Jonathan Stempel
(Reuters) – Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc sold more shares of Bank of America Corp to lock in profits after a big surge in the second-largest U.S. bank’s shares, bringing sales to more than $3 billion this month.
Berkshire Hathaway sold 18.4 million shares of Bank of America stock between July 25 and 29 for $767 million, according to a regulatory filing late Monday.
The company has sold 71.2 million shares for $3.05 billion since July 17, reducing its holdings in the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank by 6.9% to 961.5 million shares.
Buffett’s conglomerate remains Bank of America’s largest shareholder, with a 12.4% stake worth $39.5 billion as of Monday’s close. The company must report sales until its stake falls below 10%.
Berkshire and Bank of America declined to comment Tuesday.
Bank of America shares rose as much as 1.9% in morning trading but have since fallen since Berkshire’s selling began.
Bank of America shares have risen by nearly two-thirds since late October and are now trading at 1.2 times book value after trading below it for most of the past decade.
Buffett has long been a supporter of the leadership of Brian Moynihan, who has served as the bank’s chief executive officer since 2010.
Berkshire Hathaway bought $5 billion in preferred stock in Bank of America in 2011, when some investors were concerned about whether the bank had enough capital after paying off huge mortgage and legal debts from the 2008 financial crisis.
Buffett ultimately spent $14.6 billion on Bank of America shares in 2017, exercising his warrants to exchange his preferred shares for common stock. Those shares were worth more than $45 billion when Berkshire’s sales began.
The sale comes a little more than a year after the 93-year-old billionaire gave particular praise to Bank of America and Moynihan while Berkshire sold other bank shares.
“I like Brian Moynihan a lot,” Buffett told CNBC in April 2023. “I don’t want to sell.”
Berkshire has also been selling Apple shares, selling about 115 million shares in the first quarter.
The company may reveal further sales revenue when it reports second-quarter results on Saturday.
At Berkshire Hathaway’s annual meeting on May 4, Buffett said he expects the iPhone maker to remain Berkshire Hathaway’s largest stock investment, but that a sale makes sense because the 21% federal tax rate on profits is likely to rise.
Berkshire is based in Omaha, Nebraska, and owns dozens of businesses including auto insurer Geico and BNSF Railway.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Kirsten Donovan and Mark Potter)
