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11:14am 03/05/05 Warren Buffett confesses he 'struck out' in 2004 (BRKA, BRKB) By Thomas Middleton NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Warren Buffett, renowned investor and chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRKA) , said he "struck out" in 2004 by failing to make acquisitions that would have increased earnings. In his company's 40th annual report Saturday, the 74-year-old CEO said Berkshire Hathaway increased its net worth by $8.3 billion last year. That increased the company's per-share book value by 10.5%, which fell short of the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index, which posted a 10.9% return for 2004. Buffett said he found "very...

Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates was elected Tuesday to serve on the board of directors of prominent investment company Berkshire Hathaway. In doing so, Gates will serve as an advisor to longtime friend and Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett. In a statement, Gates said he hoped his years of experience at Microsoft would prove to be of value to Berkshire's shareholders. "I am delighted and honored to have been asked to serve on the board of this very successful company," Gates said. Gates also serves on the board of Bothell, Wash.-based biotech company Icos. Despite being close to Gates, Buffett has...

By John Berlau © 2004 Insight/News World Communications Inc. Though President Bush constantly is criticized and attacked by Democratic partisans for pursuing policies that benefit "the wealthy," why are so many of what would be considered America's superrich his political opponents? In addition to the Hollywood mega-elite, which since the death of Sam Goldwyn have opposed the GOP mainly for cultural reasons, billionaire businessmen have stepped forward calling for the defeat of Bush or his policies. Most prominent has been speculator George Soros, who has pledged to raise $75 million to defeat Bush, given millions to Democratic Bush-bashing groups such...

Pro-Lifers Ensure Pampered Chef Profits No Longer Support Abortion By Candi Cushman Pro-life moms working for The Pampered Chef — the nation's largest direct-sales kitchenware company — have scored a major victory against the abortion industry by stopping pro-abortion donations from one of the world's largest megacorporations, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Headed by billionaire Warren Buffett, one of the abortion industry's top financiers, Berkshire is a conglomerate of corporations including The Pampered Chef, Dairy Queen and Fruit of the Loom. For years, the company has funneled millions of its profits into The Buffett Foundation, which in turn bankrolls several "reproductive rights"...

<p>Berkshire Hathaway, the hugely successful, Nebraska-based company led by Warren Buffett, recently announced an end to its program for charitable giving, and in a way that is big news.</p> <p>The program was an object of adoration for years, not least because it allowed Class A shareholders to designate where they wanted their portion of the company's charity to go. It seemed so democratic, so enlightened compared with the usual corporate-charity model: allowing an executive committee to pick a few charities on behalf of all shareholders. And yet we should be glad that Berkshire's program has ended. It was a bad idea in the first place.</p>

Warren Buffett has drawn criticism in the past for supporting pro-choice causes, but it never affected Berkshire Hathaway's charitable giving—that is, until Cindy Coughlon, a 34-year-old stay-at-home mom in Peoria, Ariz., came along. Now, as a result of her campaign against pro-choice donations, the most powerful man in business has terminated Berkshire's entire contribution program, which distributed nearly $200 million over the past two decades to institutions ranging from schools to groups on either side of the abortion debate. The unusual program—call it a charitable dividend—allowed Berkshire shareholders to designate $18 per share annually for up to three charities of...

This is the text of an email sent out today from Pampered Chef's founder, Doris Christopher. Dear Kitchen Consultants: I have shared with you my pride in being a part of the Berkshire Hathaway family of businesses. I knew that this was the kind of family where The Pampered Chef would thrive and grow for years to come. I have also shared with you my feelings of respect for Warren Buffett. Today, I am even more proud to call Warren my mentor, leader and friend. This week I went to Warren with a heavy heart. I told him that many...

Today Berkshire-Hathaway has announced that it will stop its shareholder-designated contributions program. Quote from the Berkshire-Hathaway press release: "Berkshire Hathaway has terminated its shareholder-designated contributions program, which has distributed approximately $197 million since it was begun in 1981. This program has allowed holders of Berkshire’s A shares to designate a per-share sum for the company to contribute to as many as three charities, the only requirement being that the designee have 501(c)(3) status. The program thus allowed a wide diversity of donations, some of them controversial but all outside the control of Berkshire." The entire press release can be viewed...

(AgapePress) - A growing number of Christian, pro-life mothers are leaving lucrative careers with a national kitchenware company because of the new owner's support of abortion. "The Pampered Chef" is one of the nation's largest and fastest-growing kitchenware companies. The company, founded in 1980 by professing Christian and stay-at-home mother Doris Christopher, has been driven mostly by stay-at-home moms who sell the products from home. The company boasts more than 67,000 "Kitchen Consultants" and sales of $700 million annually. But now, according to Citizen magazine, many Christian mothers are walking away from the company because Pampered Chef's new owner, billionaire...

Warren Buffett, who's made his billions guessing the future of the market, is offering a much scarier kind of forecast these days. The "Oracle of Omaha" has been using recent public appearances to predict new terrorist attacks on the United States. At Berkshire Hathaway's annual meeting in May, typically a confab of cone-head value investors terrorized by lofty price-to-earnings ratios, Buffett declared that detonation of a nuclear device in an American city—"$1 trillion nuclear event" in Manhattan, for example—was inevitable. "We're going to have something in the way of a major nuclear event in this country. It will happen. Whether...

Charlie Munger, who runs Wesco Financial, is the famed right-hand man of Warren Buffett. He is also a master investor in his own right. At Wesco's annual meeting a week ago, he shared his always-blunt opinions on Berkshire Hathaway, the scandalous ethics in the accounting, law, and investment banking professions, and more. Warren Buffett is generally acknowledged to be the greatest investor ever -- one of the reasons why 13,000 people flocked to the recent annual meeting of his investment vehicle, Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A). But closely following Buffett are a handful of other legendary investors, including his long-time partner,...

NEW YORK, March 20 (Reuters) - Warren Buffett, the canny billionaire known as the "Oracle of Omaha", took home just $100,000 in pay last year and once again spurned the idea of stock options and other popular CEO incentives, as he has for many years. The 71 year-old investor, second only to friend and bridge partner Bill Gates on the world's rich list, paid himself $100,000 for running his Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (nyse: BRKa - news - people) conglomerate, which made $795 million profit last year. The modest U.S. Midwesterner, worth about $35 billion, is a long-standing enemy of stock...