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Bill Gates (L) , Melinda Gates (C) , Warren Buffett (R)
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Warren Edward Buffett is an American investor, businessman and philanthropist. He is regarded as one of the world’s greatest stock market investors, and is the largest shareholder and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. With an estimated net worth of around US$62 billion, he was ranked by Forbes as the richest person in the world as of February 11, 2008.
Often called the “Oracle of Omaha,” Buffett is noted for his adherence to the value investing philosophy and for his personal frugality despite his immense wealth. His 2006 annual salary was about $100,000, which is small compared to senior executive remuneration in other comparable companies, and when he spent $9.7 million of Berkshire’s funds on a business jet in 1989, he jokingly named it “The Indefensible” because of his past criticisms of such purchases by other CEOs. He lives in the same house in the central Dundee neighborhood of Omaha that he bought in 1958 for $31,500, today valued at around $700,000.
Buffett is also a noted philanthropist. In 2006, he announced a plan to give away his fortune to charity, with 83% of it going to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. In 2007, he was listed among Time’s 100 Most Influential People in The World. He also serves as a member of the board of trustees at Grinnell College.
Warren Buffett was born in Omaha, Nebraska in August of 1930 to Howard and Leila (Stahl). As the son of a local stock broker, he was likely exposed to markets at a young age. As he got older, Buffett had a few successful entrepreneurial ventures, making him consider proceeding straight into business rather than going to college. His father, however, overruled him on this.[citations needed]
One of his mentors, arguably the most influential, was Benjamin Graham. Graham’s philosophy had such an impact on Buffett that he enrolled in Columbia Business School to study directly under him. In Buffett’s own words: “I’m 15 percent Fisher and 85 percent Benjamin Graham.”
As Buffett would often say about Graham’s teachings: “The basic ideas of investing are to look at stocks as business, use the market’s fluctuations to your advantage, and seek a margin of safety. That’s what Ben Graham taught us. A hundred years from now they will still be the cornerstones of investing.”
In June 2006, Buffett gave approximately 10 million Berkshire Hathaway Class B shares to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (worth approximately USD 30.7 billion as of June 23 2006) making it the largest charitable donation in history. The foundation will receive 5% of the total donation on an annualized basis each July, beginning in 2006. Buffett will also join the board of directors of the Gates Foundation, although he does not plan to be actively involved in the foundation’s investments.
Both Warren Buffet and Bill Gates have been ardent supporters of planned parenthood, a non-profit organization that receives financial support from the Buffet and Bill and Melinda Gates foundations. Planned parenthood performs approximately 20% of all abortions in the United States. Planned Parenthood receives almost a third of its money in government grants and contracts ($336.7 million in FY 2007) with the rest coming from clinic income and donations from wealthy individuals such as Warren Buffet.
He also announced plans to contribute additional Berkshire stock valued at approximately $6.7 billion to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation and to other foundations headed by his three children. This is a significant shift from previous statements Buffett has made, having stated that most of his fortune would pass to his Buffett Foundation. The bulk of the estate of his wife, valued at $2.6 billion, went to that foundation when she died in 2004.
His children will not inherit a significant proportion of his wealth. These actions are consistent with statements he has made in the past indicating his opposition to the transfer of great fortunes from one generation to the next. Buffett once commented, “I want to give my kids just enough so that they would feel that they could do anything, but not so much that they would feel like doing nothing.”
The following quotation from 1988, respectively, highlights Warren Buffett’s thoughts on his wealth and why he long planned to reallocate it:
“I don’t have a problem with guilt about money. The way I see it is that my money represents an enormous number of claim checks on society. It’s like I have these little pieces of paper that I can turn into consumption. If I wanted to, I could hire 10,000 people to do nothing but paint my picture every day for the rest of my life. And the GNP would go up. But the utility of the product would be zilch, and I would be keeping those 10,000 people from doing AIDS research, or teaching, or nursing. I don’t do that though. I don’t use very many of those claim checks. There’s nothing material I want very much. And I’m going to give virtually all of those claim checks to charity when my wife and I die. (Lowe 1997:165–166)
On June 27, 2008, Zhao Danyang, a general manager at Pure Heart China Growth Investment Fund, won the 2008 5-day online “Power Lunch with Warren Buffett” charity auction on eBay with high bid of $ 2,110,100. Zhao had the right to dine with 76-year-old Buffett, at New York’s Smith & Wollensky Steakhouse, may invite up to 7 companions for the private lunch and can ask Buffett anything at all, except what he’s buying or selling. Auction proceeds benefit the San Francisco Glide Foundation. In 2007 Mohnish Pabrai dined with Buffett.
Buffett donated 512,169 Class B shares of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. stock to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (451,250 shares) and 2 charitable foundations. At $ 3,999 each, the shares are worth $ 2.05 billion.
Buffett also helped Dow Chemical to help pay for its $ 18.8bn takeover of Rohm & Haas. He thus became the single largest shareholder in the enlarged group with his Berkshire Hathaway, which provided $ 3bn, underlining his instrumental role during the current crisis in debt and equity markets.
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References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_Buffett
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Suggestions:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_billionaires_(2008)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_billionaires_(2007)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_billionaires_(2006)
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