At one point, Warren Buffett said, “In business, I look for economic castles protected by unbreachable moats.” He uses the castle as his metaphor for representing the company. The moat itself is representative of a strong competitive advantage. It makes sense that a wider moat will provide much more protection over the long term. The billionaire investor has presented the world a tremendous amount of wisdom through the years, but this specific piece of insight is more poignant now than at any time in history.

When it comes to profits, corporate America is a battlefield. It has an endless supply of warriors that are all working toward breaching your moat in an effort to gain their own profits. In 2007, during one of Warren Buffett’s letters to shareholders, he explains, “A truly great business must have an enduring mode that protects excellent returns on invested capital. The dynamics of capitalism guarantee that competitors will repeatedly assault any business castle that is earning high returns.”

A company with a recognized name and a worldwide brand possesses a wide moat. Taking a look at variables such as branded earnings, brand contribution and financial value, the top 100 valuable brands across the globe grew their net worth by 7% to $2.6 trillion in the past year. All of these companies did this with 11 of the 13 categories posting year-over-year growth according to BrandZ.

Most notably, the most valuable brands had a stock performance that outperformed the broader market by a wide margin. It shouldn’t come as any surprise that Berkshire Hathaway owns a number of the names on this top 100 list.

If you have taken Buffett’s advice about powerful brands and economic moats over the years, then you should have experienced some very profitable outcomes.

Let’s face it…

Out of the 10 largest equity holdings owned by Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway, eight of them are in top 100 valuable brands and on the list.

Buffett believes in America and he is not shy about his bullish stance. While recently being interviewed on CNBC, Buffett said, “In terms of the economy, the luckiest person born in the history of the world is the baby being born in the United States.” Thinking about that for a moment, it’s quite fitting to realize that more than half of the top 100 brands are companies based in North America. They also account for roughly 2/3 of the $2.6 trillion brought in by the top 100 brands.

Warren Buffett, billionaire investor, will spend his day meeting with a select group of children that will pitch him on their business ideas. Don’t expect any of these ideas to generate new acquisitions for Berkshire Hathaway or Warren Buffett.

The kids pitching the ideas are between the ages of seven and 16 years old. They are finalists in a contest that is tied to “The Secret Millionaire’s Club,” which is a cartoon that Warren Buffett narrated and it teaches children about finances. You can watch the cartoon on the Hub cable network, or view it online at www.smckids.com

The group consists of three teams and five kids that were flown in to Omaha in order to present their ideas to Warren Buffett and the other judges. The finalists all come from New Jersey, Washington, Kentucky, Ohio, Maryland, Texas and Maine respectively.

The winner of the contest – both team and individual – will receive a total of $5000. The runner ups get $500.

By Kids for Kids oversees the competition and the Fairholme Foundation is sponsoring it.

Legendary philanthropist and investor, Warren Buffett, intends to host his only charity power lunch to benefit one of the biggest and most respected charities in the US, San Francisco’s GLIDE. They are currently celebrating their 50 year anniversary, where they help the neediest residents in the city. This eBay auction for a power lunch with Warren Buffett is now in its 14^th year. The opening bid begins on June 2 at 7:30 PM PDT and closes and June 7 at 7:30 PM PDT. The winning bid last year – $3,456,789 – set a world record as the highest selling auction on eBay.

This year’s bidding will start at $25,000. Each bidder has to be prequalified before they can actually place their first bid. If you’d like to prequalify to bid for the power lunch, please visit GlideLunchWithWarrenBuffett.com. The individual that wins the bid is allowed to invite up to seven friends to have lunch with Warren Buffett at Smith & Wollensky, “the quintessential New York steakhouse.”

If you’d like more information about the auction, please visit the website GlideLunchWithWarrenBuffett.com, or you can call 415-674-6001. If you would rather contact them by email, you can do so at Buffett@glide.org.

“As we mark 50 years in San Francisco, GLIDE is incredibly grateful to the long-term support we’ve received from Warren Buffett,” said GLIDE’s Founder and Minister of Liberation Reverend Cecil Williams. “Thanks to his vision, our ongoing partnership with eBay for 11 years, and the generosity of the winning bidders, we’ve been able to provide unconditional support to our neediest neighbors and help people regain control of their lives.”

“There’s all kinds of people that need that kind of help, and I don’t think anybody is better at providing it than GLIDE,” said Warren Buffett.

