Berkshire Hathaway, the $1.21 trillion Omaha, Nebraska conglomerate that many investors treat as a barometer of the American economy, reported a weaker third quarter on Saturday, November 7 — and simultaneously revealed that it bought back $9.6 billion of its own stock in just three months, more than double the pace of the previous quarter. Operating earnings fell 5.8 percent to $12.705 billion, down from $13.485 billion a year earlier, while net earnings fell 28 percent to $22.11 billion, according to the company's earnings release and its Form 10-Q filing, both dated November 7, 2026.
Source: Reuters
The buyback figure is the headline inside the headline. Berkshire repurchased $9.6 billion of its own shares between July and September, on top of $4.8 billion earlier in the year, and then bought about $2 billion more in the first four weeks of October, Reuters reported from the company's release. September alone accounted for $5.41 billion — 56 percent of the quarter's total. Even after that spending spree, and after paying for two major acquisitions this year, Berkshire ended September holding $356.9 billion in cash and equivalents, down from $380.2 billion six months earlier. Its biggest buyback year ever remains 2021, when it repurchased $27 billion of stock.
Insurance dragged the quarter down, and GEICO dragged insurance
Almost all of the profit decline came from insurance. After-tax insurance underwriting earnings fell 42.9 percent to $1.352 billion, from $2.369 billion a year earlier, and insurance investment income fell 14.1 percent to $2.734 billion as interest rates declined. The biggest single weak spot was GEICO, the car insurer millions of American drivers know from its advertising: GEICO's pretax profit fell 45 percent, its underwriting profit dropped to $982 million from $1.77 billion, and its loss ratio — the share of premiums paid out in claims — rose to 76.6 percent from 71.5 percent. GEICO's claims costs rose 8.5 percent to $8.73 billion, while premiums written slipped 0.3 percent to $11.71 billion. Reuters reported that GEICO has been deliberately charging lower premiums to win back customers it lost during a multiyear effort to improve underwriting quality and cut overhead, and that the lower prices, higher claim frequencies and larger average claims together squeezed the result.
Source: The Edge, from Berkshire Hathaway release and 10-Q
The weakness was broad across the insurance group, not only at GEICO. Berkshire Hathaway Primary Group's pretax underwriting profit fell to $119 million from $506 million, and the reinsurance group's fell to $582 million from $884 million, while claims also grew in other insurance and reinsurance businesses. Notably, catastrophes do not explain the decline: Berkshire reported no losses from significant catastrophe events in the first nine months of 2026, against an estimated $850 million of such losses in the same period of 2025. The insurers' float — the money Berkshire holds from policies that funds its investing — still grew to about $178.5 billion, up about $2.1 billion since the end of 2025.
Trains, power lines and factories carried the other side
Outside insurance, the quarter was strong. BNSF, Berkshire's railroad and one of the largest freight networks in North America, lifted after-tax earnings 19.3 percent to $1.729 billion, as railroad revenue grew 14.7 percent to $6.87 billion on shipping volumes up 3.9 percent, higher fuel surcharge revenue and better yields on consumer, agricultural and energy products. Berkshire Hathaway Energy — the utilities, natural gas pipelines and real estate brokerage group — earned $1.612 billion, up 8.3 percent, on stronger United States utility and pipeline results. For readers who drive trucks for a living, one smaller line in the release matters too: higher gasoline prices boosted earnings at Pilot, the truck-stop chain Berkshire owns along the interstates.
The manufacturing, service and retailing group earned $4.042 billion after tax, up 11.8 percent, and supplied almost a third of Berkshire's operating earnings, as group revenue rose 17.8 percent to $64.45 billion. Aerospace and industrial gas turbine sales helped Precision Castparts raise pretax profit by 30 percent. The soft spots were on the consumer side: Berkshire said several retailing businesses face sluggish demand amid economic uncertainty, with declines at Fruit of the Loom underwear and Forest River recreational vehicles, and lower tax credits hurt battery maker Duracell. Total company revenue still rose 11 percent to $105.65 billion — the second straight quarter of double-digit growth.
The Abel era: the famous cash pile is finally moving
This was the third quarter with Greg Abel, 64, as chief executive, and the results show a clear change of style from his predecessor. Warren Buffett, 96, ran Berkshire for about 60 years and, toward the end, repeatedly said he had difficulty finding things worth buying; he is now chairman emeritus, after his son Howard Buffett replaced him as chairman in September. Abel has shown a greater willingness to put the cash hoard to work, Reuters reported: Berkshire spent $9.4 billion buying Occidental Petroleum's chemicals business, OxyChem, and $6.8 billion completing its purchase of home builder Taylor Morrison in July at $72.50 a share. It has also spent billions on Alphabet shares to help Google's parent expand in artificial intelligence, took a 4 percent stake in Italian software company Bending Spoons, and was a net buyer of stocks by $11.2 billion over nine months — the opposite of a year earlier, when sales exceeded purchases by $10.6 billion. Its stock portfolio stood at $335.5 billion on September 30, with Alphabet, American Express, Apple, Bank of America and Coca-Cola accounting for 65 percent of its value.
Berkshire said 'considerable uncertainty' remains about economic and geopolitical events, including tariffs and wars, and that the uncertainty is hurting consumer confidence and demand at several of its retail businesses — even though the wider United States economy grew at a 3.4 percent annualised rate in the third quarter, according to the Commerce Department's advance estimate. CFRA Research analyst Cathy Seifert, who rates the stock 'hold', said Berkshire's balance-sheet strength, diversification and buybacks are tailwinds, and that investors may be rotating into 'less volatile, high-quality names such as Berkshire' — but she also warned that the company's limited financial disclosures 'become a point of vulnerability' when results go the wrong way.
Wall Street has noticed the shift. Berkshire's shares reached record highs this week despite a broader market selloff driven by worries about artificial intelligence spending and debt, and since the end of September the stock has outgained the S&P 500 index by more than 18 percentage points, after lagging badly since Buffett announced in May 2025 that he would step down. CNBC reported that Class A shares are up more than 12 percent over the past month while the S&P 500 fell about 5.5 percent. Berkshire itself urges investors to look past the 28 percent fall in net earnings, because that figure includes unrealised gains and losses on stocks it still owns and has not sold; its release calls the investment gains of any single quarter 'usually meaningless' and warns they can make per-share earnings extremely misleading.
Source: CNBC via US Brief
What happens next
Markets were closed on Saturday, so the first share-price verdict on these numbers arrives when United States markets open on Monday, November 9. Investors will be watching three things: whether the buyback pace continues now that the share price has rallied to records — Berkshire's own policy allows repurchases only when the chief executive, after consulting the chairman, believes the price is below the company's intrinsic value, and never if they would take cash, equivalents and Treasury bills below $30 billion; what Berkshire's next 13F filing reveals about changes in its stock holdings, including its Alphabet position; and whether GEICO's price-cutting strategy starts converting into customer growth without further margin damage when fourth-quarter and full-year results are published. Berkshire had 1,418,900 Class A equivalent shares outstanding on September 30, and shareholders' equity rose to $761.4 billion, against total assets of $1.30 trillion.