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...The company disclosed that its auto insurer Geico had passed along higher rates to customers and had suffered fewer claims, lifting its results....
...Buffett takes a firmly hands-off approach to Berkshire’s businesses, but makes an exception for insurance, which spans Geico, the National Indemnity Company, and vast reinsurance operations, including Gen...
...The gains were fuelled by strong results from Berkshire’s insurance unit, including at Geico, as well as higher interest rates....
...Buffett’s sprawling conglomerate, which owns the BNSF railroad and Geico insurer, first invested in the iPhone maker in 2016 at the direction of one of his two investment deputies: Todd Combs and Ted Weschler...
...Todd Combs, one of Buffett’s two investment deputies and who became chief executive of Geico in 2019, is also in the running....
...Its utilities provide power to 13mn customers and in Geico it owns one of the largest insurers in the country. Combs and Weschler were plucked from relative obscurity to help run this portfolio....
...Its utilities provide power to 13mn customers and in Geico it owns one of the largest insurers in the country....
...The acquisition by Berkshire, whose related interests include car insurer Geico and dealership Berkshire Hathaway Automotive, was regarded as a vote of confidence in the US economy and more particularly...
...The company’s Geico auto-insurer, which had struggled to cope with payouts on claims for much of the past two years, showed improvement....
...Extracting better returns from Berkshire’s existing businesses is likely to take on greater importance as the game-changing deals that built Buffett’s reputation, such as the 1996 acquisition of motor insurer Geico...
...There were, he said, few deals that offered the kind of transformative impact past takeovers have had, such as its purchases of insurers Geico and National Indemnity or the BNSF railroad....
...But investors said they would be closely scrutinising Buffett’s annual letter next February for any indications that change is afoot at the conglomerate, which counts insurer Geico and the BNSF railroad...
...Geico reported a second consecutive quarter of underwriting profits, following more than a year of losses....
...The sprawling conglomerate is now worth more than $780bn, with stakes in Apple, Coca-Cola and Bank of America as well as ownership of the BNSF railroad and Geico insurer....
...Investors were buoyed by the fact that Geico, the company’s auto insurance unit, posted a second consecutive quarterly profit after more than a year of losses....
...“As a result, we currently expect Geico to generate an underwriting profit in 2023,” Berkshire said....
...But this year, Abel — heir apparent to lead the $710bn conglomerate that includes the BNSF railroad, private jet operator NetJets and insurer Geico, as well as the other public and private groups Berkshire...
...One of Berkshire’s crown jewels, the Geico auto insurer, swung to an underwriting profit after six consecutive quarters of losses....
...But this year the heir apparent to the $710bn business that includes the BNSF railroad, private jet operator NetJets and insurer Geico, as well as the other public and private groups Berkshire has invested...
...It is also the latest shift by the conglomerate, which spans the Geico insurer, BNSF railroad and Dairy Queen ice cream purveyor, into blue-chip technology companies....
...Berkshire’s insurance unit suffered an operating loss of $962mn during the quarter, with Geico warning that higher used auto parts prices and an increase in accidents were weighing on its results....
...Insurance unit Geico recorded a $487mn pre-tax underwriting loss in the quarter, up from the three months before....
...Profits at its insurance businesses — which includes Geico — were nearly wiped out, falling to just $47mn from $764mn a year earlier....
...In his most recent letter to shareholders, Buffett again extolled the virtues of insurance “float” or the premiums that policyholders pay to Berkshire insurance companies such as Geico....
...Instead, Buffett directed Berkshire to pump much of the cash that the company’s various businesses — which span insurer Geico, BNSF Railway and the Dairy Queen ice cream chain — were generating in 2020 and...
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