There were few big surprises in wide-moat-rated Berkshire Hathaway's latest 13-F filing -a quarterly Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) requirement for institutional investment managers.

Warren Buffett

Having already telegraphed a number of its movements in mid-February, including the sale of 35 million shares of Phillips 66 common stock for US$3.3 billion in a private transaction with the oil and gas company. CEO Warren Buffett also alluded recently to the purchase of 74.2 million additional shares of Apple for an estimated US$12.5 billion. This trade lifted the tech giant to more than one-fifth of Berkshire's equity portfolio, noting that the insurer eliminated its remaining stake in IBM as well - for an estimated US$314 million.

Berkshire also made large additions to existing stakes in agricultural products firm Monsanto and Teva pharmaceuticals. Increasing its holdings in the former by more than 60 per cent, Berkshire acquired an additional 7.3 million shares for an estimated $850 million, and picked up 21.7 million more shares of the generic drug manufacturer for an estimated $390 million, doubling its position.

Other purchases during the quarter included 3.7 million shares of US Bancorp, 1.4 million shares of Bank of New York Mellon, and 0.5 million shares of Delta Air Line - for an estimated US$197 million, US$73 million and US$27 million, respectively.

While we knew about Berkshire's trimming of its Wells Fargo stake - selling 1.7 million shares for an estimated $97 million during the period - to keep its holdings below 10 per cent of the bank's total outstanding shares, we were surprised to see the insurer sell more than 80 per cent of its position in Verisk Analytics for an estimated $128 million, while also eliminating its remaining stake in Graham Holdings for an estimated $62 million.

As for the remaining sales, Berkshire sold 0.3 million shares of Charter Communications, 1.9 million shares of Liberty Global PLC, 0.5 million shares of United Continental, and 0.2 million shares of Sanofi-Aventis, for an estimated US$86 million, US$66 million, US$35 million and US$7 million, respectively.

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Greggory Warren is a US-based senior stock analyst with Morningstar.

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