warren buffett

Warren Buffett's Does A Little Shopping At Tiffany & Co.

Filed under: Jewelry

Famed billionaire Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. picked up a pricey bauble this Valentine's week, $250 million of Tiffany & Co. debt. Tiffany & Co. is still the world's second-largest retailer of luxury jewelry but like many retailers, especially those in the jewelry business, it took a deep hit over the past holiday season. With its stock share price falling and lower sales numbers, the Buffett boost provides much-needed insulation in an unsure world.

Buffett has been buying up debt everywhere lately on companies as varied as Harley-Davidson and Sealed Air Corp., the makers of Bubble Wrap. Bonds on this debt pay between 10 and 15 percent. The Tiffany bonds are at 10 percent and half of the bonds will mature in 2017, the rest two years later. Tiffany will use the money to repay debt and regroup in a time that has seen other jewelry retailers including Whitehall and, just last week, Fortunoff, fall into bankruptcy. In the last year or so much of Tiffany's strategy has involved opening smaller stores and creating more entry-level sterling silver pieces. Last March before the economic crisis really got into full spin, I questioned whether these stores and this merchandise represented a dilution of the TIffany brand. Given the prevailing winds of change, Tiffany could decide to reverse course, open fewer stores this year and strengthen its luxury reputation or it could continue on the current track and hope that consumers with less money to spend will still want a little piece of Tiffany.

Tags: berkshire hathaway, BerkshireHathaway, tiffany, warren buffett, WarrenBuffett

The Classicist: Magnates, Mansions & Millionaires

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Estates, Books, The Classicist, Wealth

The excesses of today's tycoons have come under lots of scrutiny lately due to the dire financial situation. Titans of business have always been at the forefront of American mythology however, in both good times and bad, and it's worth putting today's crop of nabobs in their proper historical context. That's what William G. Scheller has done admirably in his new book, Great Estates: The Lifestyles & Homes of American Magnates (Universe, $35). The oversized, lavishly illustrated volume celebrates the history of 40 of America's true barons of business, from the 1700s through this year's Forbes list, and opens the door into their private palaces along the way.

Beginning with the colonial era, when trade was overtaking landholding as a way to get rich, Great Estates follows the "restless careers of our most brilliant and driven merchants, industrialists, and financiers as they mastered a new economic world of textiles, railroads, oil, and steel." With the twentieth century came fresh opportunities: "automobiles, motion pictures, broadcasting, publishing, and retailing on a massive scale, and the vast horizon of high technology." And of course the massive mansions that men of great fortune erected as monuments to their success along the way.

These include Henry Clay Frick's Manhattan mansion, now a magnificent museum; William Randolph Hearst's San Simeon in California, aka Hearst Castle; and one of our personal favorites, railroad magnate Jay Gould's gothic castle on the Hudson River, Lyndhurst (pictured above on the book's cover). Shortly after he purchased the estate as a summer home in 1880, Gould was at the zenith of his power, having gained control of Western Union Telegraph, the New York Elevated Railway and the Union Pacific Railroad with rapacious methods that once caused him to be beaten by a Wall Street mob.

Gallery: Magnates' Great Estates

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum (former Carnegie Mansion)

Tags: Astor, Bill Gates, BillGates, Frick Collection, FrickCollection, Hearst Castle, HearstCastle, Henry Clay Frick, HenryClayFrick, Jay Gould, JayGould, Lyndhurst, Mansion, Rockefeller, San Simeon, SanSimeon, Tycoon, Vanderbilt, Warren Buffett, WarrenBuffett, William Randolph Hearst, WilliamRandolphHearst

Continue reading “The Classicist: Magnates, Mansions & Millionaires”

Who's Up, Down & Out on New Forbes 400 Richest List

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wealth

Forbes just released its annual Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans, and billionaire Microsoft founder Bill Gates (above) is back on top after briefly ceding first place to Warren Buffett this spring. Gates has a net worth of $57 billion as opposed to Buffett's $50 billion - $12 billion less than he had several months ago before Berkshire Hathaway's stock plummeted 15%. Buffett isn't the only one to suffer a major reversal. The year's biggest loser was Sands casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, No. 15, whose fortune fell $13 billion in the past 12 months - about $1.5 million per hour, Forbes notes - to $15 billion.

