How to Read Berkshire Hathaway's 13F Filings

Read the filing before the headline

Berkshire Hathaway's Form 13F is a quarterly snapshot of certain reportable U.S.-listed equity holdings. It is not a live portfolio, a complete balance sheet, or a record of every investment decision made by Warren Buffett or Berkshire's other investment managers.

This article was refreshed on July 11, 2026. Any statement about a specific holding must be tied to the relevant quarter and the filing or amendment published in the SEC's EDGAR system. Meridian does not label an undated position as “latest.”

What Form 13F establishes

The filing identifies reportable securities held at quarter end, with reported share counts and market values. It can support comparisons between two quarter-end snapshots after identifiers, share classes, corporate actions, and amendments are normalized.

The filing generally does not establish:

• the purchase or sale date within the quarter;
• cost basis or realized return;
• the manager responsible for a position;
• the complete portfolio, including many non-reportable or private assets;
• associated short, derivative, or other hedging exposure; or
• whether the position still exists when the filing becomes public.

A reproducible comparison workflow

1. Open Berkshire Hathaway's primary filing and information table in SEC EDGAR.
2. Record the quarter-end date, filing date, accession number, and whether an amendment exists.
3. Match securities by CUSIP and share class rather than ticker alone.
4. Adjust the comparison for stock splits, mergers, spin-offs, and other corporate actions.
5. Separate new, closed, increased, decreased, and unchanged line items without assigning motive.
6. Compare the filing with Berkshire's annual report, shareholder letter, and public remarks before describing management's stated rationale.

What a change can and cannot mean

A new line item proves that the security appeared in the reported quarter-end table. It does not prove an “entry point,” extraordinary conviction, or a recommendation for another investor. An increase can reflect a purchase, a corporate action, or reporting changes; a decrease can reflect a sale, rebalancing, tax considerations, or other portfolio needs. Motive requires a direct source.

Concentration should also be measured against the correct denominator. A security's share of the 13F table is not necessarily its share of Berkshire's total assets, which include operating businesses, cash, fixed-income instruments, and other holdings.

Using Meridian responsibly

Meridian can help compare successive filings and surface normalized changes with source dates. Cross-references to insider, market, or other disclosure records remain separate observations. Their overlap does not prove that the same thesis is active, and Meridian does not convert a 13F change into an entry, exit, allocation, or stop rule.

For the current position, use the newest SEC filing and any amendment rather than a dated article or cached summary. This page is educational and does not provide personalized financial advice.