes an aggressive, high conviction move.
I say either get serious about deploying some of that cash on buybacks, or institute a considerable cash dividend. Buying Apple sharss soaked up some cash, but it really doesnt inspire confidence in management given previous observations about circle of competence.
SJ
If he doesn't make a sudden surprise tender like I originally speculated (and that's a low probability), it's hard to draw any other conclusions from this than that dividends are way closer than previously suspected. Barring an -08 type drawdown the idle cash will keep growing at a rapid clip. A luxurious problem to have, but these puny buybacks don't even offer a partial solution.
StubbleJumper & alwaysinvert,
How do you feel and think about the whole thing today Monday?
- In a time context, your posts was just after the Berkshire 10-Q was released. Now we have had ongoing discussion during the weekend and analysis of the 10-Q, and it has come up that about ~USD 15B has been allocated to financials during 2018Q3 [- of the ~USD 15 B ~USD 6 B allocated to BAC -], on top of the share buyback of ~USD 1 B in the quarter.
Furthermore considerations/speculations [ time will tell ] that more capital has been allocated to perhaps BK, USB & GS, perhaps even new positions in financials.
Personally, I was a bit disappointed just after the release of the 10-Q, too. After a couple of nights sleep on it, I have a good feeling about this here Monday morning. The upward trend in liquidity surplus has been turned, and Berkshire is still the Rock of Gibraltar. All in all, not that bad, because it's actually able to generate good earnings and cash flow as it is.