Who is Greg Abel, the newly announced successor of Warren Buffett as Berkshire Hathaway CEO?
Billionaire businessman Warren Buffett, 94, announced he would step down as the CEO of the multinational conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway at the end of this year. Buffett has run the company since 1965, and yet the reactions to the announcement at the annual shareholders' meeting on Saturday (May 3) included 'surprise' and 'shock', according to many media reports.
That is because Buffett has long become synonymous with the brand and is an American business icon himself. For decades, he led a company that owns a diverse set of assets, including railroads and the battery-maker Duracell. It made huge investments in the likes of Apple and Coca-Cola, earning him the moniker ' Oracle of Omaha', referring to his hometown in the state of Nebraska, US.
Buffett said that Greg Abel, Vice Chair of Non-Insurance Operations and Chair of Energy at the company, will take over by the end of the year. A BBC report said, 'Mr Abel, sitting next to Mr Buffett on stage, was apparently caught unaware by the announcement.'
Here is why the change of guard is making waves, and what is known about Abel, as he prepares to follow one of the most well-known names in business, and lead the $1.18 trillion conglomerate.
01
Working-class background
Gregory Edward Abel was born in Edmonton, in the Canadian province of Alberta, on June 1, 1962, to a working-class family. Working odd jobs, he cleaned discarded bottles and filled fire extinguishers, according to the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, a non-profit that honoured Abel in 2018.
Upon graduating from the University of Alberta, he worked at the consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers and the energy firm CalEnergy. He joined Berkshire Hathaway Energy, then known as MidAmerican Energy, in 1992, which Berkshire later took over.
02
Significant role, years in making
Among other things, Abel oversees several chemical, industrial and retail operations. Within the last year, he has also taken over some of Buffett's capital allocation responsibilities.
Buffett said last year he would also want Abel to have final say on decisions regarding Berkshire's portfolio of public stocks. Many executives who work with Abel call him a perceptive questioner who closely scrutinises financial metrics and wants to closely understand the businesses and how they're run.
His name has been floated for a while now, as speculation around Buffett's successor grew. In 2015, then company Vice Chairman Charles Munger, who was an early collaborator of Buffett, said, 'His successors would not be 'of only moderate ability'. For instance, Ajit Jain and Greg Abel are proven performers who would probably be under-described as 'world-class''. Munger passed away in 2023. Jain, 73, is of Indian-origin and an alumnus of IIT Kharagpur. He is currently the Vice Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway.
03
Big shoes to fill
The news was met with praise for Buffett at the end of his tenure. 'Warren Buffett represents everything that is good about American capitalism and America itself – investing in the growth of our nation and its businesses with integrity, optimism, and common sense,' said Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Tim Cook, chief executive of Apple, in a post on X, said: 'There's never been someone like Warren, and countless people, myself included, have been inspired by his wisdom. It's been one of the great privileges of my life to know him.'
Explained: The rise of Berkshire Hathaway under Buffett
In August 2024, Berkshire Hathaway attained a market capitalisation of $1 trillion, becoming the first non-tech company to do so. Its success has been chalked upto Buffett's business acumen, in particular.
He was already a millionaire at the age of 30 in 1962. His stints as an investment analyst at his father's firm, Buffett-Falk & Co., in 1951-54, and as a securities analyst at Graham-Newman Corp. in 1955-56 were immensely successful.
He met Munger in 1959. Together, the duo in 1965 would revitalise Berkshire Hathaway, a struggling textile company, first by using its earnings to fund other investments, and then as a brand that would become a holding company.
One of the key strategies Buffett followed is called value investing. It involves selecting stocks that may be underestimated by the stock market. This is based on understanding the stock market's volatility, which results in 'overreactions' that may not indicate a company's long-term fundamentals. Value investors stand to profit by purchasing stocks at discounted prices and are generally long-term investors of high-quality companies.
He sought out such companies that seemed to be underdogs in the field, experiencing a spot of trouble even as their business fundamentals remained sound. Thus, Berkshire came to acquire holdings in a diverse array of companies such as GEICO, Coca-Cola, Duracell and the World Book Encyclopaedia.
