The famed investor’s Berkshire Hathaway first bought into the insurance giant in the third quarter of 2023, but secured regulatory permission to keep the holding confidential until it finished building its stake.Buffett’s company initially purchased 8.1 million Chubb shares worth $1.7 billion at the end of September, then boosted the position to 20.1 million shares valued at $4.5 billion at December’s close. It raised the bet to 25.9 million shares worth $6.7 billion at the end of March, SEC filings revealed on Wednesday.
Assuming Berkshire hasn’t touched its stake since then, it owns about 6.4% of Chubb — a company with a roughly $100 billion market capitalization.Chubb operates in 54 countries and provides everything from property and casualty insurance to health insurance, reinsurance, and life insurance.It’s a stock that Buffett will feel comfortable owning, given Berkshire has a large insurance business with subsidiaries like Geico and Alleghany.Buffett and his team also slashed their biggest holding, Apple, by 13% to 789 million shares last quarter. The sales fueled a $39 billion decline in the position’s value to $135 billion at March’s close.The Apple disposals won’t surprise Buffett’s close followers as they were clearly telegraphed in Berkshire’s recent annual report. The sales of the iPhone maker’s stock accounted for virtually all of Berkshire’s $20 billion of stock sales in the period.Berkshire investors will likely welcome the Chubb reveal, as Buffett has struggled to find assets worth buying in recent years. The bargain drought reflects the stock market trading at record highs, and fierce competition for acquisitions from private equity firms.The upshot has been an increase in Berkshire’s hoard of cash and Treasury bills to a record $189 billion at the end of March. Buffett also predicted during Berkshire’s recent annual meeting that it would surpass $200 billion by the end of June.
