No. of Recommendations: 10
To within rounding error, the rules of investing large portfolios is: if your name is Warren Buffett you can beat the market materially over time, and if it isn't you can't.
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I think there were 4 or 5 people (Buffett, Miller, Simons, etc) who were able to beat the market materially over the long-term. It is quite possible that someday there will be a fifth such person.
Read my comment with emphasis on "large". I'm pretty sure nobody else has beat the market past random chance with a 12 digit portfolio to manage. Heck, at that scale it gets hard to diverge by any material amount. You have to hold large positions from among the largest things.
It's certainly possible, even likely, that someone else will manage the feat some day. But as a rule of thumb, it makes no sense to think that the next portfolio manager at Berkshire will be that person. If they manage a 1%/year advantage over time after corporate-level tax that will be truly astounding. Book value might manage that because of the modest implicit leverage within Berkshire.
Jim
