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On September 24, 2008, Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A), (BRK.B) and Goldman Sachs (GS) entered into an agreement in which Berkshire Hathaway purchased $5 billion of Goldman’s preferred shares paying a 10% dividend. Berkshire also received warrants granting it the right to buy $5 billion of Goldman Sachs common stock at $115 per share (or 43.5 million shares) through October 1, 2013. Goldman Sachs called the preferred stock for redemption on April 18, 2011 at a premium of 10% over par value, plus accrued and unpaid dividends. As a result, Berkshire Hathaway earned approximately $1.75 billion ($1.25 billion in dividends plus a...

Imagine a Republican president regularly invoking the wisdom of a multibillionaire businessman who had profited off companies with questionable business practices, and who law-enforcement officials had recently asked to provide information about his own company’s questionable practices. No question about it: Democrats and the media would be having a field day. So why do we hear so little about the dark side of Warren Buffett? True, the double standard involving Buffett’s business record is longstanding. But now Obama is using him as a central prop in his class-warfare strategy for winning a second term. Yes, Buffett is a great investor;...

Time to pay up, rich people. “If you make more than $1 million a year,” President Obama said during his State of the Union address the other night, “you should not pay less than 30 percent in taxes.” And why should that be the case, exactly? Is it because the secretary of billionaire investor Warren Buffett — who attended the speech — apparently pays a higher tax rate than her boss, a relatively rare situation that strikes the president as unfair? Well, it’s a reason, and perhaps a politically persuasive one when the issue of income inequality has re-entered the...

Warren Buffett's secretary, after being pointed out on national television during Tuesday's State of the Union speech, now is facing criticism over her salary and second home. Debbie Bosanek and her boss both declined Thursday to disclose how much she's paid, saying it's private. In an interview with The World-Herald, Buffett also said none of the online guesses about Bosanek's salary is right, and the critics are missing his point. "I'm saying she is being treated unfairly in the tax code, as are tens of millions of others, compared to me," Buffett said. "They shouldn't change the rates on all...

Warren Buffet’s secretary, Debbie Bosanek, served as a stage prop for President Obama’s State of the Union speech. She was the President’s chief display of the alleged unfairness of our tax system – a little person paying a higher tax rate than her billionaire boss. Bosanek’s prominent role in Obama’s “fairness” campaign piqued my curiosity, and I imagine the curiosity of others. How much does her boss pay this downtrodden woman? So far, no one has volunteered this information. The IRS publishes detailed tax tables by income level. The latest results are for 2009. They show that taxpayers earning an...

When President Obama rejected the Keystone XL oil pipeline in order "for the President to determine whether the Keystone XL pipeline is in the national interest," the losers were blue-collar workers who would have built it -- as well as any American who fills up at the gas pump.But there was a winner, a big winner: Warren Buffett. Yes, that would be Mr. Make-Me-Pay-More-Taxes-Before-I-Earn-Again.You see, North Dakota is producing a lot of oil -- by next year it will be second only to Texas -- which must be moved to refineries, mostly on the Gulf Coast, and the pipelines...

I would like to propose a new "Warren Buffet" law. The law will be simple, easy to enforce, and above all, "fair." Here is my proposed piece of legislation: The WARREN BUFFET Rule The U.S.tax code should be amended to read Is your name Warren Buffet? Do you live in Omaha, Nebraska? Are you CEO of Berkshire Hathaway? If your is answer "yes" to all three questions, your tax rate on ANY and ALL income, henceforth and forever, shall be 100%. Effective immediately.

The secretary for one of the world's wealthiest men and the wife of late Apple cofounder Steve Jobs are among those invited by the White House to attend the State of the Union address. The State of the Union guest list has become an annual rite, with the first lady's box taking on the sort of gravitas shown at the Academy Awards' Red Carpet ceremony. The guests often have ties to a proposal or initiative the president will outline in the address. Among this year's guests are Debbie Bosanek, the longtime secretary for billionaire Warren Buffett. Obama frequently cites Buffett's...

