Buffett, who oversees the company’s share repurchase program, stopped buying back Berkshire shares in May 2024. He repurchases stock when he “believes that the repurchase price is below Berkshire’s intrinsic value”, according to company filings.

Little did they know that days after they had pushed Berkshire’s class A shares to a record, Buffett would announce he planned to step down as chief executive. Since then, the conglomerate’s high-vote A shares have fallen 14 per cent,