I am glad that we took the opportunity a couple years ago to attend the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting in Omaha while both Charlie Munger and Warren Buffet were running the show. I have referred to the late Charlie Munger as my fantasy mentor as I love his take on many things, particularly crypto. Not a day goes by when there is not another headline of some huge theft of crypto currency and/or a crypto promoter being convicted of fraud right along with the headlines looking for the next suckers to invest to keep the schemes going.

The crypto-industry has bought its way into the administration’s favor by filling the coffers with campaign contributions. Crypto is the generational scheme contrived by a seemingly immortal/immoral den of thieves proving that history does rhyme. It is a tulip bulb mania times Teapot Dome.

Warren Buffet, while showing his age, still managed a very competent performance at this year’s annual meeting, handling questions from Hathaway investors with clarity. He ended the meeting with the announcement that Greg Able will become CEO of Berkshire at the end of this year. I was not surprised, as Warren and Munger have been focused on the transition for some time. Who would succeed Warren had been decided with only to be determined, and the meeting settled that. I have confidence that Able is able, and if Warren has confidence in him, so do I. Warren will stick around as chairman. While the BRK stock sold off on the transition, I believe that will be just another buying opportunity, as has any other dip in BRK stock prices for decades.

Warren left BRK with a strong operating portfolio, owning more T-bills than the Federal Reserve. Warren had cashed out of some long-term extremely profitable investments over the term of recent market strength to build a cash kitty of $333 billion.

If this goes as I expect that it will, given time and patience, new opportunities will come to BRK asking for investment. From time to time, even good companies are pressured by events and conditions where they need a white knight to add equity. This can often be done with favorable valuations and terms that others cannot get. A BRK investment can steady the ship of companies that are flailing in high seas so that they can focus on what they do rather than on survival. A BRK investment is often the equivalent of a business seal of approval when it invests in a company. Success then can become self-achieving. Their current vault full of cash will enable them to transact some extraordinary financial opportunities. They know patience is on their side.

Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger took anyone along with them for the ride that would buy their BRK stock. If they got a sweet deal buying a company, BRK shareholders did too. It is so different than say, with Elon Musk, who could give a rip about his partners and investors with no fiduciary conscience whatsoever. The Tesla board reportedly started a CEO search to replace Musk, likely as a wake-up call that they had run out of patience with his absence without leave from directing the company that was having a dire consequence on Tesla shareholder equity.

Warren Buffett has maintained a low political profile, never mentioning the name of our current president while expressing concerns that caused him to pull back from the market and build a cash reserve. Labeling “Tariffs are an act of war” is about as far as he would go while talking up the success of the USA as unprecedented in the history of the world. He says that the U.S. is a winner and it is not in our interest as the global winner to stick it in the face of other less successful countries or by using our power to their disadvantage, harming them. We will not make friends and good neighbors that way … yet it seems to be the path taken by “America First.” Buffett says that being born in this country and being male was a lot of the secret to his success. That was his recognition that for at least the first half of his life, women did not have the same opportunities that men had. My wife tells me when growing up she was told that she could either be a secretary, nurse or teacher. Her sister became a nurse and she became a teacher. Age, being 94, was his third advantage, allowing long-term protracted compounding of his investment profits. Part of the reason that Buffett has kept such a low political profile is to avoid the retribution that is sure to accompany outspoken criticism of this administration’s policies. No one has boycotted Berkshire-owned companies as they have Musk’s. He is protecting his shareholders’ value, by keeping his head down disappointing the media asking him opinions, something that Musk shareholders have not enjoyed. Often you can tell what Warren thinks of things by what he does not say.

“We do want trade” were probably the most important four words that we needed to hear from Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in statements following trade talks with China. The feeling was reciprocated by China. Bessent conceded that the 145%/125% tariffs exchanged were the equivalent of a trade embargo. Now with 30%/10% tariffs, trade will resume after the interruption. President Trump still gets his 30% tariff while they talk terms. Will there be more issues? Sure, but both sides stepped back from the brink. As Warren Buffet said, tariffs are an “act of war.” I suppose what China did not do is recommit again to Phase 1. They, after all, have not complied with any trade agreement with them yet. This should give supply chains some time to diversify to reduce their risk to any one set of trade flows. The meeting did not remove all uncertainty which was plaguing business, but it did remove the prospect of both sides careening over a cliff they could not come back from.

This pause in the trade war reduces the pressure on the Fed to lower interest rates. As long as the market sees stronger economic activity, higher rates will be tolerated. They are going to give us the good news, softening the trade war and outlook first, and then we can sort out the truth after that.