Warren Buffett, whom President Obama likes to cite as a fair-minded billionaire while arguing for higher taxes on the wealthy, stands to benefit from the president’s decision to reject the Keystone XL oil pipeline permit. Mr. Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. owns Burlington Northern Santa Fe LLC, which is among the railroads that would transport oil produced in western Canada if the pipeline isn’t built. “Whatever people bring to us, we’re ready to haul,” Krista York-Wooley, a spokeswoman for Burlington Northern, a unit of Buffett’s Omaha, Neb.-based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., told Bloomberg News. If Keystone XL “doesn’t happen, we’re here to...

Rail shipments of North Dakota crude to increase with decision to block Keystone XL pipeline ### North Dakota oil drillers increasingly will rely on trains to move barrels of crude to market after the Obama administration's decision to reject plans for a pipeline that would run from Canada to refineries on the Gulf of Mexico, state and industry officials say. "Pipelines are by far the safest and most economically efficient way to transport oil, but we are left with a limited number of options if pipelines are off the table," said Tony Clark, chairman of the North Dakota Public Service...

Energy Policy: Killing the Keystone XL pipeline may help one of the world's richest men get richer. North Dakota's booming oil fields will now grow more dependent on a railroad the president's economic guru just bought. [....] Interestingly, another billionaire, Obama economic inspiration Warren Buffett, stands to benefit from the Keystone XL pipeline delay. As oil production ramps up in the Bakken fields of North Dakota, plans to use the pipeline to transport it have been dashed. As a result, North Dakota's booming oil producers will have to rely even more on the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) railroad, which...

Warren Buffett has written his first check to the U.S. Treasury since announcing his pledge to match Republican donations to pay down the national debt a week ago. Carol Loomis, Fortune's senior editor-at-large and long-time friend of Buffett's, reports that the Omaha investor received a letter from Congressman Scott Rigell of Virginia (pictured below). In it, Rigell details the $49,000 he had donated to Treasury in total in 2011 and 2012 and asks Buffett to match both (full letter is below). Buffett agreed (full letter below). Lest we raise your hopes that the national debt is over as an issue,...

'I'll donate a dollar to pay down the deficit for every dollar that Congressional Republicans donate' taunts Warren Buffet in a Reuters article (n.b. indirect quote). He must have finished President Obama's copy of "Rules for Radicals" and decided to get on the fun side--the media's side--of the Statist v. Liberty conflict. Annoying your enemy, especially to the delight of community organizers, is a winning tactic according to the realistic revolutionary's handbook. The irony of the quintessential "Have" speaking in the name of the "Have Nots" to persuade the "Have Some, Want Mores" to play in a game that gives...

Noman was delighted to find an Arthur Laffer opinion piece in this morning's paper. In it, he argues that a millionaire surtax would hurt everyone but the super rich like Warren Buffet. Noman imagines that Buffet knows this, which is why he felt safe being so bold as to champion the notion. [quote] Waving Mr. Buffett's op-ed for all to see, Mr. Obama wasted no time in proposing a surtax on millionaires called the "Buffett Rule." Putting aside all the oohing and ahhing over Mr. Buffett's selflessness, his effective tax rate on his true income would hardly budge if this...

Warren Buffett is ready to call Republicans’ tax bluff. Last fall, Senator Mitch McConnell said that if Buffett were feeling “guilty” about paying too little in taxes, he should “send in a check.” The jab was in response to Buffett’s August 2011 New York Times op-ed, which made hay of the fact that our tax system is so unbalanced, Buffett (worth about $45 billion) pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. Senator John Thune promptly introduced the “Buffett Rule Act,” an option on tax forms that would allow the rich to donate more in taxes to help pay down...

The Billionaires of the Left aren't interested in making money. The reason is that they're Good People, and Good People Don't Tell Lies. Warren Buffett is a Good Person who wants to pay more taxes. How do we know? 'Cause he says so, any time the media ask him. That's proof enough, isn't it? George Soros isn't interested in making more billions. Soros is a Good Convicted Insider Trader, who tried to knock off the currency of Malaysia and the UK, impoverishing millions of people. When asked about that, Gyorgyi says somebody had to do it. See? He's a Good...

