Billionaire Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc has bought nearly 14 million shares of Carmax Inc, the US' largest specialty used-car retailer, according to a regulatory filing on Wednesday.
Berkshire bought the shares -- its first stake in the Richmond, Virginia-based firm -- sometime in July, August or September, according to Berkshire's quarterly summary of its US$65.8 billion portfolio of US stocks.
Carmax operates 86 used car stores in 39 US markets and is preparing to open a new store in Omaha next month about 19km west of Buffett's office. Carmax says it sold 337,021 used vehicles and 208,959 wholesale vehicles at auction last year.
Berkshire's filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission doesn't say how much the company paid for the shares, which represent about a 6.4 percent stake in Carmax, but they were worth more than US$284 million at the end of the quarter on Sept. 30.
Berkshire again cut its holdings in two railroad companies, Norfolk Southern Corp and Union Pacific Corp, after months of buying.
Berkshire said it held 4.5 million shares of Union Pacific as of Sept. 30, down from the 7.4 million shares of the Omaha-based railroad that Berkshire held June 30. It's less than half of the 10.5 million shares of the railroad Berkshire held March 31, according to an earlier filing.
Berkshire also said it held 1.9 million shares of Norfolk Southern as of Sept. 30, less than the 3.8 million it owned as of June 30. Earlier this year, Berkshire held nearly 6.4 million shares of Norfolk Southern.
But Buffett's interest in its biggest railroad investment doesn't seem to be waning. An Oct. 5 filing showed he held 60.8 million shares of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. Buffett's company controls 17.2 percent of the nation's second-largest railroad.
Berkshire also now holds 2.7 million shares of Wabco Holdings Inc, a vehicle control systems business spun off of American Standard Cos. Berkshire would have received Wabco shares as part of the spinoff because it owned American Standard shares -- 10.96 million at the end of September.
Meanwhile, Berkshire bought about 3.6 million more shares of Dow Jones & Co, publisher of the Wall Street Journal. Berkshire owned 6.3 million shares of Dow Jones, worth US$378.8 million, at the end of the quarter, after a purchase of nearly 2.8 million shares earlier this year before Rupert Murdoch sealed his deal to buy the company.
Berkshire continued adding to banking holdings during the quarter, buying 28.4 million shares of US Bancorp, the parent company of US Bank. It also bought more than 22 million shares of Wells Fargo & Co, bringing its total to 280 million shares. However, it bought fewer shares of Bank of America Corp.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
RESTAURANT POISONING? Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang at a press conference last night said this was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan An autopsy discovered bongkrekic acid in a specimen collected from a person who died from food poisoning after dining at the Malaysian restaurant chain Polam Kopitiam, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said at a news conference last night. It was the first time bongkrekic acid was detected in Taiwan, Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝) said. The testing conducted by forensic specialists at National Taiwan University was facilitated after a hospital voluntarily offered standard samples it had in stock that are required to test for bongkrekic acid, he said. Wang told the news conference that testing would continue despite
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)