Name: Berkshire sells entire stakes in U.S. airlines: Buffett
Brand: reuters.com
SKU: reuters-com-1168
Availability: OnlineOnly

critic

Berkshire sells entire stakes in U.S. airlines: Buffett

preview

By , The conglomerate was one of the largest individual holders in the four airlines and in 2016 disclosed it had begun investing in the four carriers after avoiding the sector for years.Airline stocks have been hard hit by the near collapse U.S. travel demand amid the coronavirus pandemic.U.S. airlines are cutting hundreds of thousands of flights, parking thousands of planes as U.S. travel demand has fallen by about 95% and there is no clear timetable for passengers to return to flights at pre-crisis levels.Buffett said the airline industry’s outlook rapidly changed.“We made that decision in terms of the airline business. We took money out of the business basically even at a substantial loss,” Buffett said. “We will not fund a company that -- where we think that it is going to chew up money in the future.”Berkshire disclosed on April 3 it had sold about 18% of its Delta stake and 4% of its Southwest shares.“We did not take out anything like $7 or $8 billion and that was my mistake,” Buffett said at the company’s annual meeting which was livestreamed. “I am the one who made the decision.”Southwest, American and United declined comment.Delta said in a statement it was aware of the sale and has “tremendous respect for Mr. Buffett and the Berkshire team.” The airline added it remains “confident that the strengths that are core to Delta’s business – our people, our brand, our network and our operational reliability – will endure and position Delta to succeed.”Buffett said he previously considered investing in additional airlines.“It is a blow to have essentially your demand dry up.... It is basically that we shut off air travel in this country,” Buffett added.Buffett previously expressed grim sentiments about the financial outlook for airlines. He did invest in USAir in 1989.“If a farsighted capitalist had been present at Kitty Hawk, he would have done his successors a huge favor by shooting Orville down,” Buffett wrote in his 2007 annual letter. “Investors have poured money into a bottomless pit, attracted by growth when they should have been repelled by it.”Reporting by David Shepardson and Jonathan Stempel; Editing by Cynthia OstermanOur Standards:

By , The conglomerate was one of the largest individual holders in the four airlines and in 2016 disclosed it had begun investing in the four carriers after avoiding the sector for years.Airline stocks have been hard hit by the near collapse U.S. travel demand amid the coronavirus pandemic.U.S. airlines are cutting hundreds of thousands of flights, parking thousands of planes as U.S. travel demand has fallen by about 95% and there is no clear timetable for passengers to return to flights at pre-crisis levels.Buffett said the airline industry’s outlook rapidly changed.“We made that decision...

public

@Reuters reporter in DC covering transportation, aviation, autos + (anything that moves) @fcc tech Pvs @DetroitNews Michigan native. Father of three, husband

David Shepardson

Jonathan Stempel

Top and breaking news, pictures and videos from Reuters. For more breaking business news, follow @ReutersBiz.

reuters.com

Credible

Speculation

Anecdotal Evidence

Generalization

Stacking the Deck

Appeal to Authority

Straw Man

Slippery Slope

Emotional Appeal

Red Herring

False Dilemma

Illogical

Moral Equivalency

Ad Hominem

Correlation w/o Causation

Semantics

Begging the Question

Faulty Analogy

Non Sequitur

Bandwagon

Dogmatism

Failing Occam's Razor

Biased

Pure Opinion

Hit Piece

Racial Bias

National Bias

Religious Bias

Financial Incentive

Political Agenda

Gender Bias

Misused Image/Video

Study Misinterpreted

Mistake

Misused Term

Science Misrepresented

Factual Error

Satire

Surface Level

Lack of Reliable Sources

Sensational

Not Credible

Investigative

Balanced

Well Sourced

Great Context

sports

entertainment

U.S.

international

business

technology

science

culture

politics

media

health

Berkshire sells entire stakes in U.S. airlines: Buffett

No article scores yet.

CRITIC REVIEWS

PUBLIC REVIEWS