Listening to an interview of Peter Schwiezer talking to Steve Bannon (Director of Palin's Undefeated movie)...There's a whole chapter in Peter's new book exposing Warren Buffet. Supposedly he is involved in insider trading. This chapter of Schweizer's book shows how his company got the sweetheart deal to invest in Goldman Sachs in the midst of the 2008 financial crisis. One member of Congress even bought Berkshire stock the day before the deal was even announced....It was a racket!

America's richest man isn't going to make President Obama, the folks in the Occupy Wall Street movement, or their respective supporters in the media happy. Appearing on ABC's This Week Sunday, Bill Gates laughed when asked about the Buffett Rule saying, "You can't raise the taxes we need just by going after that one percent...to really deal with the deficit gap we're talking about, that alone just numerically is not going to be enough" (video follows with transcript): CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, HOST: The Buffett Rule, for instance, and all the other proposals the president is...

Byron Trott has a household name, provided that the household is worth a few billion dollars. Trott is a Chicago investment banker who has advised the likes of the Pritzkers and the Wrigleys. He earns their trust, friends and competitors said, because he is the soul of discretion, never leaking details of pending deals or hogging credit. Accordingly, he seldom gives interviews or takes leading roles in civic functions. Insiders said Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel had to twist his arm to get him to join the board of World Business Chicago, the city’s economic development promoter. And yet Trott...

RUSH: Speaking of the Republican primaries, Larry Flynt I see is offering up to $1 million for details of sex with Rick Perry. Have you heard that? (interruption) What, if you had details -- you wouldn't pass them on? No. No, no, no. If you're a woman, if you've had sex with Perry he's willing to pay you, but if you've got details of somebody else having sex with Perry you could follow up. I want to make a counteroffer, ladies and gentlemen. I today would like to offer up to $1 million for any details of sex with Warren...

Pressed by House Republicans and the Wall Street Journal editorial board to release a copy of his tax returns to justify the so-called "Buffett tax," the Oracle of Omaha said he would comply if News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch did the same. "I think it might be a terrific idea if they would just ask their boss, Rupert Murdoch, and he and I will meet at Fortune, and we'll both give you our tax returns and you can publish them," Buffett told Fortune's Carol Loomis. "I'm ready tomorrow morning," he said. In a New York Times column, Buffett asked Congress...

Life was simpler in the fictional town of Mayberry, N.C., where “The Andy Griffith Show” was set, and images of Sheriff Andy Taylor and his son Opie evoke a more prosperous America. But did the mystique of that setting include a 90 percent tax rate on the wealthy? On MSNBC Wednesday, appearing from the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., director and producer Ron Howard said he would be open to the wealthy paying more taxes.

While Obama and Buffet are working on finding new ways to fleece middle class America of more of our money to finance the salaries of the new storm troopers, the SEIU, Teamsters and Teacher’s unions and the various ACORN spawned organizations, the two are simultaneously prosecuting an all out war on the private sector. To hear the old kook tell it the idea came to him while he was playing in the bathtub. Those of us who no longer believe in the tooth fairy prefer to to dig a little and find out just exactly how did this seemingly Archimedian...

Flip Sides of the Same Coin As everyone knows, President Obama has surrounded himself with crony corporatists in order to brandish his credentials as a business-friendly President. The transactions between them are fairly standard and straightforward. In return for government contracts, subsidies, regulatory exemptions, tax breaks and the like, corporate chieftains like Jeff Immelt at General Electric and Andrew Liveris at Dow Chemical do the President's bidding in public affording him a much needed fig leaf with which to cover his lack of interest in actual business. While the distinction is not always clear between businessmen and those who capitalize...

WASHINGTON -- Billionaire investor Warren Buffett isn’t as undertaxed as he and President Obama seem to think. *** Buffett actually was taxed twice on his investment income. First, Buffett had to make the money he invested. Those earnings were taxed as corporate income, at about a 35-percent rate. Then, Uncle Sam took another cut when Buffett invested the money and earned a profit. That’s when Buffett paid the 15 percent capital-gains tax rate. All told, after combining corporate taxes and capital gains taxes, Buffett forked over about 45 percent of his earnings.