Yes, the rumors are true. Warren Buffett is much more than the CEO and chairman of Berkshire Hathaway these days. He’s also now one of their head salesman.

Recently, Warren Buffett visited a Dairy Queen this past Monday evening. He did so in order to serve up the restaurant chain’s newest flavor, the S’mores Blizzard. Then he decided to even eat some ice cream for the cameras.

As you know, Berkshire Hathaway owns Dairy Queen. That’s why Mr. Buffett is always happy to talk about their tasty treats.

John Gainer, Dairy Queen CEO, gave Warren Buffett a jersey. The label read that he was the restaurant’s number one fan. Buffett also went to the store wearing his favorite Dairy Queen tie.

Berkshire Hathaway, led by investing billionaire Warren Buffett, recently had its credit rating dropped from AA+ to AA. Their rating was cut by Standard & Poor’s rating services.

S&P made a statement that tells us that even though Berkshire Hathaway maintains an “excellent business profile,” the lesser credit rating “better reflects our view of BRK’s dependence on its core insurance operations for most of its dividend income.” (Standard & Poor’s statement has been posted on their website, but you cannot view it unless you are registered.)

Standard & Poor’s also makes mention that “management succession” is a factor in the way that they are thinking. The Financial Times had this to say:

“Mr. Buffett has said he and Berkshire’s board have decided who will follow him as chief executive, but they have chosen not to make it public. The company intends to split the chairman and chief executive role that Mr. Buffett plays, with his son serving as non-executive chairman.”

Warren Buffett is 82 years old.

The Financial Times also makes mention that “Mr. Buffett has a history of clashing with S&P. He criticized the agency in August 2011, when the credit rating agency downgraded the US’s sovereign debt rating, saying it ‘doesn’t make sense.’ A few days afterwards, S&P reduced its outlook on Berkshire Hathaway from ‘stable’ to ‘negative.’”

If you’re wondering what all of this will mean for Berkshire Hathaway, the MoneyBeat blog of The Wall Street Journal tells us the downgrade “will have little effect” on the borrowing cost of the company. They also report that the downgrade news has not prompted any of the firms dealing with Berkshire Hathaway to demand a need for more collateral, reports MoneyBeat.

On Wednesday, Berkshire Hathaway revealed that it has taken up new investments in Starz and Chicago Bridge & Iron Co. They also decided to sell off some of their shares of Mondelez International Inc., a snack food maker.

There were a number of other adjustments made to the $85 billion US stock portfolio of Berkshire Hathaway during the first quarter of 2013. These changes were recently disclosed in documents that were filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, or the SEC for short.

At the end of the first quarter, the company owned 6.5 million shares of construction and engineering firm Chicago Bridge & Iron, which has a main focus on energy products, and they also owned shares in the Starz movie network totaling 5.6 million

Chicago Bridge & Iron recently completed their purchase of The Shaw Group back in February of this year. They are the primary contractor at Plant Vogtle’s nuclear expansion. This deal is valued at $3.1 billion. The Shaw Group continues to remain the primary contractor of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility at Savannah River Site.

It’s quite common for investors to closely watch the things that Berkshire Hathaway does when trading so they can copy what Warren Buffett does. But, many of the most recent investments are smaller than $500 million. So these investments are most likely coming from Ted Weschler and Todd Combs, Berkshire Hathaway’s investment managers.

We are unable to learn which investments were made by whom through the quarterly stock filing. We do know that Ted Weschler and Todd Combs each have $5 billion portfolios that they manage for Berkshire Hathaway. Although Warren Buffett continues to make the majority of the investment decisions for the conglomerate based out of Omaha, Nebraska.

The officials at Berkshire Hathaway do not often comment when making their required disclosures, and when left a message on Wednesday afternoon, no one responded immediately.

At the end of 2012, Berkshire owned 12.8 million shares of Mondelez International. It has now cut its stake to 7 million shares. The company also trimmed their shares of Kraft Foods to 1.6 million. It was previously 1.67 million shares.

Berkshire also added on to some of the other investments in their energy portfolio. They bought more shares of National Oilwell Varco Inc. which brings it to 7.5 million shares. They didn’t add to their shares of ConocoPhillips or Phillips 66.

It’s no surprise that Buffett also added onto his favorite bank stock, Wells Fargo & Co. The company now owns 458.2 million shares. This is up from 439.9 million shares.

