NEWS - US
Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway cut its stake in Kraft by 23% in Q1 after saying the food giant made a number of "dumb" moves in acquiring Cadbury.
Berkshire cut its holding in Kraft from 138.27 million shares to 106.73 million over the quarter, filings to the US Securities and Exchange Commission show.
The group was once the largest shareholder in Kraft, controlling 9.4% of the company.
Buffett was critical of Kraft and CEO Irene Rosenfeld for using "undervalued" company stock to buy Cadbury, and for selling Kraft's frozen pizza businesses to Nestle to partly fund the deal.
At Berkshire's annual shareholder meeting earlier this month, Buffett said the pizza disposal was "particularly dumb".
Berkshire sold a net $639m of equities during the first quarter, in part to fund its $26.5bn takeover of Burlington Northern Santa Fe. Berkshire liquidated holdings in health insurers UnitedHealth and WellPoint in Q1.
Notable Changes:
Added: 2.54 million shares of Republic Services, bringing his stake to 10.8 million shares.
Added: 795K shares of Iron Mountain, bringing his stake to 7.8 million shares.
Added: 244K shares of Becton, Dickinson and Company, bringing his stake to 1.7 million shares.
Sold: 8.4 million shares of Procter & Gamble, bringing his stake to 79.1 million shares.
Sold: 31.54 million shares of Kraft Foods, bringing his stake to 106.7 million shares.
Sold: 33.5 million shares of ConocoPhillips, bringing his stake to 34.2 million shares.
Sold: 1.15 million shares of M&T Bank, bringing his stake to 485 million shares.
Sold: 920K shares of Costco, bringing his stake to 4.3 million shares.
Sold: 274K shares of CarMax, bringing his stake to 7.7 million shares.
Liquidated: SunTrust Banks, The Travelers Companies, UnitedHealth, WellPoint.
Buffett's top three holdings were Coca-Cola at 200 million shares, Wells Fargo at 321 million, and American Express at 152 million. He maintained his holdings in all three.
Categories: US
Topics: Warren buffett
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