Let's hope that Warren Buffet is better at managing funds than he is at tax policy. After Buffett complained that his secretary pays a higher tax rate than he does, Barack Obama decided to call his new class-warfare taxes “the Buffett Rule� and emphasize that he wants to make taxes more “fair.� But was Buffett right? According to an AP fact check — and just about every ounce of common sense that exists outside of the class-warfare fever swamps of the White House these days — not at all: “Middle-class families shouldn’t pay higher taxes than millionaires and billionaires,� Obama...

According to Bloomberg and other sources around the web: Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. agreed to buy $3 billion in preferred shares that pay an annual 10 percent dividend and are callable after three years at a 10 percent premium. GE also said it will sell $12 billion in common stock, gathering more cash to fund operations. Somehow, this is a new program/sales pitch to build confidence in the stock by showing that the world’s savviest investor bought into the company. This is clearly designed to entice investors as the company is looking to raise money through some kind of stock...

*snip* General Electric [GE 15.41 0.40 (+2.66%) ^ 0.40 (+2.66%) ] officially notified Berkshire Hathaway [BRK.A 103460.00 -340.00 (-0.33%) ] on Tuesday it intends next month to repurchase the $3 billion of preferred stock it sold him in October 2008.GE has flagged the move for a while. Under terms of the deal it struck with Buffett when all hell was breaking loose, the company led by Jeff Immelt was obliged to wait three years to call the bonds. It also needed to give at least 30 days notice—hence this week's letter from Fairfield, Connecticut, to Omaha. Buffett's money doesn't come...

As expected, President Obama’s jobs speech was full of political pabulum and worn out Democrat talking points straight out of the Bolshevik takeover of Russia. I predicted earlier this week, the president’s plan would be little more than a speech. He has no plan to send congress so that they can “pass it now” as the president repeated seventeen times during his speech. Mr. President, if passing a bill, which doesn’t exist, is so important – why did you wait almost three years to take action? Furthermore, why is there no bill for Congress to take action on? President Obama...

This one’s truly, uh ... rich: Billionaire Warren Buffett says folks like him should have to pay more taxes -- but it turns out his firm, Berkshire Hathaway, hasn’t paid what it’s already owed for years. That’s right: As Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson notes, the company openly admits that it owes back taxes since as long ago as 2002. “We anticipate that we will resolve all adjustments proposed by the US Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) for the 2002 through 2004 tax years ... within the next 12 months,” the firm’s annual report says. It also cites outstanding...

Warren Buffett has made a career out of casting himself as a common man -- a folksy octogenarian from Omaha who also is the richest man on earth. The billionaire everyman never misses an opportunity to sow his optimistic seeds about stock ownership and America’s future, while professing his profound desire to pay more taxes. Yet when it comes to investing his own billions, this common man has little time for common stocks, but plenty of time for special deals that save him taxes and almost always put him ahead of mere mortal shareholders. Such was the case this past...

Buffett's Berkshire has agreed to buy 50,000 preferred shares of Bank of America for $5 billion. That means he's paying $100,000 per share. He also has options to buy 700 million. That's 7% dilution for shareholders. Buffett says it's not just a vote of confidence in Bank of America, but in the U.S., according to Becky Quick on CNBC. It's a better deal for Bank of America than Buffett gave to Goldman Sachs in some ways, he says. And get this - he dreamt up the idea to invest in Bank of America yesterday - in the bathtub. Bank of...

Former American Express CEO Harvey Golub gives a major rebuttal to calls from Warren Buffett and Barack Obama for more taxes on the rich. Writing in the WSJ, Golub makes three points. First, it is absurd that half of the country pays no income taxes. Second, "the extraordinarily complex tax code is replete with favors to various interest groups and industries." Third, the government is bloated by wasteful spending. Until someone addresses these issues, he says he pays enough: Over the years, I have paid a significant portion of my income to the various federal, state and local jurisdictions in...

Warren Buffett's recent call to increase taxes on the super- and mega-rich has garnered much media attention.  But how much money could such increases actually raise?  What effect could they have on reducing the nation's deficit or debt?  As it turns out, not much.  Below is a quick look at the latest IRS data on earners making more than $100,000: (Figures in $Thousands)   Adjusted Gross Income Income Tax Paid  After-Tax Income (What's left)    $100,000 under $200,000 $1,801,446,897 $212,290,589 $1,589,156,308    $200,000 under $500,000 $905,347,402 $176,322,148 $729,025,254    $500,000 under $1,000,000 $332,037,478 $80,458,185 $251,579,293    $1,000,000 under $1,500,000 $130,149,237...