He reversed his position on staying away from tech stocks in 2016, when he began buying Apple shares, driven by the devotion Apple users show to their devices and viewing the company itself as a 'moat,' a business that does not stand to lose its market share while open to growing profit margins.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
&w=3840&q=100)
Business Standard
21 minutes ago
- Business Standard
US hiring slowed to 130K new jobs amid uncertainty over Trump's policies
The American job market likely continued to slow last month, hobbled by worries over President Donald Trump's trade wars, deportations and purges of the federal workforce. The Labour Department's numbers on May hiring Friday are expected to show that businesses, government agencies and nonprofits added 1,30,000 jobs last month. That would be down from 1,77,000 in April but enough to stay ahead of people entering the workforce and keep the unemployment rate at a low 4.2 per cent, according to a survey of forecasters by the data firm FactSet. Mainstream economists expect Trump's policies to take a toll on America's economy, the world's largest. His massive taxes on imports tariffs are expected to raise costs for US companies that buy raw materials, equipment and components from overseas and force them to cut back hiring or even lay workers off. Billionaire Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has slashed federal workers and cancelled government contracts. Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration is expected to make it harder for businesses to find enough workers. For the most part, though, any damage has yet to show up in the government's economic data. The US economy and job market have proven surprisingly resilient in recent years. When the inflation fighters at the Federal Reserve raised their benchmark interest rate 11 times in 2022 and 2023, the higher borrowing costs were widely expected to tip the United States into a recession. Instead, the economy kept growing and employers kept hiring. But former Fed economist Claudia Sahm warns that the job market of 2025 isn't nearly as durable as the two or three years ago when immigrants were pouring into the US job market and employers were posting record job openings. Any signs of weakness in the data this week would stoke fears of a recession again, Sahm, now chief economist at New Century Advisors, wrote in a Substack post this week. It's too soon to see the full effects of tariffs, DOGE, or other policies on the labour market; softening now would suggest less resilience to those later effects, raising the odds of a recession. Recent economic reports have sent mixed signals. The Labour Department reported Tuesday that US job openings rose unexpectedly to 7.4 million in April seemingly a good sign. But the same report showed that layoffs ticked up and the number of Americans quitting their jobs fell, a sign they were less confident they could find something better elsewhere. Surveys by the Institute for Supply Management, a trade group of purchasing managers, found that both American manufacturing and services businesses were contracting last month. And the number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits rose last week to the highest level in eight months. Jobless claims a proxy for layoffs still remain low by historical standards, suggesting that employers are reluctant to cut staff despite uncertainty over Trump's policies. They likely remember how hard it was to bring people back from the massive but short-lived layoffs of the 2020 COVID-19 recession as the US economy bounced back with unexpected strength. Still, the job market has clearly decelerated. So far this year, American employers have added an average 1,44,000 jobs a month. That is down from 1,68,000 last year; 2,16,000 in 2023; 3,80,000 in 2022, and a record 6,03,000 in 2021 in the rebound from COVID-19 layoffs. Trump's tariffs and the erratic way he rolls them out, suspends them and conjures up new ones have already buffeted the economy. America's gross domestic product the nation's output of goods and services fell at a 0.2 per cent annual pace from January through March this year. A surge of imports shaved 5 percentage points off growth during the first quarter as companies rushed to bring in foreign products ahead of Trump's tariffs. Imports plunged by a record 16 per cent in April as Trump's levies took effect. The drop in foreign goods could mean fewer jobs at the warehouses that store them and the trucking companies that haul them around, wrote Michael Madowitz, an economist at the left-leaning Roosevelt Institute.