Berkshire also added onto its investment in Walmart, and brought it up to 49.2 million shares at the end of March. They previously held 47.5 million.

Buffett also increased his company’s investment in Internet registry service VeriSign Inc. They previously held 3.7 million shares, and now own 8.2 million.

The company completely eliminated two of their smaller investments in General Dynamics Corp. and Archer Daniels Midland Co. Both were part of the Berkshire Hathaway portfolio at the end of 2012. Plus, Berkshire reduced its stake in Bank of New York Mellon from 19.6 million shares to 18.9 million shares.

Terry Branstad, Iowa Gov., stepped out on a ledge last year by bucking his party in order to lobby with Democrats. Why? To extend a key federal tax credit for wind power. After a major battle in Congress, the credit was eventually extended and Branstad’s gamble looks to have paid off big time. Warren Buffett announced that MidAmerican Energy, a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary, is going to put $1.9 billion into new wind farms in Iowa.

Who loses out on this deal?

Other Fuels Are More Expensive Than Iowa Wind Power

When Buffett and company announced their latest investment, it provided full credit to extending the production tax credit and expanding wind generating capacity in Iowa.

In total, this new investment is going to put another 656 turbines into MidAmerican Energy’s wind portfolio. Since 2004, the company has already brought 1276 turbines into Iowa. Buffett is also bringing wind power into many other states as well.

Once they have the new turbines fully operational, MidAmerican believes that they will produce 39% of its retail generations strictly from wind power.

To make a comparison, by the year 2011, the energy mix of the company was predominantly coal at 47%, and wind was only about 26%. 20% more of their production was from natural gas and oil, with hydro, nuclear and “other” making up the last 7%.

MidAmerican believes that the rates are going to go down by $10 million each year when all the new turbines are in place by the year 2017. They believe an initial savings of $3.3 million is going to kick in much earlier. It makes sense that Iowa ratepayers are not going to be upset over the latest investment in Iowa wind power.

Green Jobs for Iowans

Over the next 30 years, MidAmerican Energy believes that the new wind projects will create 48 more permanent jobs, 460 part-time construction jobs and another $360 million worth of new property tax revenue.

To try and figure out what this new construction may mean for local economic development, let’s take a look at the Atchison County, Missouri wind farm. Ibderola Renewables, creators of this project, leased the property of 44 different landowners and gave them added revenue. The payments were around $365,000 each year. This project tax revenue ripple effect created about $1 million in taxes annually.

Atchison County believes that local fiscal stability is due to the wind tax base, as noted by the county official in 2010:

“Every county in the state of Missouri almost has experienced a decline in their sales tax revenue and Atchison County has not. We attribute that directly to the construction of the wind farms.”

Now moving back into Iowa, residents are not only going pick up a few dozen jobs, but wind production will provide a much broader ripple effect since the wide distribution of land leasing will also come in to play. This will provide the local governments with a much more sound fiscal footing, giving them the ability to tend to bridges, roads, schools and other civic duties.

The Wind Gamble Pays off for Branstad

Gov. Branstad ends up looking like a genius too, when all is said and done. Branstad did more than just sign his name to a letter when he lobbied for the extension of the production tax credit for wind power. Right after the November election, when the issue really began to heat up, he came out strong at a joint press conference along with Sam Brownback, fellow Republican governor of Kansas, as well as two other Democratic governors, John Hickenlooper of Colorado and John Kitzhaber of Oregon.

Here’s what Branstad had to say:

“My state has directly seen the negative impact related to the PTC not being extended earlier. For example, Siemens recently laid off 400 employees at its plant in Fort Madison, Iowa, and ClipperWind Power laid off 100 workers at its plant in Cedar Rapids, Iowa”

Now if we go forward to last week, after MidAmerican Energy announced the new wind farm investments, Branstad who is quite often referred to as “a champion for wind energy in Iowa,” had to say this about the state’s new prospects:

“MidAmerican Energy’s proposed project will be the largest economic development investment in the history of the state, bringing needed jobs to Iowa, as well as significant economic benefits.”

This is going to look really great on campaign literature during the next election cycle, especially since the governor only has a less than perfect 45% approval rating according to the poll in February 2013.

As a matter of fact, it appears that the only potential loser is the candidate that will be offered up by the Democrats to run against him as governor of Iowa next year. Even though the Iowa voters have mixed reviews; the poll also showed that Branstad has a wide margin lead over all of his potential opponents.