Investors might hang on Warren Buffett's every word when it comes to financial advice, but Republicans are less than enthusiastic about the Oracle of Omaha's opinions on taxation. After the billionaire chairman of investment firm Berkshire Hathaway wrote an op-ed in the New York Times complaining that the mega-rich are undertaxed in comparison to the middle class, conservatives urged him to voluntarily send more of his own money to the Internal Revenue Service and leave others alone. Not only are they willfully missing Buffett's point, they're seemingly oblivious to the fact that in many ways his tax ideas mirror those...

-- In a recent New York Times op-ed article, Warren Buffett asserts that the super-rich do not pay enough taxes. He suggests that any new budget deal should raise rates on the super-rich, especially on their "unearned" income from interest, dividends and capital gains. Buffett is wrong. Bad government policies play a major role in generating inappropriately high incomes, but singling out the super-rich is misguided. And the policy Buffett criticizes most -- low tax rates on capital income -- should be expanded, not eliminated. The first problem with Buffett's view is that the number of super-rich is too small...

Mr. Warren Buffett wrote a column for the New York Times today in which he argues that he and others in his situation should pay more taxes. There are several problems with his argument: 1. He argues that he and others don't have to pay FICA "taxes". Yes, there is an income cap on FICA contributions, however, FICA was not called a "tax" until recently. FICA is the amount that you pay for your own social security retirement. At one time, it went into a trust fund or a "lock box" as Al Gore called it, payable only for social...

OUR leaders have asked for “shared sacrifice.” But when they did the asking, they spared me. I checked with my mega-rich friends to learn what pain they were expecting. They, too, were left untouched. While the poor and middle class fight for us in Afghanistan, and while most Americans struggle to make ends meet, we mega-rich continue to get our extraordinary tax breaks. Some of us are investment managers who earn billions from our daily labors but are allowed to classify our income as To understand why, you need to examine the sources of government revenue. Last year about 80...

The healthy growth of mankind depends on continuously decreasing the cost of water and energy everywhere.Nice thought. Why mention it?Its a mission statement.For who?Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett — and through them America’s billionaires. Why Bill Gates? Why Warren Buffett?As to Bill Gates, his passion; According to a recent interview Understanding science and pushing the boundaries of science is what makes me immensely satisfied. What I’m doing now involves understanding maths, risk-taking. The first half of my life was good preparation for the second half.’ Now in the context of the interview he was...

Most of us took this week's stock market as self-evident doom, but not Warren Buffett. He's 'never been better'. To Buffett, the S&P's downgrading his company Berkshire Hathaway = opportunity. While buying stocks at cut rates, Buffett is also planning on selling Berkshire Hathaway bonds to take advantage of cheap capital. Buffett told CNN Money's Term Sheet today that the sea of red all over the S&P 500 earlier this week is exactly what he looks forward to--a chance to buy low. "The lower things go, the more I buy. We are in the business of buying," he said. It's...

What commonality binds Haim Saban, Penny Pritzker, and Warren Buffett, aside from membership in the billionaire's club?  Guilt, and not the quotidian variety -- unfulfilled potential, disappointing behavior, lost love -- that afflicts most of us.  Theirs is a guilt that only afflicts the very rich -- a guilt that arises from wanting more equitable outcomes coupled with an unwillingness to pay the requisite taxes to achieve those outcomes.  It's the same guilt that has plagued Rockefeller, Kennedy, and Mott progeny for decades. Messrs. Saban and Buffett and Ms Pritzker are newcomers to the world of self-imposed tax-deficiency guilt, but...

