Berkshire Hathaway Stock (BRK.B): Operating Earnings, Cash and Buybacks in Numbers

Michael Whitman · Trading since 2017, full-time since 2020 · YouTube creator, 137K subscribers · Published 2026-11-07

Berkshire Hathaway stock is one company traded as two tickers. BRK.A is the original share, which closed at $856,612 on November 6, 2026. BRK.B is a slice worth one fifteen-hundredth of it, which closed at $570.89. Behind both sits an insurance group that also owns BNSF railway, a large energy business and dozens of manufacturers and retailers, plus a stock portfolio and a very large pile of Treasury bills.

Quote pages give you a P/E, a 52-week range and a headline. They do not separate what the businesses earn from what the stock portfolio did, and on November 7 StockAnalysis, for one, still showed a P/E of 14.36, built on earnings from before that morning’s third-quarter report. This page works the numbers from Berkshire’s own releases and filings.

BRK.B at a glance: a record close on November 4, 2026

Prices are the November 6, 2026 closes. Earnings come from the third-quarter release and 10-Q posted on November 7, and from the 2025 year-end release. Share counts are from the 10-Q cover, dated October 28.

In 2026 to November 6, BRK.B rose 13.6%, against 8.8% for the S&P 500 with dividends reinvested. It set a record close of $579.09 on November 4 and was 1.4% below it two days later.

How it works: Berkshire’s A shares and B shares

An A share converts into 1,500 B shares, and never the other way. The 10-Q spells out the rest. A B share gets one fifteen-hundredth of an A share’s economic rights but only one ten-thousandth of its vote. So the 480,476 A shares on the October 28 cover hold 33.9% of the company’s economic value and, by our arithmetic, 77.4% of the votes.

BRK.B first traded in May 1996 and was split 50-for-1 on January 21, 2010, which set the current 1,500 ratio.

The conversion keeps the prices tied. If BRK.A ever traded well below 1,500 B shares, a holder could convert and sell the B shares for more. Nothing works in the other direction, so A can drift above. We compared BRK.A’s close with 1,500 times BRK.B’s on every one of the 4,226 sessions from the split to November 6, 2026:

• Median gap: A at 0.05% above 1,500 B. On November 6 it was 0.03%.
• How tight: within 0.5% on 83.5% of sessions and within 1% on 92.7%. A closed above on 62.3%.
• The extremes: A at 3.42% above on April 14, 2023 (2023 had a median gap of 1.24%, the widest year), and 1.90% below on March 13, 2020, in the COVID crash.

For most buyers the choice comes down to the ticket size. At $856,612 a share, A is out of reach for a small account; B gives the same slice of the profits per dollar, with almost no say in votes.

The original data: operating earnings, net earnings and the cash pile

Operating earnings against net earnings. GAAP accounting puts the change in value of Berkshire’s stock holdings straight into net earnings. Berkshire’s own releases strip those gains back out and report operating earnings: what insurance, BNSF, the energy business and the operating companies made after tax. Its own release calls quarterly investment gains “usually meaningless” for judging the business.

Each year uses the latest release that shows it, so 2022 carries the restatement printed in the 2023 release. The 2018 and 2020 gaps include $3.02 billion and $10.99 billion of write-downs, and 2025 includes $8.26 billion of impairments on Kraft Heinz and Occidental.

• Steadier, not steady. Operating earnings grew 79.5% from 2018 to 2025 but fell in 2019, 2020 and 2025. Their year-to-year spread (standard deviation) was $9.1 billion; for net earnings it was $41.4 billion.
• The 2026 mix so far. In the first nine months operating earnings were $37.03 billion, up 8.0%. Manufacturing, service and retailing gave 31.6%, insurance investment income 22.9%, underwriting 13.0%, BNSF 12.6% and the energy business 9.8%.
• The third quarter was weaker. Operating earnings fell 5.8% to $12.71 billion. Underwriting profit fell 42.9% and investment income 14.1%, while BNSF rose 19.3%.

The cash pile. We added up three balance-sheet lines: insurance-and-other cash, short-term Treasury bills, and the railroad and energy businesses’ cash.

• End of 2018 to end of 2023: $111.9 billion, then $128.0, $138.3, $146.7, $128.6 and $167.6 billion.
• The jump: $334.2 billion at the end of 2024 and $373.3 billion at the end of 2025.
• September 30, 2026: $377.4 billion, of which $336.7 billion was Treasury bills. That includes $20.5 billion of bill purchases not yet settled, so net of those it was about $356.9 billion.
• Against the share price: $377.4 billion is 31.1% of the $1.21 trillion market value. Insurance float, the money held for future claims, was about $178.5 billion. Our Treasury bills page covers what those bills pay and how they work.

Download the data: earnings, cash and buybacks and results-day moves. Both are free to reuse with a credit and a link to this page, under our site license.

A worked example: two P/E ratios for one Berkshire share

All inputs are in the November 7, 2026 release and the 2025 year-end release, except the price.

1. Trailing net earnings per B share. $26.92 for the first nine months of 2026, plus $31.04 for 2025, minus $22.14 for the first nine months of 2025, gives $35.82.
2. P/E on net earnings. $570.89 ÷ $35.82 = 15.9. Before the third-quarter report the same sum used $14.28 for the 2025 quarter instead of $10.33 for 2026, giving $39.77 and 14.35x. StockAnalysis still showed 14.36 on November 7.
3. Trailing operating earnings. $37.03 billion + $44.49 billion − $34.29 billion = $47.23 billion.
4. Price to operating earnings. $1.21 trillion ÷ $47.23 billion = 25.7.
5. Book value. Berkshire shareholders’ equity of $761.37 billion ÷ (1,418,900 Class A equivalents × 1,500) = $357.73 per B share, and $570.89 ÷ $357.73 = 1.60. Our price-to-book page explains the ratio.