&w=3840&q=100)
Business Standard
21 minutes ago
- Business Standard
Boson Cell leads India's march towards sustainable energy storage solutions
Boson Cell, which claims to be the first indigenous lithium cell manufacturing company, has officially launched two new variants—high-performance, cost-effective energy cells: 18350 B-30A and 21700 B-50A. This supports the Prime Minister's clarion call towards making India an Atmanirbhar destination for multiple industries, ensuring that the country's journey towards energy self-reliance and sustainable use of renewable energy is no longer a distant reality. Boson Cell is now at the forefront of the country's rapidly evolving lithium ecosystem, which is set to redefine the way India is perceived by the global audience. With India's lithium-ion battery market projected to skyrocket to $9.56 billion by 2030, Boson Cell is expected to become a critical enabler in key industries—especially clean mobility, consumer electronics, renewable energy, and the rapidly expanding drone market. Supported by forward-looking government initiatives such as FAME II, the PLI Scheme, and the Drone Shakti programme, the demand for reliable, affordable, and locally sourced battery technology is at an all-time high. 'Boson is not just another cell manufacturer—it's a symbol of India's technological prowess in powering sustainable solutions to address the requirements of the burgeoning futuristic industry that are banking on renewable energy,' said Guru Punghavan, Chief Executive Officer, Boson Cell. 'We're not only replacing imports but building smarter, cleaner, and more scalable energy solutions that can power the future of every Indian household, enterprise, and innovation. The cells, manufactured in three variants—Economy, Advanced, and Extreme—can aid the multi-dimensional requirements of battery manufacturers as well as individuals with smaller-scale needs. Quality is at the heart of Boson's promise, with each lithium cell undergoing rigorous multi-stage testing to guarantee safety and superior performance. These cells are designed for wide compatibility, powering a diverse range of applications including electric vehicles, drones, solar energy systems, power tools, and more.' Boson Cell's expansion is timed to capitalise on India's drone sector boom, fuelled by applications in agriculture, defence, logistics, and infrastructure. The Indian drone market is expected to reach $13 billion by 2030, creating a surge in demand for lightweight, high-density, and durable lithium storage solutions. With increasing government support for local drone manufacturing and operational adoption across sectors, Boson's high-performance cells are uniquely positioned to become the backbone of this unmanned aerial revolution. Manufactured through a sustainable, eco-conscious process, each cell embodies the company's steadfast commitment to sustainability, safety, and scalability—ensuring products that are both reliable and responsible. Boson offers cells at a lower cost compared to imported alternatives. Alongside affordability, the company provides faster turnaround times, shorter lead times, and lower minimum order quantities (MOQs) for distributors, enhancing operational flexibility and supply chain efficiency. Currently, Boson's products are available across Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala, and Andhra Pradesh, distributed through electronics retailers, supermarkets, and local kirana stores. Online accessibility is ensured via partnerships with Amazon, Flipkart, and Boson's own direct-to-consumer e-commerce platform. Looking ahead, Boson Cell is targeting a pan-India presence through modern trade and organised retail channels by the end of 2025. The company also plans to deepen its engagement in strategic sectors such as drone technology, electric vehicle manufacturing, and clean energy integration. With its cutting-edge technology, commitment to local manufacturing, and industry-focused approach, Boson Cell is not only powering India today—it is shaping the country's energy future.
Mint
29 minutes ago
- Mint
India Bucks Tepid Trend Across Emerging Asia as US Data Awaits
(Bloomberg) -- Follow Bloomberg India on WhatsApp for exclusive content and analysis on what billionaires, businesses and markets are doing. Sign up here. Markets across much of emerging Asia traded in a narrow range ahead of US payrolls data, with the exception of Indian bonds that swung wildly after a bigger-than-expected interest-rate cut. Bloomberg's Asia Dollar Spot Index dipped 0.1% on Friday, with the stock benchmarks in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China also slipping. Bucking the trend was India, where the Nifty 50 advanced and the 10-year bond yield slid as much as 11 basis points. It later recouped the losses to trade flat at 6.25%. Global funds shifting money away from the US and back to Asia has been a big theme for investors in recent weeks. Data due later on Friday is likely to show US hiring slowed last month, potentially giving the Federal Reserve grounds to cut interest rates this year. An index of Asian currencies versus the dollar has already advanced 2% this quarter, and further Fed easing may help extend their gains. So would an easing of trade tensions, though the most recent call between President Donald Trump and China's Xi Jinping failed to lift sentiment. 'A weaker NFP print would reinforce the narrative that US exceptionalism is indeed fading,' Malayan Banking Bhd. analysts wrote in a note 'We hold on to selling USD.' Currency valuation has emerged as a central theme in the trade talks between the US and other countries, though in its first report on foreign-exchange practices since Trump returned to office, the Treasury Department declined to name any country a manipulator. China, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Vietnam all feature on the US watch list. Even with US scrutiny of exchange rates, a number of market participants foresee further EM currency gains. JPMorgan Chase & Co. this week suggested investors boost their exposure to the currencies of developing markets. The firm said it was positive on the South African rand, Thai baht, Brazil's real and Mexico's peso. For India, the deeper-than-expected 50 basis point cut to the repurchase rate signals that policy makers are worried about growth against the backdrop of global trade tensions. 'We still expect INR to underperform,' analysts at Nomura Holdings Inc. wrote in a note following the decision. The bank said it is long EUR/INR and also positive on Indian rates. --With assistance from Malavika Kaur Makol and Bhaskar Dutta. More stories like this are available on
