Subject: Re: What recent Berkshire security do you like best_QM
Possibly no indevidual on, but I'm guessing as a group they would qualify - and are excelling:

8001:tyo Itochu Corp
8002:tyo Marubeni Corp
8031:tyo Mitsui
8053:tyo Sumitomo
8058:tyo Mitsubishi

Between them, they cover a vast proportion of the Japanese export economy.


Yes, I like these too, and I coat-tailed 0.2% stakes in 3 of them in May 2025, up 21% on average since then.

I didn't put them in my list because they were mostly bought in 2019. But Buffett did buy a fair bit more at the beginning of this year, increasing his stakes by about 10-20%, and now owns about 10% of each, and perhaps a bit more, since they have all allowed him to go somewhat beyond the previous 10% limit.

After this last known increase, they represented 2.6%, 1.2%, 2.3%, 1.1% and 3.0%. So they are quite big investments, and even the increases would qualify as significant (>0.2%). Combined, they now represent about 10% of the $303b investment portfolio, about the size of the #3 holding (Bank of America). For comparison, #1 Apple was at 22% at the end of June, and #2 American Express was at 16%, with #4 Coca-Cola at 9%.

I have not counted subsequent share price movements, but it is worth noting that these sogo shosha are all up another 17-28% since June 30, so they probably represent an even higher share now.