The two answers differ by ten points because trailing net earnings include $34.3 billion of investment gains, less $4.5 billion of impairments. A P/E ratio taken from net earnings moves with the stock market as much as with the businesses.

Greg Abel succeeds Warren Buffett as CEO

Greg Abel runs the company now. On May 3, 2025 Warren Buffett said he would recommend Abel as chief executive. The board voted unanimously the next day, effective January 1, 2026, according to the 8-K filed May 8, 2025. The 2025 10-K says major capital allocation and investment decisions are Abel’s responsibility. Buffett, whose approach is on our Warren Buffett page, was re-elected a director at the May 2, 2026 meeting.

BRK.B fell 5.1% on May 5, 2025, the first session after the announcement. From the May 2, 2025 close to November 6, 2026 it gained 5.8%, against 32.1% for the S&P 500 with dividends.

Repurchases restart: about $9.65 billion in one quarter

Repurchases restarted. Buybacks are made when the CEO, after consulting the chairman, believes the price is below intrinsic value, and never if cash and Treasury bills would fall below $30 billion.

In the third quarter of 2026 Berkshire bought 4,536 A shares at an average of $751,341.72 and 12,384,959 B shares at an average of $503.68, about $9.65 billion in all by our arithmetic. BRK.B closed 13.3% above that average on November 6. Class A equivalent shares fell from 1,543,960 at the end of 2020 to 1,418,900 on September 30, 2026, down 8.1%.

Results days: 35 Saturday releases since 2018

Berkshire posts results on a Saturday morning, so the market reacts on Monday. Our definition of a results day: the first session after each Saturday release, dated from the release itself, measured from the Friday close. Berkshire files the matching 8-K later, often on Monday afternoon, so we do not use filing times. Before 2018 the first-, second- and third-quarter releases came out on Fridays, so the count starts on February 24, 2018 and runs to August 8, 2026: 35 releases. The comparison sessions run from February 26, 2018 to November 6, 2026.

• The median move was 1.54%, against 0.62% on the other 2,153 sessions and 0.64% on the other 419 sessions that also followed a weekend.
• 10 of the 35 moved 3% or more, against 2.4% of other sessions. Only 2 moved 5% or more.
• Direction: 21 were up, 60.0%, against a 52.9% base rate, a gap well within chance (two-sided binomial p = 0.50).
• The largest were +6.06% on November 9, 2020 and −5.12% on May 5, 2025, the Monday that also followed the succession news.
• The November 7, 2026 release will first meet the market on Monday, November 9.

When it fails: when Berkshire lags a strong market

It can fall about as far as the market. From December 10, 2007 to March 5, 2009, BRK.B fell 53.9%, against 55.3% for the S&P 500 with dividends, and it did not regain that high until February 15, 2013. In 2020 it fell 29.6% to March 23 and took until November 16 to recover. BRK.A fell 48.9% from June 19, 1998 to March 10, 2000, and took until November 14, 2003 to regain its 1998 high. Our drawdown page explains the measure.

It often lags in strong markets. Against the S&P 500 with dividends, BRK.B beat the index in 5 of the 11 calendar years from 2015 to 2025. It trailed in 2019 (10.9% against 31.5%) and 2020 (2.4% against 18.4%), and beat it in 2022 (3.3% against −18.1%). Over the ten years to November 6, 2026 it returned 14.85% a year, against 15.35% for the index.

Cash earns what bills pay. With $336.7 billion in Treasury bills, a large slice of the balance sheet earns the short-term rate and nothing more. Insurance investment income, which includes that interest, was 22.9% of operating earnings this year and fell 14.1% in the third quarter.

Size cuts both ways. At $1.21 trillion, a deal large enough to move results has to be very large. The two 2026 purchases, OxyChem for $9.4 billion and the homebuilder Taylor Morrison for about $6.8 billion, together came to about 4% of the cash pile, according to the 10-Q.

Questions people ask

What is the difference between BRK.A and BRK.B?

One A share equals 1,500 B shares in economic rights and can be converted into them, but B shares carry only one ten-thousandth of an A share’s vote. Since 2010 the two have closed within 0.5% of that ratio on 83.5% of sessions.

Does Berkshire Hathaway pay a dividend?

No. The 2025 10-K says Berkshire has not declared a cash dividend since 1967. It returns cash through buybacks instead, $14.4 billion in the first nine months of 2026. Our retained earnings page explains where kept profits go.

What is Berkshire’s market cap?

$1.21 trillion at the November 6, 2026 closes, using both share classes from the 10-Q cover. Our market cap page covers how the figure is built.

Who runs Berkshire Hathaway now?

Greg Abel, President and CEO since January 1, 2026. He signed the third-quarter 2026 10-Q in that role.

How big is Berkshire’s cash pile?

$377.4 billion in cash and Treasury bills at September 30, 2026, up from $373.3 billion at the end of 2025.

Related

The ratios here are explained on P/E ratio, price-to-book and earnings per share. A large holding in one name carries the risks on our concentration risk page, and the S&P 500 page covers the index this stock is measured against.

This page is educational, not financial advice. Test every idea on your own charts before risking money.