Adelson's fellow casino kingpin Kirk Kerkorian, No. 27, was another underachiever, losing $6.8 billion this year. Still, they were both better off than the 33 moguls who fell off the list altogether due to declining fortunes. On the plus side, 31 new plutocrats moved up to take their places, including Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, 24, who makes his debut on the list with an estimated net worth of $1.5 billion.

Other Forbes 400 first-timers include fertilizer tycoon Alexander Rovt, car dealer and art collector Norman Braman, and Patrón tequila founder John Paul DeJoria. Meanwhile, New York City's billionaire mayor Michael Bloomberg was the year's biggest gainer, as his net worth jumped $8 billion to a total of $20 billion, snagging him the No. 8 position. Also worth noting among this year's stats:

The average net worth of Forbes 400 members is $3.9 billion.
There are 42 women on the list with an average net worth of $4.2 billion.
For the 2nd year in a row, the minimum net worth needed to make the list is $1.3 billion.
The assembled net worth of the richest Americans rose by only 2%, or $30 billion, to $1.57 trillion this year.

See the complete list here.

Tags: Bill Gates, BillGates, Billionaires, Forbes, Forbes 400, Forbes400, mark zuckerberg, MarkZuckerberg, Michael Bloomberg, MichaelBloomberg, Patron tequila, PatronTequila, sheldon adelson, SheldonAdelson, warren buffett, WarrenBuffett

Buffett's Annual Lunch Sets Record

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Charity

Here's a unique mark of inflation, Warren Buffett's annual auctioned lunch brought in more than three times the amount that it did last year. Last year, the lucky luncher bid $650,100 but this year, Chinese businessman Zhao Danyang offered $2.1 million to lunch with the famous investor at the Smith and Wollensky steakhouse in New York. Back in 2005, the winning bidder paid just $351,100 for the privlege.

The proceeds go to a non-profit foundation which fights poverty and homelessness.. So far Buffett has raised over $4 million but selling himself each year but his biggest charitable move has been his declaration that he will give the bulk of his fortune to the charitable foundation set up by Bill and Melinda Gates.

[Thanks, Ben]!

Source

Tags: buffett lunch, BuffettLunch, warren buffett, WarrenBuffett

Buffett Lunch Auction Ends

by Nicole Weston (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions

The winning bid for lunch with Warren Buffett this year was $620,100. The bidding was all done by five individuals and the winner, whose eBay name is "fastisslow," will be able to take 7 friends to lunch with Buffett. All the proceeds of the auction, which was the second highest charitable auction ever on eBay, will all go to the Glide Foundation, a non-profit San Francisco group that provides services and food to the homeless.

The most expensive charity auction on eBay was for a celebrity-autographed Harley that sold for over $800,000, and the next most expensive was a lunch with Tiger Woods, which sold in 2001 for $425,000.

Source

Tags: auction, buffett, charity, ebay, glide, warren Buffett, WarrenBuffett

Buffett's Financial Plans

by Nicole Weston (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Events

Warren Buffett recently announced that he plans to give away the majority of his fortune upon his death. Many expected the bulk of his holdings to be given to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, which was founded by Buffett's late wife, but it now appears that the largest contribution of $30.1 billion will go to the Gates Foundation. A contribution of that size would double the size of the foundation, already the world's largest. His wife's foundation will receive approximately $3 billion, while the three foundations run by each of his children will get over $1 billion each.

The billionaire is in excellent health now and has a net worth of approximately $42 billion dollars

Source

Tags: charity, foundation, gates, gates foundation, warren buffett, WarrenBuffett

Want to Lunch with Warren Buffett?

by Nicole Weston (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions

Every year, Warren Buffett offers up the opportunity to have lunch with him in an auction that benefits the Glide Foundation. The tradition of auctioning a lunch began in 2004, when Buffett first became involved with the San Francisco nonprofit, which offers programs to help the poor, hungry and homeless. In early years, lunches often sold for $25-30,000, but when they switched the auctions onto eBay in 2003, making them much more visible, the numbers shot up dramatically. Last year's lunch with Warren sold for $351,100.