Let the word go forth: On Friday, March 25, 2011, Warren Buffett predicted the decline of the U.S. dollar. In a speech given in New Delhi (where he's hunting up some cheap Indian stocks), the chairman of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-A ) (NYSE: BRK-B ) warned investors to avoid "long-term fixed-dollar investments" such as 10-year U.S. Treasury bonds. Buffett worries that the $2.3 trillion in new money our government has pumped into the economy, when combined with interest rates so low they're practically giving money away, are combining to dilute the value of the dollar. As a result, Buffett warns:...

The Oracle of Omaha had done it again. Here is the latest letter Warren Buffett has written to shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway. For reasons of typography, we have excluded the tables, as indicated. To read the entire shareholder report, click here. To the Shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.: The per-share book value of both our Class A and Class B stock increased by 13% in 2010. Over the last 46 years (that is, since present management took over), book value has grown from $19 to $95,453, a rate of 20.2% compounded annually.* The highlight of 2010 was our acquisition of...

SNIP Buffett also has some inspirational words for those worried about China surpassing the U.S. He told Vanity Fair: “We had four million people here in 1790." “We’re not more intelligent than people in China, which then had 290 million people, or Europe, which had 50 million. We didn’t work harder, we didn’t have a better climate, and we didn’t have better resources. But we definitely had a system that unleashes potential. "This system works. Since then, we’ve been through at least 15 recessions, a civil war, a Great Depression…. All of these things happen. But this country has optimized...

I know that we are all supposed to love Warren Buffett as the Sage of Omaha, businessman and all-around good guy, but I keep reading stories that make me wonder. Here's a story about Warren Buffett, the estate tax, and the life insurance industry. Did you know that the life insurance lobby is actively lobbying to restore the estate tax?  Why would the life insurance industry care about that? It turns out that ten percent of life insurance industry revenue is related to the estate tax. Wealthy people take out life insurance in order to reduce estate taxes because...

Milton Friedman once noted that most businessmen are anti-capitalists. However, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates are moving into a category all their own, putting their vast fortunes behind support for everything from philanthro­statism to just plain statism. Mr. Buffett recently offered fulsome praise to “Uncle Sam” for allegedly rescuing the U.S. (and himself) — with taxpayers’ money — from the consequences of policies put in place by … Uncle Sam. The Sage of Omaha is a big believer in soaking the rich. He has joined Mr. Gates in a high-profile attempt to strong-arm other billionaires into committing to give away...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama will name Warren Buffet as one of fifteen winners of the 2010 Medal of Freedom, a White House official said on Wednesday. Buffet, one of the world's most successful investors who has donated a vast chunk of his multibillion dollar fortune to charity, will receive the medal at a White House ceremony early next year. .. Buffet is one of Obama's closest defenders in the business community..

Mega billionaire Warren Buffet once called derivatives "financial weapons of mass destruction." Apparently, Buffet has failed to heed his own advice to avoid them. Warren Buffett's company posted an 8 per cent drop in third-quarter net income as the value of its derivatives portfolio fell sharply, but BNSF railroad and Berkshire Hathaway's (BRK.A-N125,560.001,080.000.87%) many other operating companies performed well... The biggest factor in the decline was a $95-million loss on Berkshire's derivatives, some of which are tied to equity markets and credit defaults. A year ago, those derivatives were worth $1.1-billion.

Communists, Socialists, Marxists, Maoists and Islamics are in the US Government. They all believe in a government that’s opposed to the US Constitution and, thus, the America our founders created. They want America to give up its sovereignty and to become a member of a one-world socialist government. For simplicity, let’s call them all “commies”. We began researching Obama and other commies in US Government and Media about 18 months ago and were shocked. Here’s the high-level overview of what we learned, which is chronicled in great detail at CommieBlaster.com: - America has been at war with communism for over...

Warren Buffett hired 39-year old Todd Combs, a former Connecticut hedge fund manager with $400 AUM (assets under management), to oversee Berkshire Hathaway's portfolio. From FOXNews: "For three years Charlie Munger and I have been looking for someone of Todd's caliber to handle a significant portion of Berkshire's investment portfolio," Buffett said in a statement. "We are delighted that Todd will be joining us." Combs previously worked at Castle Point Capital, where he managed just $400 million. Under Buffett, Combs will manage a “significant portion” of the investment portfolio, according to the firm. What caught his eye? The Wall Street...