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The week's question
In December 2024, in the thread "Re: BRK: Why Not XOM?", BreckHutHigh asked the members: "What about the long road trips with kids?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
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Stocks A to Z / Stocks B / Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A)
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Author: mungofitch 🐝🐝🐝 GOLD
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Number: of 21944 
Subject: Re: A B spread 2.35%
Date: 12/16/23 10:47 AM
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To me, the slight economic premium for the A shares always represented the value in the extra voting rights inherent in the A shares. For a long time those extra voting rights were not worth much because Buffett and Munger had such a large, outsized influence in the company that shareholder votes really did not matter all that much.
As time has gone on, Buffett has slowly been disposing of his shares and more and more As are being converted into Bs. Now Munger is gone. The extra voting rights of the A shares are becoming more valuable.


That's all logical, but to me it seems less than sufficient to explain the observed drift. Logic is rarely enough to make sense of the market!

The A:B premium was pretty steady for many years before the split at the time of the BNSF purchase. Around 0.3%, if I recall.

It dropped to essentially zero premium for a few years after the S&P 500 addition.
Other than occasional excursions, it was basically nothing at 1500:1 almost all of 2010-2020.

There was a bump in 2021 which faded, then it started climbing substantially and steadily in the last 18 months.
The recent levels haven't been seen before outside of chaotic bear markets when the B holders, the relative weak hands, seem to sell faster.

That just doesn't seem to match the pattern of buybacks and the concomitant increase in value of the voting premium.
To me, it seems that something new is going on. Maybe not something important, but it remains a bit of a mystery to me.

Maybe as simple as a bit of shift in marginal relative demand because of the ability to buy fractional A shares at some brokers?

Jim
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This community has written 21,448 posts about Berkshire Hathaway. The article-length ones it recommended most:
BRK: Why Not XOM? · 62 recs · 2024
Second quarter comments · 60 recs · 2023
Berkshire's Profit Contributors · 57 recs · 2023
Summary of 2Q 2026 · 54 recs · 2026
3Q Summary · 53 recs · 2024
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