The Berkshire Beat: November 28, 2025

All of the latest Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway news!

This Thanksgiving, I am especially thankful for each and every one of you.

To every reader who opens these letters each week, who (in YouTube parlance) likes and subscribes, who forwards the occasional post to a friend, who takes a moment to leave a comment that makes me smile or think harder — a heartfelt thank you.

And a special sprinkling of gratitude for the wonderful group of paid supporters who make this whole thing possible. You are the reason this newsletter can afford to exist in the form that it does. What might look like “just” a summary of Berkshire Hathaway news or a cleaned-up transcript of an old Warren Buffett speech is usually the product of dozens of hours of digging, reading, writing, and re-writing.

The fact that you have decided this little corner of the internet is worth real money and real space in your life humbles me more than words can say.

So thank you, again, for believing that Kingswell is worth it.

I will continue to do my very best to keep it that way — and ensure that your time, attention, and trust are never misplaced.

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The Wall Street Journal published a wonderful retrospective of Charlie Munger’s final years. His stepson, Hal Borthwick, summed Charlie up best: “To the day he died, that mind was running. He never stopped learning.”

That relentless curiosity was on display until the very end, as he contemplated the future of artificial intelligence and even re-evaluated so prosaic a commodity as coal. In the last year of his life, Charlie became convinced that the market severely underestimated coal’s enduring role in the global energy mix — and put his money behind that conviction with investments in Consol Energy and Alpha Metallurgical Resources. He soon had a paper gain of more than $50 million on these stocks.

• Each week, Charlie also hosted a group of business associates and friends at the Los Angeles Country Club to talk shop — and often hammered home one particular thought: “Take out Berkshire’s top five investments and its returns are pretty middling.” Even after building one of the greatest investment track records of all time, the man remained allergic to self-congratulation and never stopped reminding everyone (including himself) how much of success comes down to a handful of big, asymmetric wins.

• There are lighter moments, too: In their later years, Munger and Buffett’s phone calls became unintentional family entertainment because both men had grown so hard of hearing that the entire household could follow just about every word of their booming conversations.

Mark Gurman of Bloomberg swatted aside last week’s Financial Times bombshell about Apple CEO Tim Cook’s imminent retirement. And, when it comes to Apple news and rumors, Gurman’s batting average would put him in Cooperstown.

“Based on everything I’ve learned in recent weeks,” he wrote, “I don’t believe a departure by the middle of next year is likely. In fact, I would be shocked if Cook steps down in the time frame outlined by the FT.” Gurman likewise dismissed speculation that the story may have been a “test balloon” floated by Apple to prepare Wall Street for any upheaval. “That isn’t the case, either. I believe the story was simply false.”

Speaking of Apple… Counterpoint Research is back this week with more good news for the iPhone maker. According to the firm’s latest global smartphone forecast, Apple will dethrone Samsung as the world’s top smartphone maker — claiming the top spot for the first time in fourteen years — on the back of robust iPhone 17 sales. These coveted new models have driven double-digit growth in both the United States and China, with Apple now projected to hold 19.4% of the market by year’s end.

But that’s not all! Counterpoint also expects Apple — with its much-awaited foldable iPhone rumored for 2026 — to remain #1 for years to come.

“Given an increasing preference for the iOS ecosystem, compatibility between devices, and a substantial number of older models within Apple’s installed base due for renewal,” the report notes, “Apple will retain the lead over other smartphone OEMs through the end of the decade.”

Earlier this month, Markel CEO Tom Gayner joined the Behind the Balance Sheet podcast — and, with Berkshire Hathaway being by far the largest stock in his portfolio, had much to say about the conglomerate. To start, Gayner remains utterly unfazed by Berkshire’s underwhelming stock performance (lagging the S&P 500 and trading well off its highs) since the annual meeting in May.

“What happens in any particular six-month period is irrelevant,” he said. “When you consider the way [Warren Buffett] does things — and the north star that he uses — it doesn’t really include short-term comparisons to the S&P 500. I don’t think it enters his mind that much. And, similarly, to the best of my ability, I try not to let it enter my mind as well.”

Gayner also marveled at how, though many in the business world pay lip service to Buffett and Munger’s vision and influence, surprisingly few have tried to emulate Berkshire itself. “I can recall a number of years ago — this goes back twenty years or so — there was a Wall Street analyst who visited Markel and they were doing their due diligence and, at the end of the day, the gentleman looked at me and somewhat scoffed and said, ‘You know, the problem with you guys is you are trying to be just like Berkshire Hathaway.’ To which I replied, ‘Who would you rather us be like?!?’ That seemed like a pretty good role model to me.”

Marching to your own drumbeat — even when the drummer is Warren Buffett — feels terrifying to most people.

“To some extent,” said Gayner, “Buffett has taken on — along with his partner Charlie Munger — personal responsibility to behave differently than what the crowd would have you do or what they would [call] the institutional imperative. You are behaving differently — and that’s like the zebra who is too far away from the center of the herd. There are a lot of evolutionary practices and wiring and sensations in people that cause us not to want to be too far from the center of the herd.”

Markel owns 1.2 million shares of Apple, so what does Gayner think about Buffett slashing Berkshire’s stake in the tech giant? “When you see the best investor ever in the world sell something that you own,” he said, “you ought to at least have a little bit of concern about your judgment and [ask], ‘What does he know that I don’t know?’”

Nevertheless, Gayner is still fully on-board the iPhone train. “But, with that said, Apple has just been absolutely brilliant at creating an ecosystem … I’ve got an Apple product sitting here in my pocket right now, as do most people that I know. I have a monthly bill that I pay Apple for various and sundry subscription services. And it seems like that is likely to persist for a while. The stock is reasonably priced. They keep repurchasing it. They’ve got a lot of things going for them.”

The proposed merger between Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern sparked fierce debate at the recent RailTrends conference — with BNSF Railway firmly in the “Against” camp. BNSF chief marketing officer Tom Williams reminded attendees that any railroad merger must clear a very high regulatory bar of actually strengthening competition. And on that score, he argued, the UP-NS deal falls woefully short.

“It’s hard for me to get my head around how that even translates into maintaining competition,” he said, “let alone enhancing competition.” Williams also pointed out that the existing system, with interline service between two western railroads and two eastern ones, already provides essentially transcontinental service.

Independent rail analyst Rick Paterson struck a similarly skeptical note — casting doubt on the merger’s rosy promises of post-deal traffic booms. He noted that, over the past decade, combined non-coal volume for both Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern inched up a measly 0.2%.

“At the end of the day,” said Paterson, “this is a ‘trust me’ story because they’re asking us to believe that these two companies — which have recorded zero volume growth over the last ten years — will now grow by 10% within three years.”

And, finally, a few odds and ends to finish off the week…

• NetJets has already pre-sold “well over half of the aircraft” that it expects to take delivery of in 2026.

• The Free Press
  reprinted excerpts from Warren Buffett’s new Thanksgiving letter as part of its “Ancient Wisdom” series — with permission from Buffett himself.

• This week, Berkshire collected approximately $173,423 in quarterly dividends from Jefferies Financial Group.

• And, in honor of the holiday, Kraft Heinz has taken Day-After-Thanksgiving sandwiches to the next level with its all-new “Leftover Gravy” squeezable bottle. The company dubbed this “The Moist Maker” as a nod to the popular Friends episode where Ross flips out when someone surreptitiously eats his beloved gravy-soaked sandwich.