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Warren Buffett and Bill Gates called Wednesday on their billionaire peers to give away half of their wealth. The pronouncement by Messrs. Buffett and Gates stems from a series of dinners the two men held over the past year to discuss the effects of the recession on philanthropy with some of the nation's richest people, including New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, investor Ronald O. Perelman and David Rockefeller, his family's patriarch. The result of the dinners is an invitation, called the Giving Pledge, which asks the nation's billionaires to publicly commit to give at least half of their wealth to...

Buffett's Big Warning: State's Facing A "Terrible Problem" In Rolling Over Their Debt Joe Weisenthal Jun. 2, 2010, 5:36 PM Warren Buffett's appearance in front of the FCIC approved very few fireworks. By our estimation, the Oracle totally charmed the panelists, preventing them from landing a blow on anyone. But this is interesting, especially if, like us, you think that state finances remain a growing economic problem. According to DealBook, he warned of a "terrible problem" for states in refinancing their debts. Asked whether various states should be rates AAA, he said: "If the federal government will step in to...

Two years ago billionaire investor Warren Buffett’s company Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) snapped up 8.7 million shares of Nalco Holding (NLC), a move that some speculated, at the time, was a bet on water filtration. Berkshire Hathaway’s 6 percent ownership of Nalco (9 million shares as of Dec. 31, 2009) turns out to be a play in the business of oil spills as well.

Some of America's leading billionaires have met secretly to consider how their wealth could be used to slow the growth of the world's population and speed up improvements in health and education. The philanthropists who attended a summit convened on the initiative of Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, discussed joining forces to overcome political and religious obstacles to change. Described as the Good Club by one insider it included David Rockefeller Jr, the patriarch of America's wealthiest dynasty, Warren Buffett and George Soros, the financiers, Michael Bloomberg, the mayor of New York, and the media moguls Ted Turner and Oprah...

The world's third richest man, Warren Buffett, today declared that he saw nothing wrong in an allegedly fraudulent $1bn mortgage deal by Goldman Sachs and suggested that losers in the transaction, including Royal Bank of Scotland, had only themselves to blame for exercising "dumb" judgment. . .

Warren Buffett offered a vigorous defense of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Saturday, saying the embattled firm hadn't engaged in improper activity and shouldn't be blamed for the losses of its clients. Goldman has been reeling from Securities and Exchange Commission allegations that the bank had engaged in fraudulent activities in relation to a mortgage deal called Abacus 2007-AC1. Goldman says it did nothing wrong. The billionaire investor said he fully supported Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein. Asked if he could choose a successor for Mr. Blankfein, Mr. Buffett said: "If Lloyd had a twin brother I'd go for him." Buffett also...

Lobbying by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway on proposed financial reform as it impacts the treatment of derivatives has helped the famed investor avoid a financial hit, the WSJ claimed. Derivatives reform has been folded into broader legislative measures, senior Democrats told the paper.

In the Galleon Group insider trading case, the focus has now turned to Warren Buffett’s Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) deal, which came during the peak of the financial crisis. The Wall Street Journal, citing a person close to the situation, has reported that before the public announcement of the deal where Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK.A) invested $5 billion in Goldman Sachs Group, a director at the bank tipped off Galleon Group’s Raj Rajaratnam about the deal.

Link to the Bloomberg article

I been reading this information on sites linking to a banned site here. Basically 2-year notes of Berkshire-Hathaway and some other AAA rated big compaies actually have a lower yeild than 2-year Treasuries. Investing with Buffet is safer than investing with Zero.

The bond market is saying that it’s safer to lend to Warren Buffett than Barack Obama. Two-year notes sold by the billionaire’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in February yield 3.5 basis points less than Treasuries of similar maturity, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Warren Buffett is widely regarded as one of the most successful investors of all time. Yet, as Buffett is willing to admit, even the best investors make mistakes. Buffett's legendary annual letters to his Berkshire Hathaway (BRK-A) shareholders tell the tales of his biggest investing mistakes. There is much to be learned from Buffett's decades of investing experience, so I have selected three of Buffett's biggest mistakes to analyze.

Taleb: Buffett's Track Record Means Completely Nothing, I Have Proof George Soros Is The True Oracle Vincent Fernando Feb. 9, 2010, 8:02 AM In an ai5000 article next to a studio shot with a stuffed black swan, Nassim Taleb makes it clear he has far more confidence in the investment acumen of George Soros than Warren Buffett. ai5000: "I don’t want to spend too much time on Buffett. George Soros has 2 million times more statistical evidence that his results are not chance than Buffett does. Soros is vastly more robust. I am not saying Buffett doesn’t have skill—I’m just...

Buffett: 'Too Big to Fail' Not Going Away By Dunstan Prial FOXBusiness 01-21-10 Warren Buffett said Thursday that one way to ensure banks don’t take on too much risk is to penalize chief executives whose banks get into trouble. /snip The reforms propose restrictions on the size of big U.S. banks and the amount of risk they can take on. The so-called Oracle of Omaha said regulation is an important part of any effective financial system. In addition, Buffett said there likely will always be financial institutions “too big to fail.” However, he said it’s inherently difficult for regulators to...

Warren Buffett's Chinese Cars Will Start Killing The US Auto Industry As Soon As This Year Vincent Fernando Jan. 13, 2010, 7:12 AM BYD, the upstart Chinese electric car maker Warren Buffett famously has an investment in, is planning enter the U.S. market as soon as the second half of this year. Considering the U.S. market entrance by multiple new auto players (from Chinese firms BYD and Geely, to India's Tata and even U.S. upstart Tesla Motors) expect auto industry competition to get far more intense than it already is. BYD just showed off their latest e6 model and while...

Interesting discussion

Demand for private jets is way down and NetJets will lay off almost 500 pilots as a result -- almost 20% of its staff of 3,000 pilots. because of a decrease in demand. NetJets is a unit of investor Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway

Warren Buffett, the second richest man in the world and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK.A), doesn't have much faith in the future of print media. In an interview on CNBC's Nov. 3 "Squawk Box," following the announcement of his purchase of Burlington Northern (NYSE:BNI), Buffett was asked to comment on the future of news media, in particular newspapers and business news by "Squawk Box" co-host Becky Quick. Buffett is optimistic on the future of business news. "Our system has just gotten started," Buffett said. "I mean, we've had a couple of hundred years of progress, but we have not exhausted...

Stock-market champion Warren Buffett was identified this afternoon as a $2,400 donor to Houston Mayor Bill White’s U.S. Senate campaign in a note from White’s campaign otherwise touting his successes raising money online. White spokeswoman Katy Bacon said Buffett also is poised to give again to White if there’s a special-election runoff. Buffett, who hails from Nebraska, doesn’t show up on the Texas Ethics Commission Web site as a past donor to Texas candidates for state office, though he ponied up to Democratic presidential hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama last year and to Democratic Senate candidates including Al Franken...

Ralph Nader has been many things: lawyer, consumer-rights bulldog, political activist and perennial third-party presidential candidate. He has now added a new title to his business card: fiction writer. His latest book, Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us!, is a 700-page populist fantasy in which a small group of billionaires and media moguls — led by Warren Buffett and including Ted Turner, George Soros, Bill Cosby, Yoko Ono and Phil Donahue — pool their massive resources to reform the U.S. With the help of a $15 billion war chest and a p.r. campaign starring a talking parrot, the group successfully...